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DISH TV / KVH SATELLITE ANTENNA
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Once again from the “What It’s Worth Department”.
I have, and have had for a number of years, DirecTv and have had no problems. As far as they are concerned, the bus is just another tv in my house.
When it hasn’t been used for a while, when I turn it on it gives me an error message concerning an extension 716 issue. When that happens I call the customer Service number, 800-531-1600, and every time they have, within a couple of minutes, had me back in business.
After having said all of that, it is a fact that when I’m out of my home area I don’t get my home local stations. I have to get the network channels from another source. That’s just the nature of the beast.
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If you setup an online account with DirecTV you don’t even need to make a phone call. You will be able re-activate your receiver online once you are out in the open and connected to the satellite. The same requirement before you call for the same option.
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Have had Dish and Winegard for about 10 years. Did upgrade the dome last year to a RoadTrip T4 Motion from the old style Winegard motion. No problems but like somebody said above , if coach sits in barn a while , one quick call to hit receiver and 10 minutes , good to go. Oh and 10 bucks a month added to my Home systems. Also have a Tailgater that if somebody comes over and doesn’t want to stay in the casa, I can hook up to receiver, put Tailgater out and they can watch the tube while here.
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We like the Dish programming. At home, other than the usual outages when it rains the system works at least as good as DirecTV.
But there is one thing I cannot figure out and the phone technicians are generally clueless so I cannot get answers from them. Here’s my confusion: At home our antenna is fixed. It points at satellite 61.5, and we get every channel we subscribe to.
In the bus both the KVH technicians and the Dish technicians agree we cannot pick up all we subscribe to on one satellite. So to get every subscribed channel our KVH has to be set to the specific group, lately the Legacy Eastern Arc which includes satellites 61.5, 110 and 119. If the KVH “switch” is not set to receive all three then not all subscribed shows are received. If the “switch” is set all three satellites will be seen by the KVH antenna, but here’s the annoying issue. Shows we get at home on 61.5 might instead be received on 110 or 119. Switching to a different channel then usually results in listening to the KVH whine and rotate until it picks up whatever satellite provides the show we want. It might take a few seconds to make the switch, or it might take up to 5 minutes while the KVH searches the universe.
When the TV and receiver are turned off, we get to listen to the KVH squawk and whir as it starts looking for a satellite, even though we aren’t watching TV or have the Dish receiver turned on. This goes on every 10 or 20 minutes and after a while gets annoying.
So why is a fixed antenna aimed at one satellite able to receive all channels, but the in-motion KVH has to figure out what satellite will provide the desired show, and then wear itself out searching the sky until it locks on. Admittedly we get all we are paying for, but what a pain in the ass it is having to go into the KVH IP address to insure it is properly set to receive a satellite group. And then we have to listen to it moving until we pick a channel, turn on the TV and receiver and it locks on the appropriate satellite.
Maybe I should start slow and learn how to operate a smart phone, and then move up to figuring out satellite antennas.
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Don’t know about the TrcStar but As far as my Wingard T4, i have a toggle to turn satellite searching off and on and the T4 is quick to grab on whatever show/channel you turn to. Hitting 2 satellites and I think the above mentioned. You can hear it if sound is off but it’s quick when it changes satellites.
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I don’t know of any DISH plan where all channels come from 61.5. The home antenna should have more than 1 “eye” on the LNB and this is so it can receive the signal from more than 1 satellite. Most users setup on the Eastern Arc can get their programming from 61.5 plus 72.7. Others also pick up the 77 satellite. The Western Arc utilizes 110, 119 and 127. The dome antennas only have 1 “eye” on the LNB so can only receive the signal from a signal satellite and must move from satellite to satellite to receive programming broadcast there. The domes do have the advantage of being able to utilize a hybrid mode where you use the EA for 61.5 and WA for 119 and 129 channels but it causes a lot of movement since the satellites are so far apart.
Even the home sytle RV antennas like the Winegard Trav’ler are only setup for the WA satellites so using them to receive 61.5 or 72.7 has to be done manually and only 1 at a time.
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The EA is 61.5, 110, and 119 and if the satellites are far apart, which explains the racket we listen to when changing channels there are only 2 LMB on the fixed dish at home.
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Those LNB are actually dual LNB. At home you are getting multiple sat signals arriving at the receiver. The sat switching is seamless because of the simultaneous signals.
You may have one or two coax lines from the dish to the receiver. One of those is likely a spare also. They are interconnected at the back of the LNB head. Dish has used various switch configurations over the years. I think current technology has the switch built into the LNB head.
Dish is also telling me I need to move off the western arch 110, 119, 129 to the eastern arch 61.5 and friends but they can’t get a 61.5 signal at the current LNB location. When 119 dies and it will, (Direct just had a bird die and they are hustling to get it out of orbit.) they will have to exceed their 200 ft coax length rule to place a new LNB out on my bus barn.
This stuff is always changing.
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“The EA is 61.5, 110, and 119 and if the satellites are far apart, which explains the racket we listen to when changing channels there are only 2 LMB on the fixed dish at home.”
