Planning to switch from cable to Directv, have some questions

[Spiffyis5150]

Ok, I need some help/guidance from you guys. I've read through this forum quite a bit and found a lot of great information, but I still have a few questions. First, let me describe my setup. I have an all brick house up to the roof. The second story of the house is wood siding. The house is approxmately 4 years old. I plan to buy 3 HR21s and 1 regular box. Most rooms have at least 2 jacks with 1 coax per jack. I have all the cabling going to a central wiring closet upstairs which is where every single cable terminates including the connections from the outside(2 coax and 2 Cat5e). All my coax is RG6 quad shield. Now, here's my questions:

1) What are my options if I don't want to drill through the brick? Is it possible to run the cables through the windows like with flat coax or something? I'm really not wanting to drill into my house anymore than I need to. In my head, I was thinking about having the installer drill into the house on the second story and run the four coax cables through the attic space to my wiring closet from the dish. My main problem is the two coax per DVR(seems like that's a lot of peoples' problems). I don't want to drill into the outside of the house for each room. For the regular box, that's obviously not a problem, but I either need to find a way to use two coax to each room(maybe if I use both jacks in the rooms) or use an SWM8 which will add more money onto the initial costs but solve my problem.

2) If I go with the SWM8, should I order it before the install and have it there for when the installer comes or just tell the installer that I will live with one coax run to each room and then come back and do it after the install myself?

3) Do I need to call Direct to get the 2nd tuner going on the DVR or is just a matter of me hooking it up? Just want to make sure. I would assume option B.

4) I'm assuming that I can get the installer to run the coax from the dish to my wiring closet. Is that a bad assumption? I know that the installer will run coax from the dish to somewhere, but do you think there will be an issue of using my wiring closet? The box with all the wire in it backs up to the attic space so running cable to it from the roof is trivial(just gotta get through to the exterior). Also, since I've got all RG6 quad shield run over the whole house so is it safe to say that the installer will let me use my existing cable to my rooms?

Thanks for any help that you can give me on these questions. I really appreciate the experience and knowledge this forum provides.

[e_identity]

<snip>Most rooms have at least 2 jacks with 1 coax per jack. I have all the cabling going to a central wiring closet upstairs which is where every single cable terminates including the connections from the outside(2 coax and 2 Cat5e). All my coax is RG6 quad shield. Now, here's my questions:

1) What are my options if I don't want to drill through the brick? Is it possible to run the cables through the windows like with flat coax or something? I'm really not wanting to drill into my house anymore than I need to. In my head, I was thinking about having the installer drill into the house on the second story and run the four coax cables through the attic space to my wiring closet from the dish. My main problem is the two coax per DVR(seems like that's a lot of peoples' problems). I don't want to drill into the outside of the house for each room. For the regular box, that's obviously not a problem, but I either need to find a way to use two coax to each room(maybe if I use both jacks in the rooms) or use an SWM8 which will add more money onto the initial costs but solve my problem.

Item one is the only place where I might contribute something, and I don't pretend to be authoritative. I understand that quad shield RG6 is what DirectTV uses. You don't specify, but I understand that DirectTV also uses coax with a solid copper conductor. I believe you are correct that you need 2 coax to each HR21. By the book, the intstaller will run 4 coax from the dish, then use a multiswitch to distribute to the 4 tvs. FWIW, I drilled one 3/4" hole in my brick house and four, unterminated QuadShield RG6 coax fit nicely. That said, I suspect you can go via the attic space just as easily, but it does complicate the grounding situation (By the book, you need a grounding block where the coax enters the house, then a ground wire to (best choice based on my reading) the house ground rod. If I understand correctly, the ground wire from the grounding block to the house ground is supposed to be 6 AWG copper not more that 20 feet. It may not be possible to satisfy all these criteria if the grounding block is on the second story (and possibly on a different side of the house from the house ground rod). Lots of people skip grounding and you can read lots in these forums on the subject.) My installer said they never run 4 wires from the dish. Instead they run a twin pair from the dish to the entry point, and install a multiswitch (usually just inside) at the entry point. Can't say whether this is good, but it suggests that 2 RG6 QuadShield Coax to your closet may be enuf, install the multiswitch in the closet, then wire to the TVs from the closet. Finally, if you have one coax to a wall jack already, how hard would it be to run a second? If that isn't feasible, then I am not sure what to recommend. You can try reading about diplexing, but I don't know if that is useful in this situation. Sorry for the rambling style, hope it helps, e_identity

[Spiffyis5150]

My problem is my upstairs has no attic space above it. The grounding point is where the cable is currently terminated at the front of the house on the side of my garage, so in order to get to the wiring closet, one has to come to the back(or to the other side of the house) to get any type of attic access. I've read the many discussions here on grounding and personally I think grounding is a good thing. I did not realize that it needed to be grounded where the coax enters the house. I thought that the grounding came from the dish itself from the pics that I saw here. If that's the case then it may be difficult for me because the grounding point is the farthest point from most locations in my house that would work. Definitely something to consider. Thanks!

[putty469]

From what I have read, not many installers are trained on SWM8 because the units are not widely distributed yet. So, I would buy one and just let the installer hook up one tuner on the HR2*'s. A lot of people use a DVR with just one tuner.

It sounds like you are a great candidate for SWM8, and there are plenty of threads in this forum with folks who may be able to sell you one.

Some of the other questions you posted:

3) Just hook up the second line, nothing needed. If you use an SWM8, the cable needs to go into the tuner with the FTM label on it.
4) This should be included with the basic install. Most installers are happy to have a home pre-wired to the TV's.

Most of all, enjoy your new D* service!