Question about DirectTV

[Argo]

I currently have Basic Cable + TiVO setup. I was thinking about getting DirectTiVo (directTV + built in tivo). Before I do, I had a few questions:

1) Is there quality improvement with DirectTV over cable
2) What about loss of signal those cable commercials claim. People with DirectTV, in the past year how often did you lose your signal and for how long?
3) Is there anything else I should be aware of?

 

[KarenMarie]

Cable sucks!!

directv is GREAT! I have had it for 4+ years and would never change.
Better picture, better quality channels, more options, better service and cheaper.

and in 4+ years, I lost signal ONCE, cause we were working on the house and did not realize that the dish was knocked over. But rain, snow, fog... whatever... has never caused a problem.


I vote directv 100%

 

[flot]

1) Depends on your cable. In general, directv's quality is pretty good.
2) I've almost never noticed signal loss - it HAS happened occasionally during really big storms or whatnot, but since I have a DirecTivo it's rarely bothered me. I'd say signal loss on directv is probably *less freqent* then cable, as thinking back to times when I had cable, it probably went out randomly every so often. The difference is that with directv you'll be able to look outside and see exactly why the signal is out, whereas with cable sometimes it just shuts off in the middle of the day for no reason. (ie someone took a backhoe to the line)
3) Your DirecTivo will record the shows at the same resolution and encoding that they are broadcast in. So there is no loss of quality for using the tivo compared to straight directv feeds.

Edit: I live in South Florida, so big rainstorms (well, and hurricanes) are our only weather issue.. I'm not sure how directv would work in, say, a snowstorm.

 

[Codewiz]

Originally posted by: Argo
I currently have Basic Cable + TiVO setup. I was thinking about getting DirectTiVo (directTV + built in tivo). Before I do, I had a few questions:

1) Is there quality improvement with DirectTV over cable
2) What about loss of signal those cable commercials claim. People with DirectTV, in the past year how often did you lose your signal and for how long?
3) Is there anything else I should be aware of?

1) If you aren't on digital cable then heck yeah directv is gonna look loads better.

2) Loss of signal is BS. As long as you have a clearview to the sat then you should be fine. I lost my signal 3 times over 3 years. I live on the coast where we get some REALLY huge storms during the day. Haven't had much of a problem at all. It has to be a real bad storm to lose the signal enough to have it go out. I will admit when I first setup my dish, it was partially blocked by a tree and when a storm came I would lose tv. I just moved the dish to a place that had no line of sight problems and I rarely ever loss it now.

3) Not that I know of. I will not be going back to cable. I will either be a directv or dish network customer for as long as they are in business.

 

[dmurray14]

Originally posted by: Argo
I currently have Basic Cable + TiVO setup. I was thinking about getting DirectTiVo (directTV + built in tivo). Before I do, I had a few questions:

1) Is there quality improvement with DirectTV over cable
2) What about loss of signal those cable commercials claim. People with DirectTV, in the past year how often did you lose your signal and for how long?
3) Is there anything else I should be aware of?

1) Yes, I think so, unless you have absolutely perfect looking cable.
2) Screw the Comcast ads. DirecTV RARELY goes out, and when it does, it's usually a big storm that takes out cable as well. With satellite, TV will be back as soon as the storm eases up a bit, while the cable company is still trying to get technicians out to fix downed lines or something.

3) You WILL become addicted to TiVo. You just will. So be prepared to get a few more for other rooms in your house...actually, you should look around the net and see what the best deal is that you can find - usually there are some great ones for new subscribers.

 

[Argo]

Thanks. I live in North East so snowstorms here are quite often. How does the dish handle the snow? Also, I want to setup 2 TVs, can I do that with one DirectTiVo receiver? If so will I be forced to watch the same channel on both? How would I change channels on the second TV, if say the receiver is in the same room with the first tv?

P.S. I already have gen 2 TiVo . Is there any difference between standalone TiVo and directTiVo?

 

[dmurray14]

Originally posted by: flot

3) Your DirecTivo will record the shows at the same resolution and encoding that they are broadcast in. So there is no loss of quality for using the tivo compared to straight directv feeds.

