Can DirecTV and Cable Internet share coaxial lines?

[austin316]

Here is the deal. Tomorrow I am moving into a new apartment. It is an older home and is pre-wired with coaxial cable. The landlord said we can only get tv/internet if the installers splice into the existing cable and do not run any new lines. Here is the dilemma, we want to get satellite for the TV (DirecTV) and internet from our cable company (RCN). Now, previously, at my old apartment, we had both tv/cable through RCN and the coaxial cable was able to accept both: IE, one line we could run a splitter, one to a cable box, one to the modem and get tv and internet. Can the same be done with DirecTV and cable internet? Or does each need a dedicated coaxial cable run?

 

[sswingle]

Going to need seperate lines.

Maybe you can put the tv on the existing cable, and get the landlord to allow you to just get the RCN cable into the house, put the modem immediately there, and run temporary ethernet or wireless from that point.

 

[DarkManX]

you may be able to use something called a di-plexer. i just got a dish installed, and they use diplexers to feed both the sat signal and output to a 2nd tv over the same coax. basically its like a splitter that you put on both ends of the cable and connect all the signals.

 

[njmodi]

Why does he need separate lines? Does DirectTV use the data frequencies for STB downloads or something?

 

[Praetor]

They will interfere with each other. Diplexers work if you have one digital and one analog service, but when they're both digital, no so much.

 

[Pepsei]

as far as i know, you should be using a better cable fo directTV, RG 6, I think most of the older cables are still RG 59, although it'll work, i believe the longer the cable, the more degradation there is. Now, to feed both cable and directTV thru the same cable. it really doesn't work that way.

 

[austin316]

Originally posted by: ScottSwingleComputers
Going to need seperate lines.

Maybe you can put the tv on the existing cable, and get the landlord to allow you to just get the RCN cable into the house, put the modem immediately there, and run temporary ethernet or wireless from that point.

I think that is what we will attempt. Have D* splice into the existing lines and have the cable internet run one new inconspicuous cable.