MPEG2 Western Arc shutoff

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RTCDude

RTCDude

SatelliteGuys Pro
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Sep 20, 2005
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San Jose, CA
I got my “Final Notice” e-mail today saying the some or all of my receivers will will become “obsolete” soon. I believe this is due to the pending MPEG2 shutoff coming to the Western Arc. I have two questions:

1. I have two VIP722 receivers and one VIP625 receive. As I understand it, the 722 receivers (which are MPEG4 compatible) will continue to work and will not go “obsolete”. The 625 is only MPEG2 compatible and will stop working. Is this correct?

2. Does anyone know the timing for when the MPEG2 shutoff on the Western Arc will be completed?
 
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A CSR supervisor seemed to hint that the transition would start “soon” and could be completed by July, but was vague beyond that. Does anyone have any more detail than that?
 
Ya, the SD local channels on the 625 already disappeared back in February. I just trying to get a sense how long I may have to replace the 625 or update to a Hopper 3.

Maybe Scott knows the answer.
 
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RTCDude said:
I got my “Final Notice” e-mail today saying the some or all of my receivers will will become “obsolete” soon. I believe this is due to the pending MPEG2 shutoff coming to the Western Arc. I have two questions:

1. I have two VIP722 receivers and one VIP625 receive. As I understand it, the 722 receivers (which are MPEG4 compatible) will continue to work and will not go “obsolete”. The 625 is only MPEG2 compatible and will stop working. Is this correct?

2. Does anyone know the timing for when the MPEG2 shutoff on the Western Arc will be completed?
Click to expand...
We've been racing to replace MPEG2 receivers so its's coming very soon
 
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dweber said:
The other day I noticed that my SD locals for Columbus, Ohio are now gone. My HD locals which used to be on 129 are now on 119.


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Click to expand...
That happened in a few other markets, too
 
RTCDude said:
Ya, the SD local channels on the 625 already disappeared back in February. I just trying to get a sense how long I may have to replace the 625 or update to a Hopper 3.

Maybe Scott knows the answer.
Click to expand...
If your 625 has to be replaced, it'll be replaced with a 722k. Maybe now is the time for the 625 to...'die'?
 
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The CSR supervisor offered to roll a truck to have the 625 replaced with a 722 (I assume a 722k). But I have a second 722 that’s not being used much anymore, so I might just replace the 625 with that.

I’m still trying to decide whether to do a simple replacement, or do a whole system update to a Hopper 3 and a Joey.
 
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There is quite a bit more that is happening. There seems to have been a rather big uplink recently. It looks like they are clearing off the 129 satellite for the national channels as well. Take a look at the channels that have changed. I am guessing that some of the movie channels like HBO, Starz, that were on 129 etc. have changed as well, but I am not subscribed to confirm.

Not sure why Big10 Network just switched transponders on 129 instead of moving off.

Side note - for anyone who is subscribed to NBA League Pass, I noticed in the past week that there were a lot of the infamous JIP for the HD channels. I haven't seen that since the days when there were part time RSN's on Dish. I know some of it is coupled with MLB, NBA, and NHL all going on at the same time - but looking at this, transponder 14 on the 110 satellite used to be the Fox Sports RSN's and the bandwidth was set aside for the live games once Dish dropped the RSN's. Now that bandwidth is being used for national channels. This makes me wonder if Dish didn't re-use the space on 129, transponders 29 and 32, for the sports package, because if they did, they would have plenty of space to not need games to be JIP for HD channels.

Not sure if anyone has access to a full list of the channels that have changed, but I thought this was interesting to see.

ChannelNetworkWasNow
114E!129, TP 29119, TP 18
124BET129, TP 29119, TP 18
129Bravo129, TP 23119, TP 20
132TCM129, TP 32119, TP 20
135BBC America129, TP 32119, TP 20
137QVC129, TP 32119, TP 20
139TBS129, TP 29119, TP 18
143ESPN2129, TP 29119, TP 18
149Fox Sports 2129, TP 26110, TP 13
150Fox Sports 1129, TP 29119, TP 18
154NFL Network129, TP 29119, TP 18
162VH1129, TP 29119, TP 18
166CMT129, TP 32119, TP 20
179Discovery Family129, TP 32119, TP 20
184Animal Plante129, TP 32119, TP 20
185Hallmark Channel129, TP 29119, TP 18
192ID129, TP 32119, TP 20
193Science129, TP 32119, TP 20
197NatGeo129, TP 29119, TP 18
208CNBC129, TP 29119, TP 18
209MSNBC129, TP 29119, TP 18
216Newsmax129, TP 28119, TP 20
231RFD129, TP 18110, TP 14
232Cowboy Network129, TP 28110, TP 14
241Paramount Network129, TP 29119, TP 18
242TruTV129, TP 32119, TP 20
248GLIV129, TP 28110, TP 14
270Univision129, TP 32119, TP 20
273Galavision129, TP 32119, TP 20
289Comet129, TP 28110, TP 14
396Outdoor Channel129, TP 32119, TP 20
401Golf Channel129, TP 29119, TP 18
410Big 10129, TP 18129, TP 23
 
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One other thing I would add - Dish's yearly SEC 10-K filing lists out the all the satellites they own as well as the ones they lease. Going back and looking at previous 10-K filings, Dish renews the leases over a year in advance before their expiration date. However, looking at the one filed on 2/23/23, they did not renew their lease for the 129 satellite and that lease expires in July 2023.

Seeing that, my guess is that by the time July 2023 comes around, we are going to see:

1) MPEG2 shutoff occurs - all channels that were MPEG2 are changed to MPEG4
2) Once all MPEG2 channels are MPEG4, they are going to be rearranged to fit more channels on a single transponder thus freeing transponder space on 119/110.
3) The channels from 129 are going to be moved over to 119/110

I would be shocked if come August 1, 2023 anything is on 129. In fact, I wouldn't be at all surprised if under the configuration section where we can check satellite strength that 129 completely disappears, just like 77 disappeared from the config when it was no longer in use.
 
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zippyfrog said:
One other thing I would add - Dish's yearly SEC 10-K filing lists out the all the satellites they own as well as the ones they lease. Going back and looking at previous 10-K filings, Dish renews the leases over a year in advance before their expiration date. However, looking at the one filed on 2/23/23, they did not renew their lease for the 129 satellite and that lease expires in July 2023.

Seeing that, my guess is that by the time July 2023 comes around, we are going to see:

1) MPEG2 shutoff occurs - all channels that were MPEG2 are changed to MPEG4
2) Once all MPEG2 channels are MPEG4, they are going to be rearranged to fit more channels on a single transponder thus freeing transponder space on 119/110.
3) The channels from 129 are going to be moved over to 119/110

I would be shocked if come August 1, 2023 anything is on 129. In fact, I wouldn't be at all surprised if under the configuration section where we can check satellite strength that 129 completely disappears, just like 77 disappeared from the config when it was no longer in use.
Click to expand...
From what I've heard as a tech July is about what they were saying when mpeg2 receivers would quit working.
 
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BTW, obviously those channels that have a MPEG4/HD and MPEG2/SD duplicates, the MPEG2/SD version will just disappear Leaving the MPEG4/HD version.

But what about those channels that are only in SD? Can SD be transmitted in MPEG4, or are all those channels going to have to be up rez’d to HD?
 
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