dish install question

[Gunner411]

Okay I was wondering the other day if you could run a tv2 sig and a outdoor antenna sig into a splitter then connect to coax port on tv2 and have both sig come threw properly. or will there be interference between the 2 sig's

 

[Claude Greiner]

It should work. Been a while since I did something like that.

 

[jarvantgroup]

Okay I was wondering the other day if you could run a tv2 sig and a outdoor antenna sig into a splitter then connect to coax port on tv2 and have both sig come threw properly. or will there be interference between the 2 sig's

It will work, but you may have to set your TV2 channel to a higher setting such as 80 or even higher. The times that I have done it, the picture wasn't as clear when I left it on Air 60. Setting the modulator channel higher solved that problem.

 

[TNGTony]

Considering there are no broadcast channels above ch 51 any more I don't even think that is an issue any more.

 

[KKlare]

Careful. You have to select broadcast UHF numbers or cable channel numbers. They are different.
The old UHF numbers were 14 to 83 (or so) 6MHz segments while cable were 14 to 22 with a gap before 23 and up.
The lower cable set starts just above broadcast 13. There is a big unused-by-OTA gap between broadcast 13 and 14.
When you refer to ch 60 it is the UHF scale, usually. Above the top current broadcast channel, 51 perhaps.
There is another hickey in the cable channels at about 94 to 100 which carry the channels between 22 and 23.
So first figure which set you are going to use. prefer the UHF if you are joining an antenna to the modulator.
Confusing? Then ask about the broadcast gap between 6 and 7, lower and upper VHF.
The gap between 4 and 5 of 2MHz allows/allowed broadcasts on 4 and 5, otherwise a no-no for adjacent channels.
The lower VHF (2-6) channels are not forbidden but seldom used with digital signals. (Mostly right, I hope.)
-Ken

 

[boba]

Okay I was wondering the other day if you could run a tv2 sig and a outdoor antenna sig into a splitter then connect to coax port on tv2 and have both sig come threw properly. or will there be interference between the 2 sig's

It depends what OTA channels are available you should stay at least 2 channels away from the actual broadcast channel used locally. Example we have a fox 4 but they actually broadcast on ch.35 so channels 33 to 37 would be unusable.
TNGTony Channels above 51 are no longer used for TV broadcasts but the frequencies may have been reassigned for other Public Service Radio uses so their may still be interference.

 

[Gunner411]

Thanks for all the replies guys. over 2 yrs with dish never had to do this. first service call today tv2 was fuzzy b/c customer changed tv2 channel too close to ota channels. haha pretty crazy.

 

[KKlare]

Yes, 2-channel separation for OTA. Actually it would be that 34 to 36 that would be bad to use in example.
OTA channel 37 (I believe) will not have a station assigned to it as it is used in radio astronomy (H alpha?) FWIW.
And there are the exceptions as I note for 4 and 5 but 2 to 6 are not useful in digital.
Digital channels work next to each other only if from a common source--to stabilize their physical and frequency spacing.
Even then there seems a limit on the number of consecutive channels that can be used OTA, like 3 or 4 in a row.
-Ken

 

[Scherrman]

We always had TV2 output on channel 60 years ago. We install a lot of antennas along with satellite so we have a lot of customers that have the two combined to their TV2 and it works great. About 2-3 years ago I noticed my office TV getting snowy. It did this for days and months until it got to the point that it was hard to watch. I found that if I changed the modulated channel from 60 to 50 it cleared right up. It was shortly after I discovered it that we started getting phone calls from our customers having the same issue. I'm not sure what had changed since it worked on that channel for years.

 

[dishcomm]

Considering there are no broadcast channels above ch 51 any more I don't even think that is an issue any more.

We have a channel 55 and 64 over the air in this market.....

 

[dishcomm]

Thanks for all the replies guys. over 2 yrs with dish never had to do this. first service call today tv2 was fuzzy b/c customer changed tv2 channel too close to ota channels. haha pretty crazy.

The best thing to do is set the TV modulator to a channel between two channels farthest apart numerically in your DMA.
For example, in this DMA the greatest number of channel separation is 12..Ch 18 then the next one going up is ch 30.. Split the difference. Ch 24 is where I set a lot of my tv 2's.

 

[DNSTrainer]

. . . . you should stay at least 2 channels away from the actual broadcast channel used locally. Example we have a fox 4 but they actually broadcast on ch.35 so channels 33 to 37 would be unusable.

This is exactly what makes assigning TV2 channels - and especially mixing the TV2 feed with an off-air antenna - so problematic now. Since the digital transition, most stations no longer use the same frequency as their station number. Where I'm located, none of the channels are still using their previously assigned frequency. Closest two are Channel 30 (RF 31), and Channel 46 (RF 47). Others, like Channel 2 (RF 43), use much higher frequencies. All of our old VHF numbers (2, 4, 5, 9, 11) now use the higher UHF frequencies.

One reason mixing the TV2 feed with a cable from an OTA was never recommended by DISH, is that it would be possible (though highly unlikely) for you to actually broadcast your TV2 feed over the air through your antenna. In theory, a neighboring home could pick up that signal through their own antenna. Now, we tried all kinds of experiments to see if we could make that happen, and were never successful. But, the FCC demands that our systems create NO interference, so that configuration was "not allowed". We weren't even supposed to hook up the remote antenna on the TV2 cable without installing an attenuator for that same reason. Shouldn't be a problem anymore, as very few people are still trying to tune analog signals.