Long story short, I have a condo where we have DirecTV wired. I've been with them for over 3 years, since we moved here and have had pretty much 0 issues. My only complaint is that DTV doesn't do the installs, and therefore I have to pay some other third party dealer that we have an agreement with to do the installs. And they suck.
In late 2010 when we moved in (brand new, never lived in condo), they installed a 6x8 switch and wiring for me, rather than doing a SWM even though we never had an SD receiver, only 2 HD HR24s since the beginning. I upgraded with DTV yesterday, getting a Genie, and assumed I had the SWM installed already. I doublechecked the closet where all the MDU stuff runs, and found out that we just had the 6x8 switch, despite almost all of my neighbors having the SWMs. They want over $300 (labor and parts) to come install the SWM stuff for me.
So I was planning on doing this myself, since its seems pretty straightforward. The dish is obviously already wired for it. I know I need an SWM8 with a 29v power inserter, and the green splitter on the inside of my condo. Got all that, check.
The curveball is that they've got the 4 cables coming from the dish running to a Sonora HRV S8 splitter. We are currently using all 8 spots on each of those because of all the switches in there. Unfortunately, because it appears I still share my 6x8 switch with a neighbor, I can't simply disconnect my 6x8 and run the same wires to my SWM8. I need to be able to get connected to those 4 dish cables without screwing my neighbors.
It appears that they might have already tackled this problem by adding a 2-way satellite tap on each dish cable for another SWM8 neighbor.
Is this what I should do also? Just add another 2-way tap to each of the 4 dish cables so I can squeeze my SWM in? Or is this going to cause a loss, or a conflict getting to my neighbors?
I gather from reading online that there is a better (more expensive) way for them to do the entire MDU setup using expanders and chassis and what not. But I don't think thats in the cards, we each (as homeowners) have to pay for the installation ourselves, and I'm not willing to pay this company a couple grand for them to come set it all up the right way.
In late 2010 when we moved in (brand new, never lived in condo), they installed a 6x8 switch and wiring for me, rather than doing a SWM even though we never had an SD receiver, only 2 HD HR24s since the beginning. I upgraded with DTV yesterday, getting a Genie, and assumed I had the SWM installed already. I doublechecked the closet where all the MDU stuff runs, and found out that we just had the 6x8 switch, despite almost all of my neighbors having the SWMs. They want over $300 (labor and parts) to come install the SWM stuff for me.
So I was planning on doing this myself, since its seems pretty straightforward. The dish is obviously already wired for it. I know I need an SWM8 with a 29v power inserter, and the green splitter on the inside of my condo. Got all that, check.
The curveball is that they've got the 4 cables coming from the dish running to a Sonora HRV S8 splitter. We are currently using all 8 spots on each of those because of all the switches in there. Unfortunately, because it appears I still share my 6x8 switch with a neighbor, I can't simply disconnect my 6x8 and run the same wires to my SWM8. I need to be able to get connected to those 4 dish cables without screwing my neighbors.
It appears that they might have already tackled this problem by adding a 2-way satellite tap on each dish cable for another SWM8 neighbor.
Is this what I should do also? Just add another 2-way tap to each of the 4 dish cables so I can squeeze my SWM in? Or is this going to cause a loss, or a conflict getting to my neighbors?
I gather from reading online that there is a better (more expensive) way for them to do the entire MDU setup using expanders and chassis and what not. But I don't think thats in the cards, we each (as homeowners) have to pay for the installation ourselves, and I'm not willing to pay this company a couple grand for them to come set it all up the right way.
