3 LNB + 72.5 dish ---> 5 LNB + 72.5 dish install question

[KnordRW]

Hi all, new member here.

I tried searching and I looked through posts, but either my search-fu is failing me or this question hasn't been asked.

Last week I took the plunge and had D* upgrade me to the new dish and an HR20-100. This was a reschedule from an earlier no-show. Previously I had the 3 LNB dish as well as the round 72.5 dish for my locals, both hooked through a Zinwell 6x8 multiswitch to an HR10-250. All the installer did was replace the 3LNB dish with the 5 LNB dish (which only has 3 heads on it, the installer said two of them can see 2 sats each - is this true?) and then swap out the reciever. He didn't run any new cable, he said I already had what I needed. When he did the autodetect on the sats, one of them didn't detect at all (I think it was 103, but I'm not sure and I'm not at home to check right now), which he said was one of the new sats that wasn't up yet. It strikes me as odd that I would not need more wires from the dish or a new multiswitch to be ready for the new sats - I've not lost anything I had before.

So was the installer being lazy, wrong, or misinformed, or is this actually the correct configuration?

[Michael D'Angelo]

Hi all, new member here.

I tried searching and I looked through posts, but either my search-fu is failing me or this question hasn't been asked.

Last week I took the plunge and had D* upgrade me to the new dish and an HR20-100. This was a reschedule from an earlier no-show. Previously I had the 3 LNB dish as well as the round 72.5 dish for my locals, both hooked through a Zinwell 6x8 multiswitch to an HR10-250. All the installer did was replace the 3LNB dish with the 5 LNB dish (which only has 3 heads on it, the installer said two of them can see 2 sats each - is this true?) and then swap out the reciever. He didn't run any new cable, he said I already had what I needed. When he did the autodetect on the sats, one of them didn't detect at all (I think it was 103, but I'm not sure and I'm not at home to check right now), which he said was one of the new sats that wasn't up yet. It strikes me as odd that I would not need more wires from the dish or a new multiswitch to be ready for the new sats - I've not lost anything I had before.

So was the installer being lazy, wrong, or misinformed, or is this actually the correct configuration?


:welcome_s to DBStalk

Even though the dish looks like it only has 3 LNB's it actually has 5. The one has 99, 101, and 103 on it. You only need 4 lines from the dish to the Zinwell multi-switch. The dish itself has a built in multi-switch in the LNB head just like your 3 LNB dish did. It only has 4 outputs on it to run to receiver's unless you need more then 4. Then you run the 4 to the Zinwell switch just like you did with the 3 LNB dish and it gives you more outputs.

[Gary16]

I had my 3 LNB dish replaced with the 5 on Friday and, as with the install mentioned in this thread, the installer was able to use the same cabling that I had. He had to put in two Zinwell multiswitches since I have 7 active receivers and 3 of them have 2 satellite inputs each. Everything is working fine except for the fact that I can no longer feed my roof antenna thru the multiswitch to all of my hookups. Even though I'm getting HD locals now with the new dish, I was still hoping to use the antenna to feed a couple of HD tuners that are not hooked to DirecTV. Is there any possible way to still do this or do I have to run additional cabling thru the house from the roof antenna?

[Michael D'Angelo]

I had my 3 LNB dish replaced with the 5 on Friday and, as with the install mentioned in this thread, the installer was able to use the same cabling that I had. He had to put in two Zinwell multiswitches since I have 7 active receivers and 3 of them have 2 satellite inputs each. Everything is working fine except for the fact that I can no longer feed my roof antenna thru the multiswitch to all of my hookups. Even though I'm getting HD locals now with the new dish, I was still hoping to use the antenna to feed a couple of HD tuners that are not hooked to DirecTV. Is there any possible way to still do this or do I have to run additional cabling thru the house from the roof antenna?

Your MPEG4 HD receiver that will be able to receive the new HD channels you will need to run a separate line from the OTA to the units because you can not diplexe the OTA into the SAT line. The MPEG2 HD receiver's that you have since they will not be able to receive the new HD channels with them you could use two diplexer's to set it up. After the SAT line comes out of the multi-switch put a diplexer in and feed the SAT line and OTA line into it and then use a diplexer by the units to split the SAT signal and OTA signal back out.

You will have another option for the MPEG4 HD receiver later this year. You would need to get a SWM (single wire multi-switch). It is not out yet and not sure how much it will cost. If you do a search for SWM you will find all the information about it.