# Dish deactivates the split networks tuner outside of P/T (update: no, wrong information)



## zerdian1 (Jun 26, 2014)

*The second tech said Dish has deactivated the split tuner feature outside of Prime Time that allowed the users to schedule 4 network HDTV stations to record using one Tuner.*
Dish has removed cability to record networks on one tuner outside of the 3 hour P/T window.
For the last 1.5 years Dish Hopper with Sling and the Dish Hopper have been able to record the 4 HDTV networks outside of Prime Time on one tuner, if the shows were at the same time.
The programming side still works that way. I have morning shows all showing the same one blue tuner forToday on NBC, Good Morning America on ABC and CBS This Morning on CBS. All three morning shows did get recorded. But the Evening news even thought the highest priority does not get recorded. I have the Evening News on three of the networks. the programming guide all say they are recorded on one blue tuner with same color code for series record: Blue for ABC Evening News, NBC Evening News and CBS Evening News. And for 3 days in a row none of the shows got recorded. they say cancelled by user master bedroom. And 3 days in a row they have been cancelled. I called Dish Advanced Tech Support several days in a row. the first day an advanced tech said to delete the 3 timers network timers and recreat them. that did nothing. *The second tech said Dish has deactivated the split tuner feature outside of Prime Time*. The Programming side Hopper box, I am told, looks at the satellite and if the shows are on the same satellite they can use the split tuner. Only Dish forgot to tell their programming side that schedules the tuners as the network programs at the same time outside of prime time still have the same color tuner, in my case blue color coded tuner assigned to multiple networks at the same time. the DVR button says n shows recorded and says 0 conflicts. but for the actual recording does not work as the programming guide says they will. *THE HIGH PRIORITY DOES NOT SEEM TO MATTER.* they just do not record even though the 3 news shows are the top 3 of of the first 4 timers. instead all lower priority shows get assigned to the other tuners and they seem to record if not on a network station. I assume here from the programming side, sees that the high priority timers are scheduled to be recorded, so lower priority shows can be scheduled to be recorded. but in the implementation, the split tuner is now disabled outside of the prime time windows (8 to 11), but the proramming side of the hopper still thinks it is working like it has for the last 1.5 years. Very Bad Move on Dish's part to take away a feature that has giver more capability to their customers over the last 1.5 years. It is like removing 3 of our tuners. Dish still advertises record 6 programs at once but now it applies only to Prime time. I am sure their lawyers will put that in the fine print. But first they ahve to correct their Programming of the tuners and the Priority to get that working correctly again, albeit with 3 less tuners outside of primetime.


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## P Smith (Jul 25, 2002)

don't cry  it's just a TV


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## zerdian1 (Jun 26, 2014)

Not crying. Just upset that Dish discovered they had a feature working for 18 months, that they did not plan, so they disabled part of it. But they did an incomplete job. The programming side still allocates up to four network timers to one tuner. I am unhappy with Dish for decreasing capability in such a poor manner.


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## P Smith (Jul 25, 2002)

wait when they will start charging for the feature


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

zerdian1 said:


> Not crying. Just upset that Dish discovered they had a feature working for 18 months, that they did not plan, ...


How do you KNOW that DISH did not plan to allow 24/7 sharing of one tuner for recording the four major networks in each market? The original release and marketing of the Hopper was prime time only and DISH worked to expand the feature to share the tuner 24/7.

You're posting as if DISH was surprised that the tuner sharing worked 24/7. They were not.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

Who said they disabled it anyway? They worked to enable this feature outside of primetime... and I've seen nothing from Dish that says they have disabled it.

Are you sure that you aren't experiencing a bug and just haven't found someone at Dish who is able to fix your problem?


