Tips For Using OTA Tuner with Hopper 3

Does it really make sense for DISH to push everyone toward OTA because they think they are helping beat the greedy conglomerates that bought up all the network stations, and then produce an OTA module that is about the worst OTA tuner on the market, that a $100 Vizio 24 inch TV tuner craps all over? If DISH was serious about moving their customers toward OTA they would be resolutely striving to develop the best OTA tuner available, would they not?
Award for comment of the day. Start with a great OTA tuner, and then get busy on a great ATSC 3.0 tuner to completely make your case. Charge what you need to cover the costs in either case. Some of us rurals need great OTA reception and are willing to pay to offset the $12 local fee per month. Our tuner is grabbing all but one (FOX) and that's as good as none when you have to choose.
 
The single tuner isn’t that bad I actually use the single tuner to scan as the dual tuner doesn’t always pick up all the channels during the scan but works great after you have the channels scanned in.
You speak the truth.
 
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I am using the dual AirTV tuner on both of my Hopper3 receivers. I live midway between Plain City and Marysville Ohio. I have a channel master CM-4228HD (UHF long range multi-directional) antenna mounted 8 feet above my roof line and a channel master CM-7777HD preamplifier. I have the antenna pointed toward Dayton. I receive 71 channels from Dayton and Columbus Ohio.

My two Sony Bravia TV’s can receive 3 more channels than the Dish dual AirTV tuner. That is become there are several channels that have the same virtual ID.
22.1 is Dayton ABC
22.1 is Columbus COZI TV
22.2 is Dayton Fox 45
22.2 is Columbus Grit
22.3 is Dayton MYTV
22.3 is Columbus Mystery

The Dish tuner only shows the Dayton channels while the Sony TV tuner shows both channels.


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DISH OTA MOD1.jpeg
DISH OTA MOD2.jpeg

I have two of these. One is currently installed. I am planning to remove the one installed and do a hard reset and then install this one and see if the results get any better.
 
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I must correct myself. Those 40 channels I get on the H3 are the ones I kept. There were others I just deleted from the guide.
 
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Award for comment of the day. Start with a great OTA tuner, and then get busy on a great ATSC 3.0 tuner to completely make your case. Charge what you need to cover the costs in either case. Some of us rurals need great OTA reception and are willing to pay to offset the $12 local fee per month. Our tuner is grabbing all but one (FOX) and that's as good as none when you have to choose.
I fail to see what difference the additional cost for a good built in ota tuner is.
Dish raises the prices every year regardless.
They could raise the dvr fee by .50 or a dollar a month & recoup all of their investment.
This would please those of us that live in rural areas and use antennas.
As it is now, these ota tuners are ok, but not as good as the ones in the televisions.
 
My AirTv dual tuner picks up all there is to pick up with indoor flat antenna. I use the compass on my phone to carefully point to the all closely located towers.
Is this the AirTv dual tuner you are talking about? I have been looking on EBAY and someone is selling this one but it says it does not work with Dish Network. I have the old Dish OTA dongle from a few years ago that runs super hot so I have not been using it.
 

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I don’t have a problem with the sensitivity of the dual OTA tuner. The Dish OTA tuner works as well as the tuners in my 3 Sony TV’s, my Amazon Fire TV Recast, and my HD Homerun.

The problem is that Dish only provides correct Guide information for 13 of the 71 channels. Six of the channels have incorrect Guide information.


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Is this the AirTv dual tuner you are talking about? I have been looking on EBAY and someone is selling this one but it says it does not work with Dish Network. I have the old Dish OTA dongle from a few years ago that runs super hot so I have not been using it.
That one looks just like mine and it DOES work with the Hopper 3.
 
So I took the OTA tuner from the H3 and disconnected it then did a hard reboot. I took the second tuner I had and connected it and the H3 recognized it and did another reboot and when it came back up I went to the OTA in settings and did a scan and this time I scanned 32 channels and this time I got FOX!!! Watching my Giants losing to the Igles as we speak in glorious OTA! No hiccups, pixilation or any problems. Other than the game that is :biggrin.
 
So for Saturday's game weather was cloudy but no precipitation and the Fox signal was rock solid never a blip. The game of course was awful. Sunday for the Cowboys - 49ers game it was snowing here to beat the band and the signal was really breaking up. I tried watching it for a little while, but it was off more than on and then it made my Hopper 3 reboot so I quit watching and went back to watching a show on HGTV. A few hours later had to go up on the roof to clean snow off the dish because the satellite signal was lost. That's always fun in the dark. Today just light snow and the OTA Fox signal, which is on HI-VHF 8, is rock solid again.
 
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So for Saturday's game weather was cloudy but no precipitation and the Fox signal was rock solid never a blip. The game of course was awful. Sunday for the Cowboys - 49ers game it was snowing here to beat the band and the signal was really breaking up. I tried watching it for a little while, but it was off more than on and then it made my Hopper 3 reboot so I quit watching and went back to watching a show on HGTV. A few hours later had to go up on the roof to clean snow off the dish because the satellite signal was lost. That's always fun in the dark. Today just light snow and the OTA Fox signal, which is on HI-VHF 8, is rock solid again.
So all is well. Chapter closed.
 
This has been a helpful thread. Dumb question, if I hookup the dual tuner on my H3, will I be able to see my OTA channels and recordings from those channels on my Joeys as well?
 
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I have an Air tv - 4 tuner dvr and a Tablo - 4 tuner dvr and both pickup all the channels in my area. The hopper 3 ota tuner picks up some , but lately when I tried to use my old hopper 3 it will show the channel drop out and Lost signal message will come up. I tried all the ota tuners I had and they all do this. I never notice drop outs on my other devices or tv. The Hopper dongle is weaker and not as reliable. :rolleyes:
 
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The single tuner isn’t that bad I actually use the single tuner to scan as the dual tuner doesn’t always pick up all the channels during the scan but works great after you have the channels scanned in.
Am I correct that the way you do it is, use the single channel to scan the channels, write down the channels it finds then disconnect the single tuner and connect the dual tuner and manually add all the channels that the dual channel scans but missing?