So tell me about the Dish Hopper

[Charmonium]

My cable company was taken over by Altice and things have started going downhill very rapidly. So I'm going to switch to Dish and hopefully get rid of them as my ISP as well. But one thing at a time.

I've had Directv before and because of staggered show times, recording conflicting shows on different networks was often impossible. Even if you had a unit with say 4 tuners, an overlap of just a minute at say 10:01 vs 10:00 could mean that you could only record 2 of the shows.

The 'dvr' I have now let's me stream the shows from the cable company servers so there's never any conflict and I don't need to worry about simultaneous recording of multiple shows.

Is that how the hopper works or is it all recorded locally on a hard disk?

 

[BoomerD]

I've had the Hopper for almost 3 years. I like it a LOT. If you can get the Hopper v.3, it's supposed to be even better.

 

[Spydermag68]

The Hopper 3 has 16 tv tuners so you can record or watch 16 programs at one time. It is faster than the older hopper 2. If you have a 4K tv then you can watch split screen upto 4 shows/sporting events on the main tv. You can buy a portable hard drive that you can download your DVR-ed shows to and upto 5 devices connect to while you are on vacation. No fighting over what to watch on planes or car road trips.

https://www.mydish.com/upgrades/products/receivers/the-hoppers

 

[Spydermag68]

Another thing is that you can do is to watch or stream movies from the DVR to an iPad. I did this one day when the Broncos were playing in the playoffs this year while I was GMing a pathfinder game.

 

[Charmonium]

The Hopper 3 has 16 tv tuners so you can record or watch 16 programs at one time. It is faster than the older hopper 2. If you have a 4K tv then you can watch split screen upto 4 shows/sporting events on the main tv. You can buy a portable hard drive that you can download your DVR-ed shows to and upto 5 devices connect to while you are on vacation. No fighting over what to watch on planes or car road trips.

https://www.mydish.com/upgrades/products/receivers/the-hoppers

Much appreciated guys. I thought that this was going to be a rough transition what with all of the shows I record (and mostly delete, but still . . . ). Instead, it looks like this could be video nirvana.

I'm really, really going to enjoy telling my cable company to go fuck themselves.

How do these people stay in business? Do they just keep jacking up your rate until you not only threaten to leave but actually do it? Are there people out there paying $300/month because the temp of the water in the pot went up so gradually that it put them all to sleep? I don't get it.

 

[dr150]

Much appreciated guys. I thought that this was going to be a rough transition what with all of the shows I record (and mostly delete, but still . . . ). Instead, it looks like this could be video nirvana.

I'm really, really going to enjoy telling my cable company to go fuck themselves.

How do these people stay in business? Do they just keep jacking up your rate until you not only threaten to leave but actually do it? Are there people out there paying $300/month because the temp of the water in the pot went up so gradually that it put them all to sleep? I don't get it.

I currently have DISH. Don't get me wrong, I love the DISH service but they are much more greedy than in years past (like all the others).

I just began my Year 2 portion of my contract.

My rate shot up from $65 to $120. I called retentions to quit and they only budged me down to $100 for 2 TVs with HBO ($10/mo). In the past, I could have ramped them down to $70, $80/mo. or less.

The cancellation fee is $260 plus $10 for each receiver box. So $280 to quit.

I can currently get a $300 DirecTV promo thru Costco, but have to wait two years before I qualify as an ex-customer. I can still go to ATT or Comcast....still thinking about it, but they suck balls IMHO.

Bottom line, while I love DirecTV and DISH, they aren't as competitive as they used to be.

I pray for a game changer service, as I'd LOVE nothing more to tell these pseudo-monopolies to go fuck themselves!

 

[Charmonium]

Yeah, I expect that after the first 3 months I'll probably be paying more for Dish than I pay for cable, especially if I don't switch ISPs since Cablevision will jack up my rate now that I've ditched their cable service.