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## zerdian1 (Jun 26, 2014)

The advanced Tech team at dish is the one that said when Dish recently discovered the split tuner was working outside of primetime they set about to disable it.. They double checked with the Advanced Tech Team Supervisor and confirmed that the split network turner outside of primetime is now disabled. but every evening at 6:30PM Eeastern the 3 networks broadcast the evening news. I have been recordign them for a year and a half. The last 3 days they did not record. when I check the Daily Schedule after the fact. It shows the evening news shows were Cancelled by User, Master Bedroom. That is my Hopper and I am the only user and I did not cancell the evening news shows. I have the 3 news shows each with their own timer, Priority 2,3,& 4 for ABC, CBS & NBC EVENING NEWS SHOWS. My priority 1 is the World Cup on ESPN. Today at 1PM is the USA v. Germany World Cup game. the game will be over at 3. so all 3 news shows should record. I skipped all other low priority shows that showed up in the schedule. so whether it uses the split timer or the three individual tuners, the 3 news shows should record. at the moment they all show up as scheduled and using the single blue tuner, which is tuner 3. currently three morning network shows are recording using tuner 3 which is the blue tuner.. Tuner 1 and 2 are available. *SO THIS SHOWS THAT THE SPLIT TUNER FOR THE NETWORKS IS RECORDING THE 3 NETWORK MORNING SHOWS. TUNERS 1 & 2 ARE IDLE / AVAILABLE.* the TV Activity shows 1 of 3 tuners in use. line at bottom says watch anytime options - No Tuner Required.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

Which is exactly what I was getting at... Either you're talking to someone not actually a Dish employee (are you sure you are calling Dish and not a reseller?) OR you're talking to someone who doesn't know that they are talking about.

IF the "Advanced Tech Team" "recently discovered" this feature, they aren't very Advanced. In the beginning PTAT was the only time the tuner worked in this manner. Programmer/engineers made a dedicated effort to enable this functionality 24/7 outside of PTAT and announced it in a press release even! So anyone in the "Advanced Tech" group that only discovered this recently is not so advanced, frankly. It was an intended feature that Dish bragged about.

It also isn't something that has been disabled.

If you look around the forum, you will see other non-LiL related scenarios where people are seeing canceled timers in the manner you are seeing... for other channels... Most of them are fixed by a red-button reset OR unplugging and re-plugging power. Some have had their Hoppers replaced to fix the problem.

There are also scenarios under which one of your tuners could be failing and that creates a conflict if you have other timers and then priorities kick in and cancel some things too.

Basically, if this keeps happening, you are having a problem that you aren't getting proper help to diagnose if the "Advanced" team is telling you incorrect information.


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## zerdian1 (Jun 26, 2014)

I called Dish. Not a supplier. It is the Dish Network Hopper advanced tech team.
Granted many of the replies I have been getting, do not sound like Experienced Engineers
But more like junior customer care specialists.

But Dish has my phone routed to the advanced Hopper Tech team whenever I select Tech Support.

I am a Retired Chief Scientist and Chief Engineer. I worked on all the moon landings and putting GPS in the FAA. 
I have had Dish Network for 9 years.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

I am currently (6pm ET) recording all three of my local network affiliated news station's evening news. Plus a non-news program on the fourth channel. Plus a program from a cable channel. Plus I'm watching a different cable channel live.

Five recordings in progress, one separate live viewing. Six tuners at 6pm.

I do not know why your receiver is not performing - but it is 6pm and I'm doing fine. I'll record the 6:30pm newscasts to see what happens there.

-- EDIT --
6:30pm programs recorded fine. Anyone else having problems? Anyone else want to test (perhaps with tomorrow's news or a west coast subscriber with the 6:30 newscasts)?


