# Hopper OTA USB Adapter



## nmetro (Jul 11, 2006)

Now that I have has the Hopper with Sling, plus the OTA USB Adapter, for two years I think I would post some experiences.

If a person wants a simple plug and play device, the USB adapter works well. Plug it in to the Hopper, connect to the antenna and scan. After the scan, go to the EPG, you will see all the scanned channels in yellow. Sounds simple enough.

Now, the reason for the post, there are some issues:

1. Under certain conditions, the adapter will reboot your Hopper. Especuially, if you are connecting and disconnecting cables to your antenna.
2. Too many scans, in a short time, will also cause the Hopper to reboot.
3. The scan runs an average of 2 seconds per channel, which menas if it does not detect a signal in 2 seconds, it skips it. Even though, in a previous scan, it found the channel. In an finge area, it may take up to 5 seconds to lock in a signal, on some channels. Of course, if one has multiple transmitters, this could be problematic.
4. In some areas, a channel may be on a low power and full power channel. KBDI, in Denver, is on VHF 13 and UHF 48. At my location, UHF 48 comes in stronger, but the scanner, most of the time, will choose VHF 13 over UHF 48, because it found VHF 13 first. The same goes for KMGH on 7 and 17.
5. You cannot pick and choose a particular channel to scan for. So, as in #4, KBDI (Denver) comes in on 13 and 48. I cannot select 48 to scan in, which has the better signal. Nor can I say, I want to scan in 26, a low power channel, it will come in, but it takes more than two seconds to do so. The meter shows 65 when it does.
6. The unit does not allow the user to change the time it should take to scan between channels.
7. The unit does not allow th3 user to set a range of channels. Denver has no channels above 50, but one still has to scan through 2 - 69. If the FCC succeeds pushing channels off of 31 - 50, then that will be another shortcoming.
8. EPG data, on subchannels is very spotty, some have full schedules, most do not.

Thus, this unit is very basic. What is weird, the unit DISH offered for the Dgital Conversion offers more features, than this unit.

The unit does provdie one OTA tuner and one can record from it. Howver, only the Hopper can support the unit. The Super Joey, which is effectively a Hopper, without an internal disk, does not support an OTA adpater. The Super Joey does have a USB port, thus it could support it, but it is not in its software to do so.

The idea of an intergrated means to select OTA channels from the EPG is very nice. Too bad, its full potential cannot be realized because of shortcomings in the software which drives the unit.

Maybe, someone from DISH, might read this and offer some insights on ths USB OTA Adapter. One one think after 2 and 1/2 years that DISH woudl roll out improvements to this device.


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## SeaBeagle (May 7, 2006)

I agree with the above. Did not know that the extra three seconds would make a difference is finding a channel. DISH should fix that then.

Great write up.


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## Keniff (Nov 25, 2013)

Great writeup, but I wouldnt hold my breath if I were you.

I use an OTA dongle as well, and it works OK. The switch to digital OTA is great for HD, but in the old days you could get a weak signal and watch it if you could stand some fuzz or snow in the picture or audio, but with digital, you either get it or you dont. It's nearly impossible to watch a digital signal that is weak.

Dish could solve this problem totally for be by SIMPLY PROVING MY LOCALS THROUGH THE DISH! They had to install a second dish in a completely different location just to provide SD locals.

Talk about shortcomings...


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## nmetro (Jul 11, 2006)

I would not even bother with OTA, if DISH were to provide MeTV, Antenna, GRIT, Escape, ThIsTV, RetroTV, COZI, Bounce, ION Life, Qubo, PBS Create, Decades, Laff, JusticeTV, Movies!, Heroes & Icons, and the like, They seem to provide a number of Religious, Spanish and Shopping stations which are also offered as subchannels, but not the entertainment ones. Honetly, I woudl pay extra for something called "Locals Plus", then bothering with an antenna.



Keniff said:


> Great writeup, but I wouldnt hold my breath if I were you.
> 
> I use an OTA dongle as well, and it works OK. The switch to digital OTA is great for HD, but in the old days you could get a weak signal and watch it if you could stand some fuzz or snow in the picture or audio, but with digital, you either get it or you dont. It's nearly impossible to watch a digital signal that is weak.
> 
> ...


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## RBA (Apr 14, 2013)

Keniff said:


> Great writeup, but I wouldnt hold my breath if I were you.
> 
> I use an OTA dongle as well, and it works OK. The switch to digital OTA is great for HD, but in the old days you could get a weak signal and watch it if you could stand some fuzz or snow in the picture or audio, but with digital, you either get it or you dont. It's nearly impossible to watch a digital signal that is weak.
> 
> ...


*YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT OTA NOT SATELLITE. Yes there are some shortcomings*


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## nmetro (Jul 11, 2006)

While everyone now should be getting their locals, not all get them in HD; thus, the only alternative is OTA. This thread is a discussion about OTA abilities provided by DISH. Having a more robust OTA devices would help to reduce perceived shortcomings.



