New Dish Customer Questions

[Alto101]

I am currently a very satisfied Voom customer and am 99% sure I am going to switch to Dish instead of my cable company, Insight, or Directv.

I have a Mits 65813 and an old 27" 4X3 tv. Does anyone with a similar TV to my Mits. have both Voom and Dish right now? I have heard good things about the PQ of Dish's HD channels, but very conflicting things about the SD channels. If someone who currently has both services active could give me a comparison of the SD channels, I would appreciate it.

I plan on leasing a 942 and am willing to pay the $250 upgrade fee. I will use this receiver downstairs and then use the 2nd tv option for the tv in the bedroom. How many satellite tuners does the 942 have? How many OTA tuners? I can't find a link to the user guide for the 942 on Dish's website, is it available online yet?

Since the 942 supports both analog and digital OTA channels, can I incorporate both into the viewing guide? For example, can I have both the analog and digital NBC in the program guide at the same time? The reason that I ask is when the digital channels are transmitting a 4X3 program, they put the black bars up on the side. I would prefer to tune the analog channel and use the stretch mode on my Mits. Since I can receive my local channels already thanks to the upgraded Voom antenna, will I still need to pay for the local channels from Dish? If I have to pay, can I choose not to see them since I am sure that the OTA versions will be superior even if they are not broadcasting in HD.

A few install questions: are the 942's actually available for installs this week? The installer will need to bring a 40' ladder to reach my roof, will they try and charge me extra for this?

Thanks!

 

[Dishpointer]

Here is the 942 users guide: http://www.dishnetwork.com/downloads/pdf/product_brochures/942_Prod_SheetWeb.pdf

 

[Alto101]

Here is the 942 users guide: http://www.dishnetwork.com/downloads/pdf/product_brochures/942_Prod_SheetWeb.pdf

Thanks for the link, but this is only a 2 page info sheet, I was looking for the 50+ page user guide with detailed installation directions and operation instructions.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

There is not even installation instuctions in the 50+ page manual.

The 942 does not support OTA Analog channels yet only Digital.

No I don't think you will get one this week, there is still a very small supply (Dishstore only got 2 units) but more are coming out each day.

usually for high installs there can be an extra charge from the installer.

 

[thesaint]

Any advice before install?

I am scheduled for Sat installition for my apartment and wanted any advice before install?

1) Is this the best package availible: I got the Top 180 for 3 months free, $49.00 free installation credit and the DVR-522, free equipment.

2) Should I get the insurance?

3) What should do before install?

4) Is there I should ask the installer before or after he/she is done?

5) Do you tip installers?

6) Is the DVR-522 a good unit? Should I upgrade? Can I upgrade after instalition?

7) Can you pay a year in advance? Do you recieve a discount if you do? Would you recommend it?

8) What is CLUBDISH and how does it work?

9) I live in an apartment is ther anthing special I need to do ?

10) How is there customer service and repairs?

Thank you everyone for any advice or suggesions you could provide!

 

[shanewalker]

I'm an E*-newbie-in-waiting and have a question concerning the dish itself. The pertinent facts: 1) I'm initially signing up for the Everything Package in three rooms with the HD Pack add-on (2HD/1SD), 2) I'm in Chicago, with some locals, according to the CSR, only available with a 'second dish' (though it didn't seem they were anything other than alternate PBS and some spanish-language stations that don't interest me); 3) I've had problems with rain-fade with both an elliptical D* dish and V*'s 18" inch dish.

So, I asked the CSR to give me the most rain-fade resistant dish they had that would set me up to get everything in the programming package I wanted. I asked if I needed a SuperDish. He responded "No, our main dish is all you need." Well, I went on the website and the Dish 500 is stated as necessary for all the programming in the America's Favorite 180 and I'm a bit skeptical that I got the full accurate story from the CSR on 'rain-fade.'

What do those of you in the know think?

 

[mdonnelly]

...So, I asked the CSR to give me the most rain-fade resistant dish they had that would set me up to get everything in the programming package I wanted. I asked if I needed a SuperDish. He responded "No, our main dish is all you need." Well, I went on the website and the Dish 500 is stated as necessary for all the programming in the America's Favorite 180 and I'm a bit skeptical that I got the full accurate story from the CSR on 'rain-fade.'