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## zerdian1 (Jun 26, 2014)

*DISH IS KEEPING THE SPLIT TUNER OUTSIDE OF P/T.*
I spoke with the manager of the Dish Advanced Tech Team. 
I Relayed the info given to me yesterday and day before by Advanced Tech team member and their supervisor confirmed.
The Dish Adv Teck Mgr said be assured that Dish is keeping the Split tuner outside of P/T and not going to diminish current features. 
_*That the info from the Adv Tech Team member and confirmed by their supervisor was not correct*_.
I told him that I posted the info I had received on Dish website and on the DBSTalk website. In the past we have taken the senior engineers in the Dish Advanced Tech Team at their word. 
In the last few months the quality and knowldge level of the Adv Tech team seem to have decreased, noticably, over the previous year. 
I have been a Dish customer for nearly 9 years and a Hopper customer for close to two years. The Adv Tech Mgr had my file and said it is more like 8 years, 9 months and 15 days.
I have been a Chief Scientist and a have been a Chief Engineer. 
I no longer feel that I am speaking with knowlegable people in the Dish Adv. Tech Team anymore. 
They seem to make stuff up on the fly. I get a different incorrect answer if I call multiple times about the same problem.
This needs to be corrected.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

So ... did your evening recordings work?

You confirmed above that recording programs outside of primetime worked on your receiver with the morning shows - it should not work any differently with the evening shows.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

Sorry you are having so many problems... and I truly hope your actual problem gets corrected (or perhaps has already self-corrected). It doesn't help anyone if you call Dish and someone there gives you incorrect or misleading information. Unfortunately this is not news, nor will you be the last person to get some strangely incorrect info from Dish. This seems to be a "thing" with a lot of companies, so Dish is in good (or rather bad) company in this regard... I have lost track the number of times I have dealt with someone over the phone who knew far less than I did, which meant I was not talking to someone qualified to fix my problem since it was above my means to diagnose and thus WAY above the person to whom I was talking's head.


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## zerdian1 (Jun 26, 2014)

*THE THREE EVENING NEWS SHOWS WERE RECORDED ON ONE TUNER3, BUT I HAD TO SKIP ALL LOWER PRIORITY SHOWS IN THE SCHEDULE NEAR THE NEWS.*
Three days in a row they did not work only for high priority evening news shows. But lower priority shows were recorded.
Today I deleted or skipped any program of lower priority that had a recording around the time so that the 3 news shows would be recorded.
I was able to watch all three.

Since my news is now the highest priority, lower priority shows were still commanding the tuners. 
I skipped all lower priority shows in the schedule. 
I think There is still a Priority problem.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

My 6pm test timers were the lowest priority (68 through 70) and worked fine, even with another higher priority (13 of 70) timer recording. (The timer for the fourth local channel was priority 46 but was initially skipped because it was an "only new" timer - I restored it to make sure all four locals were recording.)

On your Hopper, how many timers were "skipped by priority" at 6:30pm before you deleted or skipped programs of lower priority?


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## zerdian1 (Jun 26, 2014)

Zero were skipped by priority.. 
Low priority timers over took high priority timers.
The high priority timers that were bypassed, the schedule shows cancelled by user.
And I did not cancel the timers.
Today, I went to schedule and everything that was scheduled to also run in same time frame as the evening news shows and I did a Skip.
So all three networks recorded.
Since I watched it happening, I noticed that the three programs were using blue tuner three.
Tuners 1 and 2 were available.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

Just for clarity and because many people confuse this... When you say "low" and "high" priority timers... what do you mean?

For reference... Priority 1 is the highest priority, and the priority decreases as the numbers increase... so priority 5 is higher priority than priority 10, priority 12 is higher than priority 20, and so forth.

I just want to be sure we are all on the same page.


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## zerdian1 (Jun 26, 2014)

Two days ago and the preceeding two days, my three daily evening news shows were priority 1,3, & 4 None of them were recorded. But My Priority 79 and 80 shows were recorded instead.
Yesterday afternoon, I went to the Hopper's schedule and issued SKIP EVENTs to any recording that might record at the same time as the evening news. So all three evening news shows were recorded using only one tuner.

This morning a Priority 7 the today show did not record. Nothing else recorded in its place.