Wrong! The shows recorded by tivo are compressed, but it's pretty hard to tell. Only in a few circumstances will you be able to see the compression in the recordings, but for the most part it is not noticable.

 

[dmurray14]

Originally posted by: Argo
Thanks. I live in North East so snowstorms here are quite often. How does the dish handle the snow? Also, I want to setup 2 TVs, can I do that with one DirectTiVo receiver? If so will I be forced to watch the same channel on both? How would I change channels on the second TV, if say the receiver is in the same room with the first tv?

Snow is no problem at all. Even in some of the heavy snowstorms we had this year, it held up fine. Like I said before, check around the net to see if you can get some good deals on multiple room systems - new subscribers really have a lot of bargaining power. You could have it displayed on 2 TVs from one receiver if you wanted, but yes, it would be the same show. I would reccommend you get another receiver for the other TV, which will allow you to watch whatever you want on that TV regardless of what is on the other. Keep in mind, the satellite dish typically has 4 signal outputs, each of which feed into a receiver, except for the TiVo, which requires 2 of the outputs. This means you could either have 2 TiVos, 1 Tivo and 2 normal receivers, or 4 normal receivers. If you want more, you have to purchase a multiswitch, which will give you even more outputs. Also, you should know that each additional receiver costs an additional $5 per month.

 

[KarenMarie]

I live in the north east, too.

nothing but rain and/or snow for as long as i can remeber. havent seen the sun fo more then a few hours since last autumn. Nothing wrong with my directv.

as far as dish network... they are going thru (might be settled now, dunno) some funky crap about not giving mtv, nick and some other channels anymore. So, I would not recommend dish until that is sorted out.



edit: we have three teevees, two recievers. Living room and master bedroom. My daughter goes to college in England, so she doesnt need a reciever in her room as when she comes home for breaks, she is hooked up to the teevee in the living room. And since i spoil her rotten, she usually gets the remote whenever she is home anyway, so there is no problem. At bedtime... i have a reciever in my room so i am not bothered at all.

 

[vi edit]

In a year and a half of service with Direct, I can only recall loosing reception twice. One was when we had such heavy (and well, heavy) snow that there was 6" of snow caked on the dish, the second was when we received 4" of rain in 2 hours with 40+ MPH winds.

Besides those two times, and it was only a matter of a few hours, I've never been left high and dry with Satellite service.

 

[wkabel23]

All this stuff is good to here, I plan on buying a DirecTV system with Tivo sometime this week

BTW, if anyone knows of any places/sites with good deals...feel free to PM me them or post them

 

[CFster]

Satellite>Cable

DirecTivo>Regular Tivo

Snow is not a problem. My dish was almost covered with snow last year and it's pointing right at a bunch of trees - never went below 80% signal strength. Usually at 94%.

DirecTivo = best thing since sliced bread.

No, really.

 

[Argo]

Originally posted by: wkabel23
All this stuff is good to here, I plan on buying a DirecTV system with Tivo sometime this week

BTW, if anyone knows of any places/sites with good deals...feel free to PM me them or post them

www.directtv.com has a deal where you get the Dish, 1 directtivo receiver, 1 standard receiver for a total of $99.

 

[wkabel23]

you can also get 1 DirecTivo receiver and 2 regular receivers for $99. Odd

 

[Pliablemoose]

Mine will go out during very heavy weather, maybe once or 2x every couple of months, just get a set of rabbit ears so you can get locals during weather. If you're using TIVO, you'll always have something to watch anyway.

I remember more frequent & frustrating outages while on cable.

 

[RossMAN]

Originally posted by: wkabel23
All this stuff is good to here, I plan on buying a DirecTV system with Tivo sometime this week

BTW, if anyone knows of any places/sites with good deals...feel free to PM me them or post them

YGPM

 

[Argo]

Ross, can I get that PM too

P.S. Reading Rossmans PM right now.. Whats the difference between Dual LNB Dish and Tri LNB Dish (HDTV) dish. Does the second support HDTV channels? Is there a drawback to buying the second just in case I decide to go HDTV in the future?

