Thinking of switching from cable to dish and hopper

[jrb967]

We've been with TW Cable for 7 years but thinking of switching to Dish to save some money. I've looked at all the other options available to us and Dish seems to be the best. Based on my research, I think we would need 2 hoppers/3 joeys to support our TV watching needs. We currently have basic cable to 3 TVs, 2 hd/dvrs and 1 hd set top box for 6 TVs. Since one son is off to college, we can go down 1 connection for now and add it back later when he is home for the summer. Our biggest concern it signal loss during bad weather. We live in a tornado prone area so it is critical to have local weather during storms. We had satellite years ago and would lose the signal every time we had a storm and be left without access to important weather info, that was main reason we moved to cable.

I have some questions so I hope you guys can help.

1. What are my options to get local stations if/when the satellite goes out? We live in a major market so all major networks and local stations are available in SD and HD. Can we just get an antenna in the attic and wire it up to the TV for those times? I just need signal to one TV as backup.

2. What is the max distant between hopper and joey? Hubby has a workshop in a detached garage and would want to get his sports out there. Would prefer to put joey out there rather than the extra hopper.

3. Does hopper work with wifi internet connection or would it need to be hardwired with ethernet?

4. I think I read somewhere that you can switch the joeys between hoppers based on what tuners are available. Is that true and is is easy to do?

Sorry if my questions are basic. We've been with cable for so long and I just want to make sure make the right choice since we'll be stuck for 2 years, if we don't like it.

thanks,
Jo

 

[mdavej]

Can you please clarify the number of TV's again? I come up with 11, 6 of which are fed by a single tuner (doesn't make sense), 3 have no cable box at all and 2 have DVRs. If you want to duplicate that with Dish, 1 Joey can serve the 6 TVs with an RF modulator and possibly an amplifier, 2 hoppers can serve the 2 that had DVRs, but you'll need 3 more Joeys for the other 3 TVs, for a total of 4 Joeys. Equipment fees alone will be $45/month.

If you keep cable and switch to cable card tuners and an HTPC, then you could possibly drop the equipment charges to about $4/month.

As for the antenna, it doesn't integrate with hopper/joey yet, but is supposed to soon. Until then you can simply connect an antenna directly to your TV.

Your hopper/joey system will connect to your internet via your existing coax and a special interface box called a HIC, so no need to worry about that.

I think a Joey can safely be around 200 ft from a node.

You can easily switch to any tuner in your system.

If HD is important to you, check out the channel lineup before you switch. Dish is missing several mainstream HD channels that you may take for granted on cable.

 

[jrb967]

Thanks Mdavej. It is 5 TVs total - living room, family room, 2 bedrooms and hubby's shop. Currently, with cable we have hd/dvr in living room and 1 bedroom and plain hd set top box in family room, other bedrooms and hubbys shop just get basic cable service via coax cable from the wall. Another reason we have stayed with cable so long - didn't need boxes for every TV to get basic cable service. Now that one son is off to college, we won't put a joey in his room. TW currently charges me $15 per hd/dvr and $10 for the hd set top box so the hardware would cost a little more but the programming is cheaper

 

[darrengs]

1. What are my options to get local stations if/when the satellite goes out? We live in a major market so all major networks and local stations are available in SD and HD. Can we just get an antenna in the attic and wire it up to the TV for those times? I just need signal to one TV as backup.

There is no OTA at this time for the Hopper. But, yes you could run you antenna to the TV as a backup, then when OTA is available just plug your antenna into it. OTA will be available on the Hopper not the Joey, so keep that in mind.

2. What is the max distant between hopper and joey? Hubby has a workshop in a detached garage and would want to get his sports out there. Would prefer to put joey out there rather than the extra hopper.

I am not sure of this, and the only distance I see mentioned in the manual was a 200 feet limit from LNB to Hopper.

3. Does hopper work with wifi internet connection or would it need to be hardwired with ethernet?

It will work with a Wifi adapter. My installer added this at the time of the install.

4. I think I read somewhere that you can switch the joeys between hoppers based on what tuners are available. Is that true and is is easy to do?

Yes, you can switch between Hoppers. It isn't a simple 1 button click, but it is easy enough.


I have 2 Hoppers and 3 Joeys and am very happy with them.

I have one Hopper fed into an RF Modulater which currently goes to a 6th TV, which I have an extra remote for. The RF remotes work much better then my Directv remotes did (even when Directv was in the same room). In fact the Hopper is on the 2nd floor and the remote works fine for me in the basement.

 

[mrtg3336rz]

The maximum distance the joey can be is 200 ft from the hopper. Meaning, the cable length from the hopper to the node plus the cable length from the node to the joey.