Signal In and Out.

[milkman]

Had Voom installed last Thursday. I have 3 receivers in place (mother in law had to have one upstairs). Sporatically each of the receivers will lose the signal for both the satellite and the OTA (sometime just the sat goes).

I called VOOM, I was on hold for awhile before it said I had to wait for a call back from them (24-48 hours, what the heck?).

Anyone have any ideas what the cause of the signal interruption could be. Right now I can get a signal from 2 of the receivers, but not the one downstairs. Last night I lost the signal on the other tv downstairs on the main TV in the living room.

 

[milkman]

Just turned off the 2 boxes that were getting a signal. Rebooted the receiver that didn't have a signal, nothing. Unplugged the receiver, waited a couple minutes then plugged it back in. It worked. Then turned on all the other receivers. The one in the living room lost the signal, and now I can't get it back. Pretty friggin weird.

 

[Sean Mota]

What's the signal quality you are getting on a satellite channel?

 

[PSB]

Is the system grounded? I would try unplugging everything you can then replugging it all back in, you can do it one connection at a time, this will keep you busy until they get back to you. I would do this with the indoor connections only, its worth a try!

 

[milkman]

Sat Signal Quality - low 90s
OTA - low 20s

Those are the figures right now on one of the tvs that is up right now. I think is has to do with 3 receivers maybe? Signal deteriorating because it has to go to 3 places? Are there a lot of people that have 3 receivers in place?


The system is grounded, I'll go outside and check just to be sure, but I did inspect the installers work. I'll unplug the systems again and see if they will stay up.

I also can't get OTA ABC, the tower is in the same location as NBC and CBS but I get nothing. Fox on the other hand is in a different direction and further away and I get that station. I am so confused.

By the way, I had Directtv setup in the same 3 rooms and didn't have an issue with signal loss to thos locations. Of course I had Directtv hooked up outside directly to the cable that was going to each room. VOOM is hooked up to a big diplexor (?) that splits the sat and the OTA signal, and then hooked up to the three cables running to each room.

 

[Sean Mota]

Can you connect one of the receivers that work to a line that is not working and connect the receiver that is not working to a line that works? This will rule out bad receiver if it works.

The other possibility is to check the diplexor. Make sure of the ends are tight and secured. If that does not work, I will put a service call. It is either the diplexor or the LNB. I will trace the cable that gets not signal back to the diplexer and connect it to another output just to see if the output of the diplexer is not working. Always disconnect your stb whenever you are changing or unpluging coax input/outputs.

 

[milkman]

I'll give that a try, but the signal drops off the various STBs in my house. I think it is depending on which ones I power up first. I only watch the 2 on the first floor, and both of those lose the signals. So I would think the diplexor or like you said, the LNB is to fault.

I'll see what VOOM says when I talk to them. Probably call them back to see if I can get through in a few minutes. That way I can get a tech out here to troubleshoot it.

BTW - thanks for the info guys, appreciate it.

 

[milkman]

OK, get this.....been fooling around with the way the intstaller put the lines into and out of the multi-switch. After trying to swap the lines out to the house, and just getting rid of the satellite in, I swapped the Lnb A and Lnb B inputs into the Multiswitch and guess what......All the STBs are running without dropping the signal. Halleluja!

I am headed off to the roof to verify what I did should be that way by looking at the dish.

Now to figure out why I can't get ABC.......

 

[Mr. Biggles]

We keep hearing these stories of bad multi switches. V* reads this forum also.

If your listening, dump your supplier and get a quality multi switch. The end cost of a decent switch sure has to beat sending installers on overpriced return trips or the total loss of a customer and the bad words he/she will spread.

Milkman,

Try adjusting/fine tuning your antenna for better reception.

 

[TechCop]

All OTA's are NOT created equal!

I'm watching a FOX channel 40 miles away off the back side of my antenna because I can't receive the one 20 miles away directly in front of the antenna. (This could be due to transmiiter power, obstructions, interference, who knows what...)

 

[milkman]

I am headed to the roof to check things out shortly. That could be the trouble with my ABC TechCop. If I can't dial it in, I call VOOM for a bigger antenna. I may just go buy a big ChannelMaster multi-directional myself since I wanted one when I had D* anyway.

As for the multiswitch, not sure if it was bad, just that I think the installer hooked the cables up wrong. After me switching them, none of my TVs have dropped the signal.

 

[milkman]

It looks like the combiner up top has the OTA and Sat signal combined into the A. The installer had the things switched at the bottom, thus when I switched them the way they should have been the signal stays up.

As for the OTA problem, I think I just need a bigger antenna because any directional adjustments I make to the antenna doesn't do anything.

 

[Sean Mota]

Good that you got the stb's working and soon with a bigger antenna your OTA. It comes to show that with a little patience and troubleshooting some problems can be resolved.

 

[jimmykce1]

Bigger antenna would be better. I upgraded to a Channelmaster 4228, which is a UHF directional antenna and its working great!!

 

[slffl]

There may be something more to this than the dish and OTA antenna. Last night I was flipping through channels and all of sudden I couldn't get anything. I went to the 'System Status' and my satellite signal went down to the 30's (usually it's mid 90's). I sat and watched as it gradually increased to the 90's again. It was pretty weird. I don't know what could have caused it.