 

[jmgonzalez]

I would suggest getting the best dish available at the time. I have a Dual LNB and am fine with it, but would need a new dish if I wanted to do HDTV or get stuff like the NASA channel.

I've been on DTV for over 4 years now and will never switch back to cable.

 

[NutBucket]

Originally posted by: dmurray14

Originally posted by: flot

3) Your DirecTivo will record the shows at the same resolution and encoding that they are broadcast in. So there is no loss of quality for using the tivo compared to straight directv feeds.

Wrong! The shows recorded by tivo are compressed, but it's pretty hard to tell. Only in a few circumstances will you be able to see the compression in the recordings, but for the most part it is not noticable.

WTF? There's no compression hardware in the DirecTIVO. That's why its so much cheaper then a regular TIVO.

 

[TMPadmin]

Just adding a bit here and a question.

I'm going back to DTV soon. When I had it at my old house I only went out once but we got 7 feet of snow in 3 days. My dish was mounted just above my fence (which was buried by snow) and got covered. Plus when the snow was coming down at that rate it lost signal. A few other times with heavy rain but that was only for a minute or two.

The only reason I dumped DTV was because I moved and wanted to save some cash, but thinking ahead I wired every room with RG6 all going to a central location in the basement. Can I bring in the lines from the dish to that central location and hook up there? Do I need a special multi-switch or can I use my "booster" I have now for the cable signal? I only want 2 receivers but also want to be able to disconnect one room and hook up another (move the receiver) if needed. Will I benefit from two dishes? I took the old one from my old house and actually mounted it in anticipation but never activated the service. If I run both dishes can I get more channels? Will I be charged? Should I take it down for the "free installation" so no question arise from the installer?

Why is everyone so crazy about Dtivo? You are spending $5 extra a month for that, why not save and buy one of those Sony recorders that have 80GB hard drives with a DVD burner? I don't have either so I'm looking for a suggestion and arguements both ways.

 

[Pliablemoose]

Originally posted by: TMPadmin
Just adding a bit here and a question.

I'm going back to DTV soon. When I had it at my old house I only went out once but we got 7 feet of snow in 3 days. My dish was mounted just above my fence (which was buried by snow) and got covered. Plus when the snow was coming down at that rate it lost signal. A few other times with heavy rain but that was only for a minute or two.

The only reason I dumped DTV was because I moved and wanted to save some cash, but thinking ahead I wired every room with RG6 all going to a central location in the basement. Can I bring in the lines from the dish to that central location and hook up there? Do I need a special multi-switch or can I use my "booster" I have now for the cable signal? I only want 2 receivers but also want to be able to disconnect one room and hook up another (move the receiver) if needed. Will I benefit from two dishes? I took the old one from my old house and actually mounted it in anticipation but never activated the service. If I run both dishes can I get more channels? Will I be charged? Should I take it down for the "free installation" so no question arise from the installer?

Why is everyone so crazy about Dtivo? You are spending $5 extra a month for that, why not save and buy one of those Sony recorders that have 80GB hard drives with a DVD burner? I don't have either so I'm looking for a suggestion and arguements both ways.

DTIVO is pretty cool, it pays attention to what you watch & automatically records stuff it thinks you'll like. It also automatically adjusts to catch your "Season Pass" shows. Since DTIVO recoded the conpressed signal, the quality of the recording is very good.

Mine picked up "Router Workshop" after noticing that I liked woodworking/home improvement shows, I didn't even know I had a channel that showed Router Workshop, they guys aren't as cool as Norm Abrams, but I really like their shows.

I do like the idea of burning DVD's of what I record though.

You'll need a multiswitch to ues your installed wiring. Multiswitch

 

[Dulanic]

Originally posted by: wkabel23
you can also get 1 DirecTivo receiver and 2 regular receivers for $99. Odd

That's cause 1 2 or 3 room are free, tivo is $99. However with 2 rooms they only give you the mini dish and it only has 2 outputs so you cant hook up the 2nd connection on the tivo to watch 2 things at once. Best bet is just getting a 3 room system, you pay $5 a month extra, however you get the triple LNB dish, so its cheaper to pay an extra $5 a month for 12 months then to pay to upgrade to the triple LNB dish. Honestly... your best bet is at CC, get the 3 room, 1 tivo and 2 samsung receivers, their samsung receivers come up the wrong price for some reason it is supposed to be $250 up front with $150 rebate, however it comes up $189 and you get $150 rebate AND a $75 giftcard.