RBA said:


> *YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT OTA NOT SATELLITE. Yes there are some shortcomings*


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## Keniff (Nov 25, 2013)

RBA. I know what the topic is about. I've been around in circles with dish on this. Admitting there are some shortcomings is great, but I forget this forum seems to be populated by Dish proponents and criticism seems to be short on tolerance.

The only reason I even agreed to upgrade my Dish system is because of the OTA dongle. 

I'll try to remember this is not a forum for venting or anything negative about Dish&#8230;people get prickly in here on that. But this is a subject that gets my ire up.

Nmetro,
That's great that you get so many OTA channels. My PBS is terrible&#8230;all of them and ABC has now bit the dust&#8230;so I'm stuck with SD Dish feed which is flaky because I live in a place that has these things called&#8230;"trees".

So my OTA gives me HD FOX, NBC and CBS&#8230;that's it. Reading your topic and info reminded me to re-scan&#8230;but I don't have infinite time to jack with this stuff. I pay a lot of money, and my point to RBA AND Dish is; I should simply get full service&#8230;click the thing on and go. I shouldn't have to do the hokey pokey just to get a full complement of channels&#8230;including locals. This is the 21st century&#8230;right?

And, as you said, I would pay even more for full functionality. Ala carte channel choices and the full complement of local HD channels. I use maybe 15% of what my channel package provides. I'd rather pay 5 bucks a channel or more and simply get only what I want.

Dish has NEVER asked me how I think about or like my service, only how their undertrained customer service staff is doing; and I can't blame them for Dish's failures or "shortcomings".

Yet they want me to "refer" people. That is funny&#8230;in a very frustrating way. But I'm stuck with it&#8230;along with all these trees comes no cable or DSL. Some days I just want to pull the plug&#8230;and if not for my wife I might just do that.

Thanks again for your write-up. It would be nice if one could select the scan time for those fringe channels on the edge.

I have to admit, at least they have the OTA workaround. I'm as frustrated with the networks and local situation as I am with Dish for making it so hard for Dish to provide these channels. I have also complained locally and told them the eyes in my household don't see their programing and advertisements as much because of this stupidity. Not everyone lives in the city&#8230;there is still country out here&#8230;


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## Blowgun (May 23, 2008)

In my limited experience, the two things that bother me is the lack of OTA data for some channels and the "Add Locals" button that eternally says, "This feature is coming soon", which clearly is not true.

On the flip side, the additional tuner is nice and during one channel scan I picked up a dead (black picture and no sound) channel which I frequently use late at night in case I fall asleep while watching a recording. I do not believe DISH has such a similar channel available without some sort of picture or sound.

While I have had Hopper crashes before, I have not performed repeated cable changes or channel scans to mirror your experience in that area.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Keniff said:


> I'll try to remember this is not a forum for venting or anything negative about Dish&#8230;people get prickly in here on that. But this is a subject that gets my ire up.


Venting is fine ... here is our official stance on the issue:

We know that many people come to this forum seeking to gain a solution to a particular issue or to complain about a particular topic. We welcome all those who seek support or sympathy. However, if your only contribution to this site is repeating the same complaint over and over again, we consider that "spamming the forum." Your posts will be deleted and further action may be taken.
DISH is not perfect ... if their customers point out DISH's imperfections there is no problem. Just don't make it your life's work.


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## david_jr (Dec 10, 2006)

I too would like to see the add channels button become functional.


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## nmetro (Jul 11, 2006)

Norice how silent DIRT is? This was put out her eto see what would happen. This thread was to consolidate issues I, and otehr have see, with the adapter.

I am aware DISH is a satel;lite company first. But, there are obvious issues which customers want addressed and have wanted these addressed for nearly two years.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

DIRT doesn't just post on every topic in the Dish forums. This could either be a topic for which they have no official answer OR simply a topic that they haven't seen. I wouldn't take lack of response from DIRT in any particular thread to mean anything at all.


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## SeaBeagle (May 7, 2006)

James Long said:


> Venting is fine ... here is our official stance on the issue:
> 
> We know that many people come to this forum seeking to gain a solution to a particular issue or to complain about a particular topic. We welcome all those who seek support or sympathy. However, if your only contribution to this site is repeating the same complaint over and over again, we consider that "spamming the forum." Your posts will be deleted and further action may be taken.
> DISH is not perfect ... if their customers point out DISH's imperfections there is no problem. Just don't make it your life's work.


True, both satellite providers have complaints. Then there are complaints mets about cable companies. It is like so me times my Hopper starts up on some music channel. I know there was a complain not about that. To me booting up to some in watched channel in no biggie. Only have to change the channel.

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