Bill5925
10-05-07, 06:33 PM
Three years ago I had a D* installation in three rooms. While I was afraid to complain at the time, the installers did a lousy job. The dish was mounted with only two bolts, and a third jammed under one end of the plate to raise it a bit. Not grounded. The TVs in two bedrooms are against a wall that is part of the walk-in closets. I had previously run cable through the attic, through the ceiling of the closets and through the wall about a foot from the electric box. (The electricity was run exactly the same way through conduit.) Instead the installers ran the cable through the outside wall next to the door of each closet, on the side facing the bedroom instead of inside the closet, then up and around the door, stapling in place. Instead of hiding the wire in the closet, it is in plain view. At least the wire is white against a white wall and doorway.
They installed a DVR in the Den which has dark wood walls. I had run cable (not RG-6) through the wall near floor level, under the carpet only across one doorway, and along the baseboard to the opposit wall and up 3' to the TV. They ran their cable from near the ceiling, along the ceiling/wall joint, then down one corner of the room to about 3' off the ground, then straight over to the TV/DVR location. There is a speaker and other components that mostly hides this straight run across the wall to the DVR. But it doesn't leave more than about 6" of play if I wanted to move the DVR. It is also ugly white cable plainly visible (and stapled) against dark wood. I would have preferred they duplicate my original cable run at least to the doorway, then around the door as they did in the bedrooms.
The point of their installation seemed to use the absolute minimum amount of cable necessary.
In two weeks I'm getting an upgrade to HD with a slimline 5-LNB, one HD receiver only in a bedroom, the old DVR in the other bedroom, and the HD-DVR in the den. According to the D* installation videos, the dish must be grounded and they are not supposed to use metal staples to run the cable. They will need to run another cable in the bedroom with the old DVR. I will also need a multiswitch that will handle 5 cables. The current one maxes at 4.
Do you think it's reasonable to ask them to run new cable, this time in the closets of the bedrooms? How about the Den for the HR-20? If the metal staples don't make much difference, might they just add 15' length to the current cables by joining with a threaded F connector or would this degrade the signal?
They installed a DVR in the Den which has dark wood walls. I had run cable (not RG-6) through the wall near floor level, under the carpet only across one doorway, and along the baseboard to the opposit wall and up 3' to the TV. They ran their cable from near the ceiling, along the ceiling/wall joint, then down one corner of the room to about 3' off the ground, then straight over to the TV/DVR location. There is a speaker and other components that mostly hides this straight run across the wall to the DVR. But it doesn't leave more than about 6" of play if I wanted to move the DVR. It is also ugly white cable plainly visible (and stapled) against dark wood. I would have preferred they duplicate my original cable run at least to the doorway, then around the door as they did in the bedrooms.
The point of their installation seemed to use the absolute minimum amount of cable necessary.
In two weeks I'm getting an upgrade to HD with a slimline 5-LNB, one HD receiver only in a bedroom, the old DVR in the other bedroom, and the HD-DVR in the den. According to the D* installation videos, the dish must be grounded and they are not supposed to use metal staples to run the cable. They will need to run another cable in the bedroom with the old DVR. I will also need a multiswitch that will handle 5 cables. The current one maxes at 4.
Do you think it's reasonable to ask them to run new cable, this time in the closets of the bedrooms? How about the Den for the HR-20? If the metal staples don't make much difference, might they just add 15' length to the current cables by joining with a threaded F connector or would this degrade the signal?