 

[RossMAN]

Originally posted by: Pliablemoose

Originally posted by: TMPadmin
Just adding a bit here and a question.

I'm going back to DTV soon. When I had it at my old house I only went out once but we got 7 feet of snow in 3 days. My dish was mounted just above my fence (which was buried by snow) and got covered. Plus when the snow was coming down at that rate it lost signal. A few other times with heavy rain but that was only for a minute or two.

The only reason I dumped DTV was because I moved and wanted to save some cash, but thinking ahead I wired every room with RG6 all going to a central location in the basement. Can I bring in the lines from the dish to that central location and hook up there? Do I need a special multi-switch or can I use my "booster" I have now for the cable signal? I only want 2 receivers but also want to be able to disconnect one room and hook up another (move the receiver) if needed. Will I benefit from two dishes? I took the old one from my old house and actually mounted it in anticipation but never activated the service. If I run both dishes can I get more channels? Will I be charged? Should I take it down for the "free installation" so no question arise from the installer?

Why is everyone so crazy about Dtivo? You are spending $5 extra a month for that, why not save and buy one of those Sony recorders that have 80GB hard drives with a DVD burner? I don't have either so I'm looking for a suggestion and arguements both ways.

DTIVO is pretty cool, it pays attention to what you watch & automatically records stuff it thinks you'll like. It also automatically adjusts to catch your "Season Pass" shows. Since DTIVO recoded the conpressed signal, the quality of the recording is very good.

Mine picked up "Router Workshop" after noticing that I liked woodworking/home improvement shows, I didn't even know I had a channel that showed Router Workshop, they guys aren't as cool as Norm Abrams, but I really like their shows.

I do like the idea of burning DVD's of what I record though.

You'll need a multiswitch to ues your installed wiring. Multiswitch

I have a brand new retail sealed Terk BMS-58 if you are interested Purchased it a few months before moving out and we're getting cable now instead of DirecTV.

 

[TMPadmin]

Originally posted by: RossMAN

Originally posted by: Pliablemoose

Originally posted by: TMPadmin
Just adding a bit here and a question.

I'm going back to DTV soon. When I had it at my old house I only went out once but we got 7 feet of snow in 3 days. My dish was mounted just above my fence (which was buried by snow) and got covered. Plus when the snow was coming down at that rate it lost signal. A few other times with heavy rain but that was only for a minute or two.

The only reason I dumped DTV was because I moved and wanted to save some cash, but thinking ahead I wired every room with RG6 all going to a central location in the basement. Can I bring in the lines from the dish to that central location and hook up there? Do I need a special multi-switch or can I use my "booster" I have now for the cable signal? I only want 2 receivers but also want to be able to disconnect one room and hook up another (move the receiver) if needed. Will I benefit from two dishes? I took the old one from my old house and actually mounted it in anticipation but never activated the service. If I run both dishes can I get more channels? Will I be charged? Should I take it down for the "free installation" so no question arise from the installer?

Why is everyone so crazy about Dtivo? You are spending $5 extra a month for that, why not save and buy one of those Sony recorders that have 80GB hard drives with a DVD burner? I don't have either so I'm looking for a suggestion and arguements both ways.

DTIVO is pretty cool, it pays attention to what you watch & automatically records stuff it thinks you'll like. It also automatically adjusts to catch your "Season Pass" shows. Since DTIVO recoded the conpressed signal, the quality of the recording is very good.

Mine picked up "Router Workshop" after noticing that I liked woodworking/home improvement shows, I didn't even know I had a channel that showed Router Workshop, they guys aren't as cool as Norm Abrams, but I really like their shows.

I do like the idea of burning DVD's of what I record though.

You'll need a multiswitch to ues your installed wiring. Multiswitch

I have a brand new retail sealed Terk BMS-58 if you are interested Purchased it a few months before moving out and we're getting cable now instead of DirecTV.

$?