For the next week, I will issue SKIP EVENTS to any lower priority shows that might record during the 3 network morning shows, the three network evening news shows and the three network late night shows.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

Ok... good... so we are on the same page. I just wanted to check 

Now the other thing that can trip you up... Priority only applies to timers that conflict with each other.

So... IF you had a timer set for 6:00pm on TNT and another timer set for 6:00pm on USA and only one tuner available, then the one with the highest priority would record, and the other would be skipped.

But... priority doesn't apply if the timers start at different, but overlapping, times.

Say you set a priority 1 timer for 6:00pm on TNT, but have a priority 50 timer set to start at 5:30pm on USA. At 5:30pm there is no conflict, so that timer will start... and if it isn't done before 6:00pm then the priority 1 timer will be skipped because there is no free tuner.

All that is to say... Your priority 1,3,4 timers for the evening news... vs your priority 79/80 timers.... What times were each of those scheduled to record? IF the priority 79/80 timers were scheduled to start earlier, then that is the explanation for why those recorded and the others were skipped.


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## SeaBeagle (May 7, 2006)

Maybe that is why some local channels will not record. Even without any conflicts. Needs to be fixed.


Sent from my iPad 4 128GB using DBSTalk mobile app


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

I don't recall seeing the conflict type Stewart proposes. A higher priority timer at 6:30 should take prescience over a lower priority timer at 6:00. The lower priority conflicting events are marked "skipped by priority" when the event list is rebuilt at night.

If one is watching live and get the warning popup that says that the tuner is about to be taken for a recording there is the option to let the event fire (taking the tuner) or stop the event (skipped by user) and watch live. Unless there is something strange going on with that setting ...

I can't confirm the flaws reported. Hopefully someone at DISH can ... because if it is not a problem that can be replicated then it is not a problem that can be fixed.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

I haven't tested lately... but I was sure that was how it worked... that timers were first fired in the order they "occur" by the clock, then by priority. I'll have to do some testing myself, though I can't specifically test the thread starter's scenario... I can test on my 922 at least with regards to the priority and see how that receiver behaves to overlapping timers and which fire vs those that are skipped by priority resolution.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

In my tests 6:30 with a higher priority than 6:00 skips the 6:00 show. Priority beats start time.

If you are watching TV when an event needs a tuner the user will be given a prompt offering to skip the recording event. If you do not respond to the prompt the default is to kill the live viewing and give up the tuner to the timer.

So say you had several events scheduled - for the sake of argument, lets say the events are Sports Center at 6pm on 140 ESPN, America's Pregame on 150 Fox Sports 1 at 6pm and the three national newscasts on ABC, CBS and NBC at 6:30pm. Your daily schedule would show no conflicts, ESPN and FOXS1 would use the first two tuners and the three locals recordings would be scheduled to use the third/PTAT tuner.

Add in the complication that you're watching TV or you were watching earlier in the day and left the receiver on tuned to a non PTAT channel. For the sake of argument say you were watching Top Gear on 135 BBCA (it airs every hour from 4pm to 7pm on Monday).

5pm - one tuner in use watching BBCA.
6pm - three tuners in use: one watching BBCA, one recording ESPN, one recording FOXS1.
~6:29pm - The user watching BBCA is warned that their live viewing will end due to the start of an event.
If the user chooses to allow the event to record the three newscasts start recording and the receiver displays one of the channels being recorded. If the user does not make a choice the default should be to record the three newscasts.

IF THE USER CHOOSES TO SKIP THE EVENT THE EXISTING TWO RECORDINGS CONTINUE ... THE THREE NEWSCASTS ARE LOST.

6:30pm - three tuners in use: one recording ESPN, one recording FOXS1, one recording the three local channels.
Unless the recordings were skipped so the user could continue to watch BBCA. Then the history would show "skipped by user".


