Hopper 3 w/OTA

[bobdob123usa]

I see many posts about not being able to use a Hopper 3 with OTA over a single cable. This didn't make a ton of electrical sense, so I decided to try it out. My current setup has the antenna plugged into a Dish hub solo in place of a Joey. The MoCA network is also shared with a Joey and a Hopper 3. For safety, I did use a POE filter on the antenna since I don't want to broadcast MoCA. I used a Dish Hybrid tap (203962) at the Hopper 3 to split off the antenna into the OTA adapter without blocking the MoCA signal from the Hopper 3. Finally, at the Joey, I used a balanced 3-way MoCA tap (5-1675MHz) to feed MoCA to the Joey and OTA to two TVs in the area. Everything runs as expected and is perfectly stable. The Hybrid Tap is supposed to drop around -10dB and the balanced splitter is -5.5dB, so the antenna signal needs to be relatively strong/amplified for this to work. But there is no conflict of the frequencies; all can co-exist. Anyway, just wanted to post what was has been tested in case it can help some people out.

-Bob

 

[ethanlerma]

Hey there, nice to see somebody else doing this in their Hopper system. I have been doing something similar on mine for about two years now, and would like to share some things that might help you and others reading this.

So, why is this possible now? The short answer is that due to this auction ran by the FCC, a lot of channels previously in the 600-700Mhz range have vacated the airwaves for LTE/5G services and are now operating at 608Mhz or below across the country. This is important because Dish uses a proprietary version of MoCA that runs from 675Mhz to 850Mhz (Traditional MoCA would not work here, as it interferes with satellite signal at 950-3000Mhz). When the original Hopper launched, these frequencies were being used by UHF channels 44 through 51, which prompted Dish to discontinue and disallow OTA multiplexing on the same coax run for home installations to prevent interference. Since those channels are no longer there, no more interference.

Now for the part I would suggest fixing in your setup:

For safety, I did use a POE filter on the antenna since I don't want to broadcast MoCA.

It sounds like you used a traditional POE MoCA filter, which is not appropriate here. As I mentioned earlier, Dish's MoCA is proprietary and on 675-850Mhz, so you are actually broadcasting your MoCA signal out at this moment because normal MoCA filters pass 5-1002Mhz. Additionally, things like the LTE/5G networks that are in place of the previous UHF channels can now enter your system as well, which may or may not be an issue depending on your proximity to a cell tower. I would recommend using a filter like this one instead, it will filter everything above 608Mhz which will filter both Dish's MoCA and cellular networks as well (It is not perfect as the gap between VHF and UHF channels can pass through, but interference there should be minimal).

 

[bobdob123usa]

It sounds like you used a traditional POE MoCA filter, which is not appropriate here. As I mentioned earlier, Dish's MoCA is proprietary and on 675-850Mhz, so you are actually broadcasting your MoCA signal out at this moment because normal MoCA filters pass 5-1002Mhz. Additionally, things like the LTE/5G networks that are in place of the previous UHF channels can now enter your system as well, which may or may not be an issue depending on your proximity to a cell tower. I would recommend using a filter like this one instead, it will filter everything above 608Mhz which will filter both Dish's MoCA and cellular networks as well (It is not perfect as the gap between VHF and UHF channels can pass through, but interference there should be minimal).

Thanks, I couldn't find anything definitive as to what frequencies Dish was using. I had the MoCA filter laying around, so I used it. Fortunately, I'm a pretty good distance from anyone so unlikely to be an issue, but I'll update the filter as suggested.