need upgrade,2nd dish,721 advice

[bunkers]

I currently have a Dish with twin LNB that is hooked up to a 301 and 501.

I about ready to call DISH and have them come out and install the free 2nd (locals) dish for me, because I really do want some of the locals which require that extra dish.

I also plan on replacing my 301 with a 721 in the next 6 months or less.

I have a couple of questions:

(1) The back of my home is facing almost straight south, and my existing Dish 500 is mounted facing straight out from my houses' South side. Would my 2nd (locals) dish be tilted much (or require a non-south facing mount)? How close can the dishes be mounted to each other?

(2) Would it be likely that with my free 2nd dish install that I would end up with the switches needed to install a 721 down the road without having to upgrade dishes and/or switches again. This is where I really need help. Is there a configuration of dishes and/or switches I need to be looking for to enable both the 721 and 501 down the road? I am not concerned about adding more receivers down the road -- 2 will be fine.

Thanks in advance to any and all who can share some insights on this with me.

Scott

[sbill67]

Question 1 Yes your 2nd dish will be facing considerably more to the east, nearly back to back of your Dish 500.

Question 2 There are a few variables to look at on switches. The ideal situation for you is, 1 DishPro Twin, a single DishPro LNBF, and DP 3 to 4 switch. This will minimize extra cabling into your home as well as give access to all 3 orbital locations as well as provide you enough outputs for 4 tuners. Im not sure what Dish Net. gives in the way of switches on a 2nd dish but most likely will be SW-21's, they will not help you for the 721's extra tuner.
Hope his helps.

[Jacob S]

(1) It may require a non-south facing mount/mast. You could try moving the mast down in which would move the dish away from the building helping prevent it from hitting the building when it goes to the left. Your numbers will not be true though on your elevation setting. The two dishes can be mounted right next to each other

(2) I seriously doubt they will just give you the switches because they might think that you are just saying that just to get some extra switches. More than likely you will end up having to buy them, but you may be able to talk to Dish about this. You might be better off waiting until you do get the 721. You will require a quad lnbf or an additional dish for the 119 slot and an additional dish (or a dish 500 skewed at 0 with two dual lnbf's if both lnbf's would be able to pick up the same slot - not sure if this would work or not).

[bunkers]

I have figured out that in order to mount a 61.5 2nd dish onto the south wall of my home, that I will need to and angle of only 22 deg South of due east. My house is basically oriented with the south wall at 180 deg. straight south. So my east wall is 90 and I need to point to 113 to get the 61.5 location.

Does anyone know if dish would mount this on my S facing wall (preferred) or if they would reccomend mounting off a pole, or adaptor or perhaps even the east side of my deck (which is very large -- and about an addtional 10-15' away). Any links to places with side mounts and/or poles would be appreciated. Thanks in advance, Scott B.

[bunkers]

How much flexibility does DISH give you (in terms of mounting location) when having them install the free 2nd dish for 61.5 locals ?

I have 2 preferred locations, and I would hope they would use one of those locations only. One is mounted on the south wall maybe a few feet west of the my current dish 500 install ... the other location would be on my adjacent deck -- maybe 15' west and 3-6' south (facing east, or 113 deg.)

[boba]

The most accurate answers to your questions are going to come from Dish Network Service Corporation(DNSC) call and set up the free second dish installation with them and ask your questions. If you currently have Dish Pro on your system they will have to use a DP-34 switch. If you have a Legacy Twin they may swap out for Dish Pro because both of your current receivers will support DP and it is simpler for the installers.

[EvanS]

bunkers - my entire situation was almost exactly the same as yours.
back of house facing south, Dish500 with TWIN LNB supporting 501/301 combo.
I got the side wing dish installed, but pointing to 148 since I am on west coast. Not sure if Colorado really seeks 61.5 or 148??
Anyway, my big difference from you is that I originally installed my main dish on the south wall of my house, right on the southwest corner. When they came to install the side sat dish they simply went around the corner a couple inches and mounted the new dish pointing west. As a matter of fact, the 2nd dish is a Dish500 with DUAL LNB. They also provided a pair of SW21's...each of which incorporated a single 110/119 cable from the main dish and a 148 feed from the side dish. The cabling from the dish area to my receivers stayed the same.
Anyway, this worked good. Then I also wanted to ditch the 301, move the 501 to where it used to be and replace the 501 with a new 721. Mark @ DishDepot got me fixed up. In addition to the 721 Mark sent a DishPro QUAD LNB. I slightly rewired so that 2 cables from the QUAD went into seperate SW21's along with the 2 cables from the side sat. The outputs of both SW21's now run to the 721 tuners so I get all the channels. Now that the 501 has replaced the 301, the original cable runs to the 501, but I chose to not bother getting the side sat fed to the 501. Pretty much watched by the kids, so they dont, care.

hope this helps

[scooper]

Bunkers - I beleive the rest of the Denver locals are on the 148 satellite, not the 61.5 !

[bunkers]

Thanks scooper ... I feel so stupid -- your right, its 148 !! Saved me a lot of embarassment and frustration ... thanks! ;-)