# To SWiM and DECA or not to SWiM and DECA



## HofstraJet (Mar 6, 2003)

I have a large setup which consists 14 HD DVRs (HR20/HR21 - all flavors) and a few cascaded multiswitches in strategic places. Currently have a slimline 5 LNB dish. All DVRs are hardwired into the home network. Everything works great, except the dish needs to be realigned.

When I call DirecTV to have the service appt for the dish realignment (can't do it myself and have protection plan), is it worth inquiring about switching over to SWiM/DECA? Any real advantages to it since all of the wiring is already in place and everything works? I see the advantage in a new install, but for an existing install with hardwired ethernet, is there any advantage?

Thanks!


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

This is another one of those "tough calls". What you have works and you seem happy. Currently the only new receiver that must have SWiM is the H25, but the HR34 [basically a double DVR] will be out soon and it too is SWiM only.
I do know someone with almost as many DVRs, who did move to a double SWiM-16 setup and DECA, which has worked well for him too.
You would sure "get your money's worth" out of the cost to upgrade. :lol:


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## DarkLogix (Oct 21, 2011)

I've read that Whole home DVR only supports upto 10 DVR's playlists (not sure if thats accurate but anyway)

with 2 SWM16's you'd have to have some sort of daca bridge to link all 14 DVR's
I'd go with ethernet as you'll have a choke point where the 2 Deca's go down to 100mbit

(idealy when you uplink a switch to another you want to have the uplink be greater than the commonly used speed) so with 2 deca systems linking via a ethernet/deca setup it would be link having 2 100mbit switches uplinking at only 100mbit

now if you can find a way to bridge them without dropping to 100mbit it would be better but I doubt that theres a device for that so I'd stick with ethernet for that size


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

DarkLogix said:


> I've read that Whole home DVR only supports upto 10 DVR's playlists (not sure if thats accurate but anyway)
> 
> with 2 SWM16's you'd have to have some sort of daca bridge to link all 14 DVR's
> I'd go with ethernet as you'll have a choke point where the 2 Deca's go down to 100mbit
> ...


While I don't have a system this complex, "it seems" the OP has 14 DVRs currently working.
Bridging two DECA clouds with 2 BB DECAs and a switch to then connect to the router, doesn't seem like the choke point you suggest. Balancing the DVRs between the two SWiM-16, and therefore the two DECA clouds, would seem to keep the switch within the 100 Mb/s, as the most one could have is 7 streams going each way.


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## lugnutathome (Apr 13, 2009)

HofstraJet said:


> I have a large setup which consists 14 HD DVRs (HR20/HR21 - all flavors) and a few cascaded multiswitches in strategic places. Currently have a slimline 5 LNB dish. All DVRs are hardwired into the home network. Everything works great, except the dish needs to be realigned.
> 
> When I call DirecTV to have the service appt for the dish realignment (can't do it myself and have protection plan), is it worth inquiring about switching over to SWiM/DECA? Any real advantages to it since all of the wiring is already in place and everything works? I see the advantage in a new install, but for an existing install with hardwired ethernet, is there any advantage?
> 
> Thanks!


I too have a large setup with 11 receivers 7 are DVRs (OK only half the DVRs you have) but I've coax drops at a minimum of 85 ft out to 191. SWM works great for this but I'm using in line amplification for 4 of the boxes and that would not be DECA friendly.

If you are meaning "large" as in long runs in addition to a high DVR count then DECA would concern me at its present point in evolution.

I run a small "cloud" here for 2 H25 receivers and they work fine but I would be concerned about having to have a large portion of traffic in your case throttled down into single CCK Ethernet points to bridge the SWM16 units via your network.

If you only have 3 or 4 "consumers" in your home active at any given time then no biggie. If you've more than 4 or 5 active consumers at a given time and they all happen to be crossing SWMs through the Ether it might be a problem.

Due to the size of my infrastructure, I've had to contract its various implementation phases out to get it to a point where I can maintain it within it's various current evolutions. (old limited HD, the big switch to lots of HD, and now SWM) each of which required different multiswiching and wiring requirements (when including a terrestrial feed as well)).

The SWM upgrade to me is a no brainer. It's a wonderful thing. No longer are 2 drops required for a DVR although I suspect in your case that's already in place so it may not be such a big deal. It is a bit more weather tolerant too.

In the end if it ain't broke you probably shouldn't fix it. But that being said, the SWM architecture gives you some flexibility your current multiswitching does not.

Don "new toys are always fun" Bolton


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## inkahauts (Nov 13, 2006)

HofstraJet said:


> I have a large setup which consists 14 HD DVRs (HR20/HR21 - all flavors) and a few cascaded multiswitches in strategic places. Currently have a slimline 5 LNB dish. All DVRs are hardwired into the home network. Everything works great, except the dish needs to be realigned.
> 
> When I call DirecTV to have the service appt for the dish realignment (can't do it myself and have protection plan), is it worth inquiring about switching over to SWiM/DECA? Any real advantages to it since all of the wiring is already in place and everything works? I see the advantage in a new install, but for an existing install with hardwired ethernet, is there any advantage?
> 
> Thanks!


