Wiring Questions for 5 LNB Dish

[eianson]

Hello. New member here. Here is my situation:

I just bought a new Plasma TV and ordered a 5 LNB dish with a DIRECTV HD DVR. The TV is going in my basement, which was finished by the previous owner.

Here is the current set up:
- Main level of the house - TiVO DVR Receiver standard definition
- Basement – Standard Definition receiver
- Triple LNB Dish

New setup:
- Main level of the house - TiVO DVR Receiver standard definition
- Basement – HD DVR receiver
- Five LNB Dish

Today when Verizon came to install a phone jack in the basement, they said that they couldn’t because there was no existing phone line anywhere in the basement, the walls are all surrounded buy foundation, and their policy is not to drill through floor boards. While I think I can get around the phone problem with a wireless jack, panic has struck that I might not be able to get a second line into the basement. The existing single line comes into the basement in an accessible area in a storage room. It is drilled through the ceiling/floorboard. However, I can’t see where it was guided from the outside to the hole in the ceiling/floor....it must be behind the drywall (makes me think that the builder may have put it in).

When I called DIRECTV (I couldn’t talk to anyone with real technical expertise) they said that that they should be able to go through the floor, but if there was a problem they could use a multiswitch, running off the single line in the basement (not sure that is right).

So here are my two questions:

1) Can the installers run additional lines through the floorboards, even if the first line runs behind drywall (from the main level to the basement....I don't really care if the second line goes through the floorboard)?
2) Can a multiswitch be placed on an existing single line already in the house to split the signal into the 2 channels?

Thanks,
Eric

 

[eianson]

After further inspection of the wiring, I am a little less stressed. The wiring box outside the house has 4 lines running into the house in one location. Two of these coax lines come out into the basement storage area. One goes to the TV in the basement. The other runs to the main-level TV location (these were the original 2 lines when we moved in). I have no idea where the other 2 lines from outside go. The second line for the main level TiVO is run separately through a new entry point close to that TV.

My assumption would be that the 2 lines running into the basement can be configured to be the two channels running off the dish. Then these can be attached to a multiswitch so I can run it to the new TV, the main level TV, and I'll probably still keep the 3rd receiver as a second basement TV.

Does this improve the situation?

Eric

 

[Teronzhul]

If you intend to use a separate multiswitch, all four lines must go from the dish to the switch. 2 lines alone will not suffice.

I would suggest using your 2 lines that head into the basement for the HD-DVR, and then either find your other 2 lines, or run 2 new lines to your main level DVR.

 

[horza1337]

On a standard 2,3,5-lnb dish, there are 3 different parts to the signal:
18v, 13v, 18.22v, 13.22v. Each of the transponders on all of the satellites belong in one of these 4 places. If you have one of these dishes, all receivers must have equal access through their multiswitch to each of these 4 outputs. That means that if you only use 2 lines, and have 4 recievers connected to these 2 lines, then only 2 of these feeds can be used. Which feeds? anyone's guess...