But you know what, I don't give a shit. I care less about the money than the fact that these assholes have raised my rates twice in the past 6 months. Fuck that shit. At least with Dish I'm locked in for 2 years and don't have to play this stupid ass game every few months. I'm really sick of that.

 

[dr150]

Yeah, I expect that after the first 3 months I'll probably be paying more for Dish than I pay for cable...

Nah, DISH will leave you alone until your credits run out in month 10 or 12.

DISH is still great though and they have some great new subscription deals. I got $350 back on one their unadvertised deals.

Look into some of these deals (there's some good money to be saved!):
http://www.retailmenot.com/view/dish.com

 

[who?]

Yeah those satellite TV companys only spent 500 million dollars to put up satellites why would they need to charge for the service?

 

[Charmonium]

Wow. Those are some kickass deals. Thanks man.

 

[Linux23]

How much is the hopper? That device really does sound sweet. I'm sick of this Fios DVR with the constant reboots.

 

[Charmonium]

I'll let you know later if I can sign up - having some issues getting this done

 

[Charmonium]

Well, this turning into quite the cozy little clusterfuck. It turns out that I'd put a freeze on at least 2 of my credit reports. I vaguely remember doing this but the details are lost in the mists of time.

So far I've unfrozen 2 of them and I'm praying to god, Jesus and the angels in heaven that I don't have to go through this a third time with Experian. I think there was one I never quite got to and by process of elimination . . . . We'll see.

What happens when you have a freeze on even one of your accounts is that they say there is insufficient info in your credit file. So if you ever get that message, it probably means you froze your account.

But I did get some useful info. If you go with the non-contract option for Dish, they charge you $350 for the Hopper3 but you do own it outright, no lease. Then there is $200 for the "activation" which includes the install. Finally you pay the first month up front which for 290 channels + HBO + Showtime, would have been about $105 for a grand total of $695. The difference there I'm guessing is tax or something.

I chatted with them for a while and they're pretty solid on that price. If you bitch and moan you can get them to throw in 3mo of HBO and 6mo service contract but otherwise, that was the best I could do - and did a lot of moaning about how expensive it was how poor I am and how I really couldn't afford it. All lies but hey, whatever works, right?

 

[dr150]

I chatted with them for a while and they're pretty solid on that price. If you bitch and moan you can get them to throw in 3mo of HBO and 6mo service contract but otherwise, that was the best I could do - and did a lot of moaning about how expensive it was how poor I am and how I really couldn't afford it. All lies but hey, whatever works, right?

You're not doing it right.

Try signing up online and use one of the special promo codes from the link I mentioned above.

I signed up a year ago and I don't think things have changed much other than the promo mixes which easily amount to over $300.

I never paid for my Hopper2 DVR (other than the typical lease fee), no activation fee, free install (installed within 24 hrs).

I signed up online with those codes which took care of everything. You can even schedule the install through the online sign-up process.

If a code you use doesn't work in the promo box, use a different code until it works. Those promo codes should take care of all the side fees for free.

Don't assume the mouth breathers on the phone can help you. They know less than nothing. They have no idea about promo codes other than the the piddly promo on their page.

Once you sign up online, THEN CALL to CONFIRM the details. It'll then show up on their screen the specifics of your promo. That's how I did it and it worked perfectly and got my $350.

(....If you already signed up with some bad deal, cancel immediately and start over from scratch online so you can get that free money!)

 

[Charmonium]

I did try that and thanks again for the tip.

The problem is that I can't do the lease option since as far as they can tell, I don't have any credit. That's not true of course but that's what they think since 2 of my credit reports were frozen.

Now that I've managed to unfreeze 2 of the 3 (third might not be frozen), I just have to wait a few days and try again. The transunion unfreeze should have taken effect immediately since I had my pin code for that. But the Equifax one could take up to 5 business days.

So I'll give it another shot next Wed. and then again Fri. if that doesn't work. And I am most definitely going to use one of those sweet ass codes.