Hopper Installation Questions

[btb79]

I'm ready to pull the trigger on the Hopper but I have a few questions. We currently only have two TVs so I would get one Hopper and one Joey at this time.

Here is my current setup:
I have a dual tuner DVR (not sure if it's 722 or not) in the basement family room and a single tuner DVR upstaris in the living room.
We watch 90% of our TV upstairs.
Main cable from Dish goes thru basement laundry room which is unfinished to the dual tuner DVR in the basement.
I think this cable is split somewhere in the laundry room to feed the tuner upstairs through the coax in the wall (installed when house was built)
Since we watch most of our TV upstairs, I think I would like the Hopper upstairs and the Joey downstairs.
Can the Sat. feed to the Hopper run through the existing coax in the wall? Will the signal strength be degraded? I know ideally you want the Sat. feed to run to the receiver without going through coax connectors, right? Will the technician install a new RG6 to the TV upstairs as part of the standard installation? This won't be easy because the family room below the TV upstairs is finished. Do I need to request that they run a new RG6 line when I upgrade? Will I also need a coax cable from the Hopper to the Joey?

Thanks in advance.

 

[sparc]

wiring diagrams: http://www.satelliteguys.us/hopper-zone/279755-hopper-joey-wiring-diagrams.html

The tech will evaluate your existing wiring and replace or run a new wire as needed. It might help with the installation if you look through the wiring diagrams. Just so you have a good idea how it might be run beforehand.

If your hopper line isn't RG6, then he'll definitely have to run a new line. Joeys can reuse even RG59 in most installs.

Also, the hopper can generally be placed in either location as this is a whole home DVR system. There are only a few things special on the hopper box itself like PIP, bluetooth audio, and some extra outputs like component. Other than that they are largely the same for viewing purposes.
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[Chuck14]

The tech will evaluate your existing wiring and replace or run a new wire as needed.

So my understanding from the Hopper docs posted a while back is that the coax line to the Hopper needs to be rated for 3000MHz (3.0GHz) because the node puts the third satellite feed to the Hopper up in the range between 2500-3000MHz.

I had my Hopper install on Monday. I told the tech before he started that the existing coax to the location where I wanted the Hopper was RG-6, but only marked as 2200MHz, so I thought that cable would need to be replaced. He said that wasn't really necessary. I asked him if he had some way of testing the existing cable to make sure it's OK, and he said basically they just hook the Hopper up and see if it works. If not, then the replace the cable.

So he hooked the Hopper up on my existing cable and it worked, so he left it as is. It seems to be working OK, but if I ever have problems with the third tuner cutting out, I'm going to insist they send somebody out to replace that cable with 3.0GHz cable for free...

 

[isaacmorseMI]

So my understanding from the Hopper docs posted a while back is that the coax line to the Hopper needs to be rated for 3000MHz (3.0GHz) because the node puts the third satellite feed to the Hopper up in the range between 2500-3000MHz.

I had my Hopper install on Monday. I told the tech before he started that the existing coax to the location where I wanted the Hopper was RG-6, but only marked as 2200MHz, so I thought that cable would need to be replaced. He said that wasn't really necessary. I asked him if he had some way of testing the existing cable to make sure it's OK, and he said basically they just hook the Hopper up and see if it works. If not, then the replace the cable.

So he hooked the Hopper up on my existing cable and it worked, so he left it as is. It seems to be working OK, but if I ever have problems with the third tuner cutting out, I'm going to insist they send somebody out to replace that cable with 3.0GHz cable for free...

Yeah it should be 3.0Ghz cable....

Sent from my iPad 2 using Forum Runner

 

[sparc]

So my understanding from the Hopper docs posted a while back is that the coax line to the Hopper needs to be rated for 3000MHz (3.0GHz) because the node puts the third satellite feed to the Hopper up in the range between 2500-3000MHz.

the coax needs to be able to pass 3Ghz signals, but that doesn't necessarily mean that old RG6 couldn't pass 3Ghz.

We've shown on this site in a previous thread that some 20+ year old RG6 can in fact pass 3Ghz signals just fine. However, that may not be the case with all RG6 ever made and could also depend on what the condition of the cable is. http://www.satelliteguys.us/hopper-zone/279176-rg6-cabling-requirements-hopper-vs-dpp.html

I would bet most rated 2.2Ghz RG6 will work just fine for hopper and is able to pass the required 3Ghz signals (i'm sure there will be exceptions though).

You also raise another question about what installers are supposed to do for customers. Do all hopper coax runs have to show 3Ghz rating on the jacket itself? I'm not sure what leeway Dish allows.

Since I had my install done in the first week, the techs didn't even want to take a chance since the existing satellite cable was unmarked. They basically redid every cable including the one's from the dish to the node even though it probably wasn't necessary. The only cable they reused is for the joeys on my install. I'm thinking a lot of techs are more relaxed about this now that they're getting more familiar with the hopper/joey equipment.

If you have any issues down the road, definitely complain. You could even message DIRT and ask.