# Dish 500 + Dish 300 = Dish 1000?



## jas88 (Feb 8, 2007)

I just came back to DISH Network from being with DTV for 2 years because I want to go to HD. So I got one HD DVR (622) and 2 HD receivers (211) to accomodate my 4 tvs (1 HD now, 2 more planned). Anyway, one of the receivers needs to go in my shop which is about 200' from my house and is served by it's own dish. I told the DISH CSR this and she said the installer would take care of it. Well, when he got here, of course he knew nothing about it. It was 6pm before he even got here and I was just wanting it done, so I had him put it all in the house and figured I would take one of the 211s later and move it to the shop. So now I am seeing what it will take to do this.

Of course, the easiest route would be to buy another Dish 1000 dish. But I am cheap and I have a bit of old equipment I would like to utilize if possible. Plus I do have some knowledge of how this all works, afterall, when I first went with DISH in 1996, you pretty much HAD to do it yourself, which I did.

So my question is this - I have my old Dish 500 dish from before. Can I use that to tune 110 and 119 and then add a Dish 300 to get 129 for HD? Will the legacy LNBs I have on the 500 work with the 211? I was thinking I could hook them together with a SW21 switch, but is it that easy? Or do I have to have DishPro LNBs to work with the 211?

Also, I don't have a Dish 300 currently. I have my Directv dish, two of them in fact. Can I use that, or does it have to be a DISH LNB?

Thanks for any help. BTW having mulitiple dishes hanging off of my shop is not a problem.


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## DP1 (Sep 16, 2002)

jas88 said:


> So my question is this - I have my old Dish 500 dish from before. Can I use that to tune 110 and 119 and then add a Dish 300 to get 129 for HD? Will the legacy LNBs I have on the 500 work with the 211? I was thinking I could hook them together with a SW21 switch, but is it that easy? Or do I have to have DishPro LNBs to work with the 211?
> 
> Also, I don't have a Dish 300 currently. I have my Directv dish, two of them in fact. Can I use that, or does it have to be a DISH LNB?
> 
> Thanks for any help. BTW having mulitiple dishes hanging off of my shop is not a problem.


You can do all you propose just fine. Legacy switches and lnb's will work with the 211.

Including the DirecTv dish and lnb as long as it doesnt have some sort of built in multiswitch.. that wouldnt be compatable. But if it's just a run of the mill single slot dish and lnb you could use that for 129.

Does your Dish 500 have a TWIN lnb where you get both 110 and 119 off one output? Or did it have 2 seperate lnb's where you had to tie those together with a SW21 to begin with? It'd be easier if it were a TWIN becausee then you could just tie 129 from the other dish into the mix with the one SW21. Theres a little more to it if you had to tie 110/119 together in the first place with it's own SW21.


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## jas88 (Feb 8, 2007)

> Including the DirecTv dish and lnb as long as it doesnt have some sort of built in multiswitch.. that wouldnt be compatable. But if it's just a run of the mill single slot dish and lnb you could use that for 129.


The Dtv dish that is on my shop now is just an old single LNB unit. The one they took off of the house last night I think has a switch in it so I won't use that one. I know it is dual LNB at least so why bother when the one I have in place will do?



> Does your Dish 500 have a TWIN lnb where you get both 110 and 119 off one output? Or did it have 2 seperate lnb's where you had to tie those together with a SW21 to begin with? It'd be easier if it were a TWIN becausee then you could just tie 129 from the other dish into the mix with the one SW21. Theres a little more to it if you had to tie 110/119 together in the first place with it's own SW21.


I'll look tonite to be sure but I think it has the twin lnb. Thanks for your very quick response, sounds like I have everything I need except the SW21.


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## BobaBird (Mar 31, 2002)

The EKB Dish 500 page shows the difference between a Twin and 2 Duals.

If you have a legacy Twin, just run it and the D* LNB through an SW21. If you have 2 duals, you will not be able to just add another SW21 because both switches will respond to the same commands. In that case, you could get a Microyal SW21X (essentially half an SW42) for 119/110, then run its output and the D* LNB through an SW21.


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## jas88 (Feb 8, 2007)

I checked last night and I do have the Twin. It has the embossed Dish label on the back and has 2 ports. So I just hook one of those to the SW21, then hook my old D* single to the SW21, and run the cable to my 211. I am happy it is that simple. If I didn't make this clear before, I am only servicing 1 receiver with this setup.

How do I go about aiming the seperate dishes? I assume my 211 will let me choose which sat it is measuring signal strength on and I can then aim each dish individually?