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## zerdian1 (Jun 26, 2014)

To WorkAround Dish's Priority Problems: I NOW "SKIP EVENT" in the Daily Schedule for any program that starts before and runs during the timeframe of my Multi Network Timers using split tuner for Netwrk Morning Shows, Network Evening News Shows and Network Late Night Shows. Now my shows record like they had been doing for the last two years before Hopper latest software update problems. I do have some other shows' timers recording during Prime Time.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

*Alleged* priority problems. I do not believe what you are doing is necessary. But if it works for you it is your receiver, your recordings.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

Thanks for the extra testing, James. That all makes sense, maybe I am remembering a time when the priority didn't work correctly? I usually don't have conflicts because I resolve them myself by not scheduling conflicts... I try to not overlap anything so that the conflict resolution of the receiver never comes into play.

That said...

The next thing I wonder about... in this member's case... If he has PTAT enabled... when does it start for him? I wonder what happens if he has multiple recordings going on his LiLs at the time PTAT is meant to begin for that night. Could that cause his recordings of the local news to be skipped because PTAT wants to grab that tuner? I know PTAT doesn't start at the same time every night... it starts earlier on weekends, and it starts earlier if a primetime program starts earlier... like if there is a baseball game on FOX that starts at 7pm, then PTAT will start that night at 7pm to grab the beginning of that event.


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## zerdian1 (Jun 26, 2014)

To Stuart Vernon , Moderator, 
Higher Priority shows get the high priority Blue tuner 3 even though they start a half hour later than a lower priority show. 
So I disagree with you statement that lower priority earlier shows can over take high priority shows that start a little later and I have confirmed this by a test. 
From my experience the priority tuner not just checks the start time but also the whole time to the shows end. 
*HIGH PRIORITY SHOW TRUMPS LOWER PRIORITY SHOW THAT STARTS EARLIER.*

My *Prime time is 8PM to 11PM* each night and *7PM to 11PM on Sunday* and PT is set ON.
There are other recordings going on during prime time but all conflicts are eliminated. 
PT is the equivalent of Priority number 0 priority ahead of number 1 Priority.
My three times that I regularily record networks using the split tuner are
*Morning Shows 7AM to 9AM*, one goes to 11AM.
*Evening News is at 6:30PM to 7PM.*
*Late Night shows are 11:35PM to 12:35AM*.

I Watched Brazil win its match in a shoot out after overtime. very long and thrilling win for Brazil with final goal by Neymar.

Just verified that the evening news tonight had 3 evening news shows recording on Blue Tuner 3,
and a Yankees vs. Red Sox baseball game on fox, also on tuner 3 (started early by Prime time). 
but tuners 1 and 2 were available.

One thing I noticed is that high priority shows go to Blue tuner 3.
The Green tuner is the second priority tuner when the Blue Tuner 3 is sceduled to record a higher priority show that starts a half hour later.
Do not yet know if Green tuner is tuner 1 or tuner 2.
The Purple tuner is the third priority tuner.


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## zerdian1 (Jun 26, 2014)

to James Long, Super Moderator,
I agree what I am currently doing Should not be necessary.
Such a work around has not been necessary except for the last week, since Monday.
but for the moment it is working.
The possibilites are my Hopper Priority SW is corrupted or less likely that I have faulty Hopper HW.

I am a little hesitant to ask the Dish Hopper Advanced Tech Support to help, becasue the quality of the Dish Hopper ATS has been very poor the last few months.
The ATS supervisors have confirmed eronous info.
I spoke with the Manager of the ATS and passed on the faulty info (like the topic of this thread) received from his team and confirmed by their supervisor. 
The ATS manager he confirmed the info I received was incorrect. DISH IS NOT GOING TO REDUCE ANY FEATURES OR CAPABILITIES LIKE THE NETWORK SPLIT TURNER RECODING CAPABILITY OUTSIDE OF PRIME TIME.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

Thanks for the new test info... I agree with James that the priority was supposed to work that way, I was just unsure if it did. I seem to recall some priority problems in the past... but maybe those problems are a thing of the past. Like I said, I tend to resolve my own conflicts by not scheduling overlapping things... so it has been a while since I let the receiver resolve a conflict due to priority.

