Thinking about E*

[jaywdetroit]

Hello E* folk.

I am a 8 year D* customer. If any of you read the D* forums, you would know me as the squeaky wheel looking for D* to add Dual Live Buffers to the HR20.

Well I see the 622 appears to have them - so now I am curious about E*.

I posted this thread in the General Sat discussion: http://www.dbstalk.com/showthread.php?t=85927

Which contains all kinds of questions. After I posted it, it seems like it makes more sense for it to be here as most of my questions are more about E* than a direct comparison between the two.

Here's a quote:

Has anyone done a comparison between D* and E*? Is there a thread out here that does that?

I am curious about E*s offerings... but I have a ton of questions.

I will list my questions. But if there is a thread that answers these (I tried to search on D* vs. E* and ticked the server off) I will be happy if someone could direct me there.

How do the services compare price wise:

2-3 TVs HD and DVR service.

What about picture quality - the same? For HD?

How does E*'s HD DVR match up with the HR20-700? (Yes I noticed it will do Dual Buffers.)

What about the future - Has E* made any announcements to compete with D*'s HD forthcoming HD line-up?

Does E* carry FSN Detroit in HD?

If I use the E* HD DVR in Dual mode, how do I get the signal over to the other TV?

Does E* have the equivalent of what D* calls SWM? Do they have it in the works?

How do the customer service departments/installers match up?

Thanks for your thoughts everyone...

[msalvail]

Hi Jay!

Wow, you have very specific questions and many of them, at that! I am sure some of the very helpful technically minded people will answer all of your questions. I have had E* for years and only recently added D* in order to get EI but I can't compare the quality of the HD as I only get *D in SD and *E in both. I will say that on my Samsung LCD TV, the SD picture is better with *E than D* but not light years better.

James Long compares *D and *E on his website so you may want to take a look at that: http://jameslong.name/compare.html

If I use the E* HD DVR in Dual mode, how do I get the signal over to the other TV?

As far as how to go from 1 room to 2 rooms on the VIP622 HD Receiver, there is a button on the front of the receiver. So, if you're like me and mostly use your Hi Def, what we do is keep it set on 1 TV mode in order to have the PIP the majority of the time. When we want to watch something different on TV2, we just press that button. When the installer runs the cable to the 2nd tv, they set it to come in on a particular channel on TV2, one that is not in use. In our case, TV2 is set on Channel 60.

Does E* carry FSN Detroit in HD?

Channel 430 is Fox Sports Detroit on *E and I don't believe that *E has added the HD channel of that RSN yet.

What about the future - Has E* made any announcements to compete with D*'s HD forthcoming HD line-up?

E* isn't really into announcements, lol. When they added AE HD not long ago, it just sorta happened without fanfare. While advertising the potential for HD, I haven't seen anything from D* either which says 'we will have these certain channels in HD by this particular date.'

How do the customer service departments/installers match up?

As a long time D* customer, you know how subjective this question is. It depends on who answers the phone and who they send out. In my area, I found that the D* installers have been much more knowledgable than the *E installers, better trained or something. But thats in North La and over the past month. It can change, lol. I have had better luck with *E Tech Support/CSRs, at least so far. They seem to have a bit more negotiating room, especially if you get an advanced tech.

[jaywdetroit]

Thanks - I went to James' site and looked at the offering. Wow! 20 bucks a month for HD.

I wondered if a CSR would come down and contacted E*. For an equivalent package to what I have now with D*, I would have to pay 15 bucks more a month.

What a bummer! Their DVR looks pretty cool. But the thought of spending 85 bucks a month without a single pay service makes my skin crawl!

I think the gotcha for me is them putting Boomerang and National G. in the 250 tier.
Otherwise I could go with the 200.

Also they said they do not carry FSN Detroit in HD :( Deal breaker. Gotta have my Tigers in HD.

Thanks for the help!!

[JM Anthony]

I've been with E* for over 10 years now and no complaints (other than the 921 the peddled, but I digress). I've got a 622 driving a 61" DLP and it does a great job. Planet Earth is unbelievable! I really like E*'s Hi-Def package in general.

I've had no complaints with their customer service or technical support staff. I even had one of their support staff follow up on a post I left here to make sure my problem got squared away. Pretty tough to beat that!

Good luck whatever you decide to do.

John