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## CABill (Mar 20, 2005)

You are better off to aim the dish with it connected directly to the receiver w/o the SW21 (use a barrel connector instead of the SW21). The receiver only finds out what kind of switch and sat configuration after it issues the commands for all possible combinations and one command produces a signal from a different satellite. When you connect the Twin to the receiver, you even need to make sure you are getting the satellite you intend through the correct LNB.

Once you have individual satellites right, connect to the SW21 as you described.


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## jas88 (Feb 8, 2007)

Okey doke, thanks much for all the tips. I hope to pick up an SW21 this weekend at EPO in Houston.


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## jas88 (Feb 8, 2007)

Well I am back again on this and as you can see it took me quite a while longer than expected to get my shop finished and then get an HD tv in there but now I have the goods and I am trying to make this happen.

Here's the problem - My 211 receiver cannot see the 129 dish when going thru the SW21 switch. I have a Twin with one cable running into the SW21 "Dish 1" slot and an old D* dish tuned to 129 in the "Dish 2" slot. Whatever dish is in the "Dish 2" slot, the receiver will not recognize when doing a Check Switch.

I called Dish Network thinking maybe my 211 needed a software upgrade or something, and they told me that I could not do what I was proposing, that I would need to run 2 cables from the Twin and then connect those 2 with the single into a DP34 switch.

Is this right? You guys told me before the SW21 would work and I trust you all more than the DISH folks on the phone.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

jas88 said:


> A while back I had a thread where you guys advised me to add a single dish tuned to Sat 129 and hook it to my Dish 500 Twin which receives 110/119 via a SW21 switch. It took me longer than expected to get my shop finished and then get an HD tv in there (the old thread got locked) but now I am trying to make this happen.


Your last post on this was 02-09-07 ... a little "longer than expected". Welcome Back!



> Here's the problem - My 211 receiver cannot see the 129 dish. I have a Twin with one cable running into the SW21 "Dish 1" slot and an old D* dish tuned to 129 in the "Dish 2" slot. Whatever dish is in the "Dish 2" slot, the receiver will not recognize when doing a Check Switch.
> 
> I called Dish Network thinking maybe my 211 needed a software upgrade or something, and they told me that I could not do what I was proposing, that I would need to run 2 cables from the Twin and then connect those 2 with the single into a DP34 switch.
> 
> Is this right? You guys told me before the SW21 would work and I trust you all more than the DISH folks on the phone.


We need a little more info on what you have.

Is the Twin a "DishPro" Twin or legacy? What LNB do you have on the second DISH? What was your wiring "before" adding the SW21? Is everything the same as it was two years ago?


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## BattleZone (Nov 13, 2007)

The DirecTV LNB doesn't have a switch built in (neither would a Dish Legacy dual LNB), so that's probably confusing the receiver. You might have to aim the Dish 500 first, then connect the two dishes with the SW21 and run a check switch. That should recognize all the hardware, even though you aren't getting 129 signal yet. You should still be able to then select 129 in the dish pointing window and move the dish until you get signal.

I'd start by making sure the DirecTV mast was plumb and presetting the elevation based on what DishPointer.com tells you for 129 from your address.


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## jas88 (Feb 8, 2007)

The wiring is the same as (almost) 2 years ago. I have a Legacy Twin (I mean it's a Twin but not a DishPro, does that make it "Legacy"?) which has 2 outputs on the LNB but the cable is only hooked to one of them. Since '07 I have been running this dish only and it receives 110/119. So now I have an HD tv in my shop office and I added a plain old single LNB D* dish which I have aimed at 129 by hooking it directly to my 211 and setting it to highest signal per the old instructions in this thread. Then I hooked up both dishes to the SW21 switch and ran a Check Switch. I have tried it with the 110/119 dish hooked to "Dish 1" port and also with the 129 dish hooked to "Dish 1" port and whichever one is on "Dish 1" the 211 can see and the other dish (meaning the one hooked to "Dish 2" port) it ignores. Whichever way I hook it, it then receives the channels on that dish just fine but cannot see the others (i.e. when hooked to 110/119 I get ESPN HD, when hooked to 129 I get ESPN2 HD). So each dish works as it should independently, I just cannot get the receiver to see both dishes at once so I get all channels that the 3 sats carry.

In the Help section of the Check Switch area, it says "For SW21 4-sat setup, see user manual" but my user manual for the 211 says nothing about this.


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## BattleZone (Nov 13, 2007)

You may have a bad SW21. And IIRC, the Twin gets hooked to the "2" port on the switch, while the "1" is hooked to the single LNB.

