How to upgrade your Hopper to 7 Tuners for $30

ScottChez

SatelliteGuys Pro
Original poster
Oct 2, 2003
1,651
142
%Hopper can be upgraded to have Seven Tuners.

I think this should be made a sticky or FAQ as most do not know the Hopper can do this.
All of this information has been posted here before, but I do not think it was presented in a way so all those upgrading to the Hopper will understand this.

How to do this
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Step 1. Get Upgraded to the new S234 software for the hopper. Most should have it by Thursday.

This NEW version new will ALWAYS tune to all 4 big networks day or night once you tune to the first Big 4 network. ABC NBC CBS FOX
This frees up the other tuners in case someone on a Joey wants to watch on of the Big 4 networks.

Whenever you turn to a big 4 network it pulls in all 4 on one tuner (tuning to the whole transponder on the sat), it isn't recording.
The big benefit is that if someone at the Hopper wants to watch ABC and someone at the Joey wants to watch NBC, it only takes up one tuner.
Once you change channels to a non big 4 network, that tuner will go back to normal on the TV Viewing Status screen. It's pretty neat and a good way to save tuners when viewing a big 4.

Step 2. Order the $30 USB Over the Air Tuner for Locals- this adds an other tuner, but it can only watch locals.

You can record and watch all Locals, plus all the locals not on the SAT like CW and PBS in HD, plus all the sub channels not on the sat like METV, Antenna TV, LiveWell, MyTV, local Weather, and PBS Kids and Create.


Today's Real world Test
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This really works. I did this test 3 hours ago. This test was done in the day time today not during prime time.

TUNER 1 - Recording HBO
TUNER 2 - Recording TNT

TUNER 3 - Now auto tunes to all 4 networks day or night if your watching a network channel
Watching NBC Live

Virtual 4 Recording ABC
Virtual 5 Watching CBS Live on Joey
Virtual 6 Watching FOX Live on Joey

TUNER 7 OTA USB Tuner Recording CW in HD
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TOTAL=7 Recording or watching 7 things at once, in the daytime with nothing to do with my prime time feature.


Myself, I think this is big news. I hope others agree.
 
Yeah, amazing how much Hopper has evolved just over the past month! Not to mention the other neat features that have been added over the previous months...

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I like the new way that they do this, and I can see it being useful to many.

Curious, as I never tried before the software update, but could, while you were using PTAT to record the big 4, you tune to one on the hopper and a different one on the joey? Is this an expansion of the time of day that it lets you do it, or a totally new feature?
 
It is more for people who like to watch live tv and or surf the networks. It is cool and with the addition of manual timers the hopper is now complete in my eyes. I don't miss my 722k at all now. I am just wondering how the new hopper will look like? I can only hope that they will include more sat tuners and still keep the ota option alive. Most likely they will build in sling. I just hope it isn't as flaky as the 922 was with built in sling. I missed not being able to record shows on Metv on Saturday nights. Now I can watch everything I like on my hopper and not miss anything.
 
Yeah, amazing how much Hopper has evolved just over the past month! Not to mention the other neat features that have been added over the previous months...

Sent from my iPad 2 using SatelliteGuys


I have to agree, one of the things that has impressed me the most since switching to Dish last May, is how fast the Hopper has been updated. All DirecTV updates were doing was causing my Series 2 Tivos to reboot and lose channels.
 
Maybe some day they can expand on this technology, after all it just came out this month.
What if they did it for other packages? Like HBO, they put 4 HBOs on one transponder and if you tune to one of them it then is tuned to all 4 HBOs?
Same for Sports channels like ESPN.

Take it a step further, what if say you subscribe to HBO, every night at 3AM HBO plays there Top Hit Movies, and the Hopper records all 4 channel giving you HBO ANYTIME- top movies instantly on demand.
So much more they can do in the future with this option. I bet this is just the start. Next year should be interesting.
 
Advantages to both systems. Depends on usage patterns for sure.
Sent from my HTC 8x using Board Express
 
true, but then my 5 tuners can access any station 24/7
since i record very few network programs thats a big plus

...and with 2 Hoppers 6 tuners can access any station 24/7, and up to 10-11 stations at certain times. ...and with 3 Hoppers it's 9 stations 24/7 or 13-15 at certain times. So what was your point again?

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