The EA is 61.5, 72.7 and 77. The WA is 110, 119 and 129. 61.5, 110, 119 is considered hybrid and can only be accesses with a dome style antenna or 2 fixed antennas.
EA and WA HOME antennas have 2 or 3 dual LNB (dual refers to a single LNB’s output and not multiple LNB’s) that can receive the EA or WA combo’s listed above.
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Bill if you go to this web site and scroll down to the RV-1 coverage depiction you will see the RV-1 antenna legacy eastern arc is 61.5, 110, and 119.
According to the Dish TV Outdoor techs those are the 3 satellites the antenna has to receive and when I do the diagnostics on the Dish receiver I have to see them displayed or I do not get all I subscribe to.
What I do not understand is why KVH cannot program their antenna to use whatever satellite it is locked on to as a benchmark to define its position and then using that known position go immediately to the next needed satellite instead of searching.
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Tom: To answer your last question, everytime you move the coach the angles between the satellites changes. Hence it has to search each time.
But!!!! As usual you are on the right track. What the antenna should do is have a GPS antenna (one that uses the GPS satellites not the chicken feces alledged “GPS” from cell towers). When to tell the antenna to find the satellites, it would record your lat, long, alt in a database in the antenna computer as well as the angles of each satellite. Then when you return to that location or are in the area, the search should be much, much quicker.
If the antenna company came to the major motor coach shows like RV Super Show or Prevost Expo or Sun N Fun or your oyster fest … they’d get all these great suggestions for improving their products.
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Keep in mind that I am quoting DISH and DirecTV information. Any reference to RV or Outdoors is term made up by those companies to deal with antennas neither DISH or DirecTV built or support. Yes, DISH and DirecTV try to offer help but their business is home users. Winegard and KVH and King Controls built antennas to “work with” these services.
Companies have used GPS in their antennas in the past but found not to help that much. Each satellite broadcasts and ID and it’s just as quick and easy to ID a couple of satellites, do the math and calculate their locations. Once at a new location the locations of the satellites is known and changing channels is just a matter of a second or 2 for the antenna to swing between one and another. As I have mentioned previously, the KVH antenna is the least RV friendly antenna out there and overly complicated. The very fact that you have to connect a computer to get the satellite options brings that fact to the forefront. As an example, with Winegard you simply need to switch a couple of dip switches on the roof. Yes, you have to go on the roof but this is usually something you only have to do once or if you travel from Coast to Coast and want to change the ARC you are assigned to.
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First understand I am not a fan of apps, smartphones or having to deal with digital technology. Regardless of my reasons I am not incapable of digging in when required, I just don’t want to have to get into the nitty gritty.
So I asked Jeff and his team to get the KVH and Dish working together and activated. I watched and even they had some issues. I installed everything but the problems they had weren’t with the installation, but with getting the Dish account activated and getting the KVH set up.
On my first trip the system did not work properly so with the help of a KVH tech I learned how I could use my computer to get into the various features of the KVH, including going to the various satellite groups or locking on to a single one.
I also found out Dish sells me a Wally, but despite pretending it is a Dish receiver and pretending to be able to help with problems the only thing Dish can do is reactivate the account and any technical support has to come from Outdoors which is a completely different company.
Then I found out that when I have issues and seek answers KVH blames Dish and Dish/Outdoors blames KVH and puts me in the middle. So despite my aversion to dealing with digital crap I am now pretty comfortable getting into the diagnostics and set up systems for both and it really pisses me off that neither company has a brochure, service manual, or a customer support person willing to ignore the animosity between companies to actually provide advice freely and completely. It seems like every piece of information I have been able to accumulate to be able to deal with issues and understand the system has had to be dragged out of each company and required multiple calls because neither company has customer support people with broad based knowledge.
I am sick of hearing I have to reboot something by pulling the plug, sick of being asked to check all connections, sick of hearing that I cannot get a certain channel because of poor satellite coverage in a given area, etc.
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“I also found out Dish sells me a Wally, but despite pretending it is a Dish receiver and pretending to be able to help with problems the only thing Dish can do is reactivate the account and any technical support has to come from Outdoors which is a completely different company.”
The Wally is an EXCELLENT DISH receiver! DISH Outdoors is NOT a completely different company. DISH outdoors is DISH.
You are listening to BS and believing what you are told by folks who have no idea what they are “reading” is not correct.
The problems you are having are 100% related to the KVH on your roof and have nothing what-so-ever to do with DISH.
I really am sorry to hear about your issues but these are issues that RVers have been having with KVH for years. It’s why KVH has something like 1% of the RV market.
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Note to Jon – Download the Dish App, enter your zip for the locals, turn on TV and Receiver and away you go. Oh wait, I forgot, the 2 cans and a string won’t work.
Even better, turn on the Roku, click on your provider of choice and away you go. Oh wait, I forgot, the 2 cans and string won’t work.
Or, just turn on your IPad and start watching AT&T TV, it doesn’t count on your data and away you go. Oh, flip phone, I forgot.
There is a pattern here boy’s….
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