What do those of you in the know think?

Well, here in Oklahoma, we get some frog-stranglers every now and then. In 16 months now with the Dish 500, I've had one experience with heavy rain affecting my picture (and it was REALLY heavy). That only lasted about 5 minutes.

 

[h0m3rs1mps0n]

Here is a good website to check and see what channels require what orbital:

http://ekb.dbstalk.com/dishlist.htm

 

[thesaint]

Pre-INSTALL advice needed

I am scheduled for Sat installition for my apartment and wanted any advice before install?

1) Is this the best package availible: I got the Top 180 for 3 months free, $49.00 free installation credit and the DVR-522, free equipment.

2) Should I get the insurance?

3) What should do before install?

4) Is there I should ask the installer before or after he/she is done?

5) Do you tip installers?

6) Is the DVR-522 a good unit? Should I upgrade? Can I upgrade after instalition?

7) Can you pay a year in advance? Do you recieve a discount if you do? Would you recommend it?

8) What is CLUBDISH and how does it work?

9) I live in an apartment is ther anthing special I need to do ?

10) How is there customer service and repairs?

Thank you everyone for any advice or suggesions you could provide!

 

[Mona]

Bad SD picture quality

We're not actually new Dish customers, but we're pretty technologically ignorant, and we get really crappy picture quality. We were hoping that Voom would solve our problems.

Obviously, we're back at Square 1 now. Since we kept Dish, can anyone give us any ideas on getting a better picture?

We don't have Dish HD. The Dish goes through Tivo, but even on Voom, w/o Tivo, the SD channels only look a little better. We have a Sony Wega TV, and HD and DVDs look fantastic. We've had two installers out here, one a Dish guy to try to improve the PQ, one the Voom guy (who does installs for all three companies), and they both agreed that the Dish PQ wasn't what it should be, but the Dish guy spent about three hours and couldn't fix it. It's really, really chalky, like someone wiped a chalkboard.

We're toying with the idea of getting HD on Dish but are reluctant because of the paltry offerings. But would the 811 receiver improve our SD picture quality as well? We may also go to cable and ditch Dish. Sorry if this isn't the correct place to ask this question, but does anyone have any ideas on why our PQ would be so bad?

 

[RUBEN SENDEREY]

Dish

HI,
I GOT THE DISH 1 HD811 AND 1 SD522 DVR ,NO INSURANCE ONE YEAR CONTRACT THE SD PICTURE IS NO DIFERENT THEN VOOM THE HD PICTURE IS 10% BETTER THEN VOOM
HD NET
HDNET MOVIES
HD DIS.
HD TNT
HD HBO
HD SHOWTIME
HD PAY PER VIUW
HD NBA CHANEL
NOT LIKE VOOM BUT LIFE GOES ON

 

[jergenf]

So, I asked the CSR to give me the most rain-fade resistant dish they had that would set me up to get everything in the programming package I wanted. I asked if I needed a SuperDish. He responded "No, our main dish is all you need." Well, I went on the website and the Dish 500 is stated as necessary for all the programming in the America's Favorite 180 and I'm a bit skeptical that I got the full accurate story from the CSR on 'rain-fade.'

What do those of you in the know think?

The Dish500 is all you need for the AT180 Pak plus most local channels in Chicago. However a second dish300 pointed at 61.5 is needed for the following channels:

WJYS 62 Religion
WYCC 20 PBS
WYIN 56 PBS
WXFT 60 Spanish
WSNS 44 Spanish
WGBO 66 Spanish

You should consider a separate TV antenna for locals that way you'll be prepared for digital transmissions (ie HD) and save money in the long run.

As far as rain-fade resistant there may be no way the guarantee that. It possible to get 100% signal and all of a sudden it drops to zero during a severe rain storm. These don't occur very often or last longer than a few minutes.

You might be able to find a third party dish (at your own expense) that's much larger but I doubt that it would be a dish500 type (getting two satellites on one dish) and also dishnetwork won't support it. The cheapest way to boost your signal is to replace your RG-6 with RG-11 coax, that adds another 3 db (double) signal boost. And again that's at your expense but at lease you keep support and your same the same equipment. Note: the installer won't substitute RG-11 even if you were to provide it (I tried). Doing either of these may reduce the likelihood of dropouts but will still not guarantee outages.