# Can I toggle between Single and Dual Tuner Mode?



## cutrock (Mar 20, 2007)

Hello, newbie here. I have Dish coming out to install a second 622. They said that the 622 counts as two tuners, so they will have to take my 211 and my 381 receiver which is in another bedroom. Since I wanted to have occasional access to programming in that bedroom for guests, I would have to have them wire the 611's second tuner for use in that room. However, most of the time, I would be using this 622 in the master bedroom, and may want to have access to both tuners. Can I leave the 622 wired to work in the spare bedroom for occasional use, but set the 622 to Single mode so I can access both tuners from the bedroom without messing anything up? I'd like to just toggle between the two settings as needed, but I don't know if there are "repercussions". I don't want to lose programming or anything like that...


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Sure. Just press the little "mode" switch inside the front panel to select single or dual mode. If you have timers set up for TV2 they will interrupt viewing on that TV ... you may want to check for new timer conflicts when you make the mode switch.


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## Hall (Mar 4, 2004)

cutrock said:


> I'd like to just toggle between the two settings as needed...


 By "as needed", do you mean by using the remote control ?? If so, no, you can't (yet ?).


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## derousse (Apr 25, 2007)

James, how might switching modes affect timer conflicts?

I typically run in dual mode with the preference set up to usually record on the TV2 tuner. My wife discovered the limitation of not being able to watch something on the 2nd TV when it is recording so after reading around on here I learned that I could temporarily switch to single mode and as long as a 2nd program wasn't recording, she could watch something on the other tuner on the 2nd TV. Then when she's done, I would switch back to dual mode.

So that was my plan of action if and when the same situation comes up again. Am I possible messing up scheduled timers by doing this?


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## cutrock (Mar 20, 2007)

Hall: In "as needed" I meant having the ability to manually switch to single mode, then using remote number 1 to operate tuner 1 or 2. Would it be that I would have to access remote #2 to operate tuner 2 in single mode? That doesn't sound right...

James: I had presumed that once the mode was switched to single I'd have access to both tuners and that if both tuners had programming to record at the same hour they'd do it simultaneously regardless of which mode I switched the receiver to. Could you please elaborate on what your were thinking about possible timer conflicts?


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## rwjga (Dec 23, 2005)

How many tuners are you allowed to have on an account. It would seem that anyone with HD could easly end up needing 3 or 4 622's if they have the means.


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## blackwhole (Apr 12, 2007)

cutrock said:


> Hall: In "as needed" I meant having the ability to manually switch to single mode, then using remote number 1 to operate tuner 1 or 2. Would it be that I would have to access remote #2 to operate tuner 2 in single mode? That doesn't sound right...


I believe the 'swap' button will switch which tuner you are viewing onscreen.

Still can't switch modes via remote. That would be a nice feature. Maybe L5.01.


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## sthor (Oct 1, 2006)

cutrock said:


> Hello, newbie here. I have Dish coming out to install a second 622. They said that the 622 counts as two tuners, so they will have to take my 211 and my 381 receiver which is in another bedroom. Since I wanted to have occasional access to programming in that bedroom for guests, I would have to have them wire the 611's second tuner for use in that room. However, most of the time, I would be using this 622 in the master bedroom, and may want to have access to both tuners. Can I leave the 622 wired to work in the spare bedroom for occasional use, but set the 622 to Single mode so I can access both tuners from the bedroom without messing anything up? I'd like to just toggle between the two settings as needed, but I don't know if there are "repercussions". I don't want to lose programming or anything like that...


I don't understand this. I have a 622 in Single mode for my HD Panasonic Plasma and a 322 in another room for my SD TV's. I ordered them at the same time from Dish, no problem.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

derousse said:


> James, how might switching modes affect timer conflicts?


I consider timers to be delicate things that should always be checked after making changes. Just in case! Moving from a situation where TV1 has control of all tuners and can record on either satellite tuner to a situation where TV1 only has one satellite tuner would make me want to watch for overlaps that both want to record on TV1.

I generally stay in dual mode (with all of it's pitfalls) so I have not experimented with what would be best in single mode. Which is why I am cautious instead of assuming that there would be no problems.

Changing modes won't smoke the receiver and can be done at the press of a front panel button - but it is worth a check if your DVR events are important to you.


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## Hall (Mar 4, 2004)

James Long said:


> Which is why I am cautious instead of assuming that there would be no problems.


 It _can_ cause conflicts as you allude to. It's probably some wierd combination of single vs dual mode, how "Record Plus" is set, and so on.

Worst case, I suspect you should be able to look at the timers and either fix any conflicts or re-create them.


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## cutrock (Mar 20, 2007)

sthor said:


> I don't understand this. I have a 622 in Single mode for my HD Panasonic Plasma and a 322 in another room for my SD TV's. I ordered them at the same time from Dish, no problem.


I was told that Dish usually only lets us have 4 tuners per home. I was lucky because I was able to fight to get a 5th one. That's why when they install my 622 dual tuner, they said they would need to take the 211 and 381 to even out the number of tuners I have.

As such I now will have two 622's and one 211 which would equal 5 tuners...Does anyone else have Dish set up to more than 5 tuners?


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## Grandude (Oct 21, 2004)

cutrock said:


> As such I now will have two 622's and one 211 which would equal 5 tuners...Does anyone else have Dish set up to more than 5 tuners?


I have a 622, 921, 721, 501 and 211 for a total of 8 tuners. I believe the limit is six (6) receivers which I had at one time.


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## sthor (Oct 1, 2006)

Why would Dish want to limit the max number of receivers per home?

As long as the customer is paying foe them more should be better.


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## allargon (May 3, 2007)

cutrock said:


> I was told that Dish usually only lets us have 4 tuners per home. I was lucky because I was able to fight to get a 5th one. That's why when they install my 622 dual tuner, they said they would need to take the 211 and 381 to even out the number of tuners I have.
> 
> As such I now will have two 622's and one 211 which would equal 5 tuners...Does anyone else have Dish set up to more than 5 tuners?


One guy says he has 8 tuners. I believe the limit may be 2 receivers per dish. That makes 4 tuners. However, I wonder if it varies based on the type of dish. One of the houses in a different part of my development has two dishes. I always assumed it was because they had more than 4 TV's.


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## Hall (Mar 4, 2004)

The number of dishes used to be a factor but with a multiswitch, you can connect many, many receivers to one dish.

Does this neighbor of yours have two dishes pointed _in different directions_ ??


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## BobaBird (Mar 31, 2002)

Dish will lease a maximum of 4 tuners, and allow each account a max of 6 receivers. The lease tuners can be 2 dual-tuner receivers, a dual- and 2 single-tuners, or 4 single-tuner receivers. Anything beyond that must be purchased, up to the 6 receiver limit. Dish has been known to make exceptions on both limits.

Allargon, as Hall implies, your neighbor is probably getting additional channels, possibly HDTV or international.


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## sthor (Oct 1, 2006)

Hall said:


> The number of dishes used to be a factor but with a multiswitch, you can connect many, many receivers to one dish.
> 
> Does this neighbor of yours have two dishes pointed _in different directions_ ??


Here in east central Florida Dish installs 2 dishes pointed in 2 different directions on their HD installations. Very common here.


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