All that said...

On the color front... (blue, green purple) I wonder if they got that working right. For a while I remember there being an issue where sometimes all the recordings would show as green or blue (for example) even though they were going to use different tuners. It seems like for a while there the colors were not right, but maybe they have that working now as well.

Another possibility, in your situation, is if there is erroneous EPG info for your LiLs sometimes. There have been times where I would set a timer for something like "The Daily Show" on Comedy Central and then a few days later my timer still was there, but I would no longer see it scheduled to record even though the program was still on the proper time and day. In those cases I had to delete my timer and create a new one. I never found out what exactly caused the problem, but if I hadn't created the timers again I definitely would not have recorded the programs I had intended to record.


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## patmurphey (Dec 21, 2006)

Isn't it time for a moderator to correct the title of this thread?


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## damondlt (Feb 27, 2006)

patmurphey said:


> Isn't it time for a moderator to correct the title of this thread?


You mean like, If the Hopper had more than 3 Tuners, the Op wouldn't have this issue?

This entire thread describes nothing but an entire recording conflict issue from not enough tuners, No offence but lease another Hopper or super joey for crying out loud.


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## zerdian1 (Jun 26, 2014)

Over the last few years of having the Hopper with external Sling and now Hopper with internal Sling, we have both seen programs that mysteriously did not record. 
But the Timer still works and it would record it the next time.
So we have gotten into the habit of duplicating recordings for shows that we can. 
My wife's Brazilian shows show from 5PM to 11PM and at 11PM to 5AM they repeat. so we record both sets each day. 
If weather interrupts as it tends to do here in South Florida on an island, especially in Summer evenings. 
For me, I watch SyFy, TNT, etc These tend to run duplicates and I record both. 
To back up Prime Time, Which My wife does not really watch, I record Prime Time on both Hoppers. 
We also record our three groups of Network Programming outside of Prime Time. The morning shows, the evening news and the late night shows, on both Hoppers, which we both watch. 
This reduces the Recoding capacity by almost half, but it solves most of the missing shows missed by one Hopper or another.
To solve capacity problems that might arise, we have multiple external 2TB hard drives which I archive shows I want to save.

I will add to my SOP, deleting and resetting up a Timer that does not record twice in a row.

What is EPG (erronous program guide)?
What is LiLs?


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## zerdian1 (Jun 26, 2014)

to Pat Murphy. 
We have enough Tuners. We also have, for the last 2 years, two Hoppers with Sling. 
For the Multiple network shows that I record, I now have it set it up that the three shows could record on the three timers or on the Blue split tuner 3. 
I have deleted (SKIP EVENT) the shows that would use the tuner 1 and 2 during the three time periods that have my morning shows, evening news and late night shows.

This thread was initiated because there is a priority problem that is not resolved on my Hopper.
I have high priority shows that did not record, but lower priority shows did record.
the response I got from Dish's Hopper Advance Tech Support and their supervisor told me the info in the topic of this thread.
Both were wrong as I learned by the end of the week.

But the priority problem still exists.
The work around is deleting all programs occurrences (SKIP EVENT) that air during my non prime time that might use the tuner 1 or tuner 2.

The possible software bug that exists on my Hopper is that the subroutine that looks to see if the tuners are available, after they have been assigned, is looking for 3 tuners for the high priority network 3 channel groups*.
if three tuners are free, it goes ahead and records the three network shows, even though it only uses the one blue split tuner 3. My work around allows me to get through that one bad SW subroutine problem.

* three groups of Network Programming outside of Prime Time: The morning shows, the evening news and the late night shows,


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## patmurphey (Dec 21, 2006)

I made no comment about priority or any other subject brought up, here. The title of the thread contained an incorrect statement that a recording feature had been removed. Thank you to the moderator that made the amendment.


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