Your Twin should just say Dish Network on the front, meaning it's a legacy LNB, and not have DishPro or DishProPlus markings.









Legacy Twin









DishPro Twin









DishPro Plus Twin


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## jas88 (Feb 8, 2007)

I for sure have the Legacy Twin. It has Dish Network embossed on the LNB. I do NOT have a DishPro. 

I don't think I have a bad SW21, this one I am using now is brand new, actually it's an SW21X but it says it will work as an SW21. I also have an old SW21 I bought back in '07 which I tried first. When it didn't work as I expected, I bought a new one to be sure. 

So, I tried swapping the inputs from the satellites again and this time my receiver can see 129 and 110 and it says the switch is an SW42. So we are making progress, but it cannot see the 119 satellite.

So it is seeing both dishes, but only one satellite from the twin. Does this mean I need to add another cable from my twin and run those into another SW21, and from that SW21 to the one I already have? Or what?


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## BattleZone (Nov 13, 2007)

No, that wouldn't work; there are already 2 levels of switches, with the internal switch in the Twin. I've seen this configuration work (the one you tried), and Dish has wiring diagrams for it.

As a Dish installer, my solution would be swapping out the LNBs for a DPP Twin and a DP Dual. It might actually be cheaper for you to pay for a service call...


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## jas88 (Feb 8, 2007)

I *really* don't want to place a service call, hell, I'll replace the Twin with 2 single LNBs before I do that.

Let me ask this question - does the SW21 have to be within a certain distance of the Twin in order to make the Twin's switch work? Because it seems that, since I can see 110 from the Twin and 129 from the single, the switch inside the Twin is the one that is not working in this setup.

There is about 50' of cable between my SW21 and my Twin, is that too far? Does the SW21 have to be real close to the Twin in order to get the signal thru to the Twin's switch? My 2 dishes are not next to each other, they are about 50' apart, the 129 dish is very close to the receiver and the Twin is way on the other end of the shop. 

I did find the Dish Network wiring diagram for my setup and you are right this should be working, but I am thinking that normally the 2 dishes would be next to each other so the runs between the SW21 and the dishes would be very short. I have one run that is 50' and one that is about 20', do they need to be more equal in length?


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## BobaBird (Mar 31, 2002)

You need an SW21 which is the only option for a legacy cascade. The SW21x uses different commands, I think the same as an SW42 (but it's only for 1 tuner) which is essentially what's in the Twin.


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## jas88 (Feb 8, 2007)

> You need an SW21 which is the only option for a legacy cascade.


Well, OK, I guess I can get *another* SW21 but the website where I got this one says "can also work alone as a regular SW21 switch" and "Compatible with Legacy DISH Systems" so I thought this one would be OK. Does this mean it would work with 2 single LNBs but not with my Twin?


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## BobaBird (Mar 31, 2002)

Yes. If you have 3 separate legacy LNBs, you can use an SW21x between 2 of them (much like a Twin), running it and the 3rd LNB to the SW21 which is always closest to the receiver in a cascade.

The legacy cascade uses an SW21 to add a satellite slot to another multi-sat switch. That other switch can't be another SW21 because both switches receive commands from the STB, so it has to be a switch that responds to a different command set. The 2- or 3-sat switch can be a Twin, Quad, SW42, SW44, SW64, or Microyal SW21X


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## jas88 (Feb 8, 2007)

OK, so is the switch in the Twin not considered an SW21? What is it? SW42? This all makes sense what you are telling me, I will round up a true SW21 and go at it again. I already have an SW21 from before but it does even less than the SW21x so I think it may be bad.

BTW, is it important or not important to unplug my receiver whenever I am connecting or unconnecting these switches? The instructions say I must but I was wondering if this is a waste of time or not. Thanks for your help.


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## BobaBird (Mar 31, 2002)

The legacy Twin is essentially an SW42, and the SW21X has been described as exactly half an SW42.

Would an installer help with the other question?


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## jas88 (Feb 8, 2007)

I called the website where I got the SW21x and the guy there told me he also did not think the SW21x would work with the Legacy Twin, so we are on to something here. I am currently waiting for 2 new SW21s to arrive, I will post my results when they get here. Thanks to all for your help and suggestions.


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## jas88 (Feb 8, 2007)

New SW21 arrived today and it worked the first time out. I now have all 3 sats (110, 119, 129) showing and getting my music channels again. BobaBird nailed it. Thanks very muchly!


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