Until you get an hr34, or a h25, I probably wouldn't bother if everything is working great today. However, without seeing an actual wiring diagram and distances and lines dropped (it sounds like you have multiswitches in multiple locations) then I don't even know how easy it would be to convert. In general I prefer DECA, and if you where having to do a major rewire for some reason, then I'd say yes, but a simple dish realignment is difficult to justify the switch with such a complex setup.

I imagine directv would charge quite a bit if you needed a lot or rewiring or multiple swims beyond two, if you didn't want to rewire what you have.


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## lugnutathome (Apr 13, 2009)

DarkLogix said:


> I've read that Whole home DVR only supports upto 10 DVR's playlists (not sure if thats accurate but anyway)
> 
> with 2 SWM16's you'd have to have some sort of daca bridge to link all 14 DVR's
> I'd go with ethernet as you'll have a choke point where the 2 Deca's go down to 100mbit
> ...


For the bandied about "limits" it's really DECA which is the gating factor. DECA was designed for an "every home" demographic and it fits nearly everyone's needs suitably but it wasn't made to scale out beyond its engineered demographic target.

For those of us "commercial scale" residential accounts we scale beyond it's engineered capacity in which case Ethernet is there to save the day.

Since the OP is running 14 DVRs and one of the Illuminati here had said "unlimited clients" on Ethernet but they thought "an 11 DVR" limit. It would seem the actual limit may in fact be in how much playlist data can be processed via a client list process on Ethernet vs how many available DECA channels are on a DECA implementation.

I'm with you on the port contention reasoning as well. That's why my DECA cloud only contains clients and all my DVRs connect via Ethernet.

Don "time to make the doughnuts" Bolton


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## DarkLogix (Oct 21, 2011)

veryoldschool said:


> While I don't have a system this complex, "it seems" the OP has 14 DVRs currently working.
> Bridging two DECA clouds with 2 BB DECAs and a switch to then connect to the router, doesn't seem like the choke point you suggest. Balancing the DVRs between the two SWiM-16, and therefore the two DECA clouds, would seem to keep the switch within the 100 Mb/s, as the most one could have is 7 streams going each way.


the choke point I speak of is if you have 2 7(8) node deca clouds its like having 2 8 port 100Mbit switches linked together via 100mbit

on a switch any port has 100mbit to any other port but if uplinked via only 100mbit then any port on switch 1 has to share that 100mbit uplink with all the other ports

it could become an issue and it might not, but has anyone yet monitored the data usage of a DVR streaming HD then multiply that by 7 and you might be past 100mbit (ieadly if you have 8 100mbit ports you'd want a gig port to uplink with so that all 8 would get full speed to the other 8)

as he already has them connected via ethernet I'd leave that in place but would do the SWiM part for future proofing and to lower the number of cables needed

if they have a reverse BSF (ie one that blocks all but deca) then he could link them together as 1 cloud, but I doubt that it would be easy to find such a device


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

DarkLogix said:


> it could become an issue and it might not, but *has anyone yet monitored the data usage of a DVR streaming HD* then multiply that by 7 and you might be past 100mbit...


"Yes" and why I don't think 7 MRV streams through 100 Mb ethernet would be a problem.


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## DarkLogix (Oct 21, 2011)

veryoldschool said:


> "Yes" and why I don't think 7 MRV streams through 100 Mb ethernet would be a problem.


So how much throughput does a HD MVR stream use?
I said that because uplinking an 8port 100mbit switch to anotehr over only 100mbit just isn't a good design though the problems with such a design might not be an issue with a given application


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## HofstraJet (Mar 6, 2003)

Based upon my observations at the switch, an HD stream from one DVR to another can be anywhere from 4-10 Mbps, depending on the quality and needs of the broadcast (e.g., Smithsonian is on the high end, local ABC on the low end). Thus, 7 streams over 10/100 should not be an issue. ATSC standard is 19 Mbps, and we know DirecTV comes nowhere near that number. Numerous threads on that around here, such as this one: http://www.dbstalk.com/showthread.php?p=2885826 and this one: http://www.dbstalk.com/showthread.php?p=2738926#post2738926

Thank you everyone for your advice. For those who asked, my setup is concentrated in the home theater (6 DVRs) and Master BR (3 DVRs) with the rest spread across the other bedrooms, garage, home office, etc. We have a max of four users at any one time, two being most common. Each location has two coax drops per DVR and an ethernet drop. Four lines from the dish feed one 16-port multiswitch. I have two multiswitches downstream from that, one in the home theater and the other in the master BR. The rest of the units feed directly off the first multiswitch. The setup was done prior to whole-home service, hence the multitude of DVRs in different locations (many duplicate recordings, depending on where I wanted to watch). I will probably pare down as I empty DVRs of content. All that said, doesn't sound like there is any real reason to make the switch at the time. Will wait for a compelling reason.

Thank you again for your advice. I don't spend nearly as much time here as I used to in my younger days, but am still part of the CE program and do what I can to assist.


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