SatelliteGuys FIRST LOOK - DISH's Hopper and Joey

[Scott Greczkowski]

Section 1: Getting Ready

The satellite community has been very excited since DISH officially announced their new Hopper and Joey platform at the 2012 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. When word that the new platform would be made available in the first quarter of 2012 few believed DISH would have made it, but it is now March 15th and the Hopper and Joey are here!

Based on the new XiP platform by EchoStar the Hopper and Joey are DISH Networks first receivers to support MoCA (Multimedia over Coax Alliance) technology. MoCA is important as it allows DISH to distribute video signals from its base station (which DISH has called the Hopper) to its client receivers (which DISH has called the Joey.)

Up until now each room that was to have satellite would need to be wired from the dish or switch to each location in the house that was to get television using RG 6 cable, however using this MoCA technology in a single Hopper setup means only one cable needs to be run from the outside to your Hopper. Installers can then reuse the existing cable wiring found in most houses to distribute the signal to the Joeys. Under the MoCA specs you can even use RG-59 cable to the Joey's! By being able to reuse the cable, which is already pre-wired in most homes. will be both a major time and cost savings for DISH going forward.

In preparation for the install I cleaned up all the wiring in my house. I've been a long time DISH customer who has had every new technology DISH has offered over the years. With that said, my existing wiring setup had two cables going to every room because mydual tuner receivers needed two cables coming in from the dish or switch. I easily took out a few hundred feet of unused cable that was running through my house. My wife was happy to see a majority of the coax outside that was running along the sides of the house gone. She was already happy with the new Hopper system about to be installed.

At my house the satellite dish is on the right side of the house. However all of my "home runs" to my TV's are on the left side of the house. To make things easier I purchased a COAX tester from Amazon.com. This allowed me to test and label each coax run so I knew exactly where each line was going. Now I had to wait for the Hopper to arrive before I could do any more work. But I could imagine how the rest of the wiring was going to go, which could be completed by just removing the old DPP44 switches and hooking each cable to a high quality two way cable splitter. I could not wait to get the new equipment in my hands!

A few days went by and then finally UPS delivered me my new Hopper and Joey's! It was already dark outside so I would have to wait for the next day to get started. (As a past beta tester of EchoStar products, it should be noted that I was provided the Hopper and Joeys for this review.)

The next morning I woke up, put on my SatelliteGuys shirt andDISH Network hat, then went outside to get to work. If felt great to be able to go outside and rip apart the mess and remove the old switches from the wall. Within minutes I was hooking the "home runs" to each room to a good quality 2 way splitter. I then did some quick cleanup of the wiring and was very happy with my efforts. Less than 15 minutes outside and I was now ready to go inside and install the Hopper.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Section 2: Powering Up

I hooked the Hopper up to its coax cable, plugged in an Ethernet cable and HDMI cable and turned on my TV. As my final step I plugged the Hopper into its power source and within a few seconds the Hopper sprang to life.

After the DISH boot up logo displayed my heart sunk when I saw an error message on the screen, the screen displayed a message of "Attention: 833 – A problem has been detected, please wait while we check your switch configuration." I was busy looking up install diagrams when I looked up at the TV again and saw that the screen had changed and it was doing a check switch and was finding my dish. Within a few minutes the initial software was downloading. I was so relieved I honestly thought there was something wrong with my setup! DISH informed me that this screen message is changing and won't affect customer installs. Simpply wait for the screen to disappear within a few seconds.

Once the initial software download was done, the box rebooted, but this time instead of seeing the DISH startup screen I saw a new Hopper start up screen. I was happy and excited now! After the boot up screen went away I was greeted once again by the "problem has been detected" error message, but this time I did not worry and I let it sit and do its thing it then downloaded more software. DISH is changing this message screen as well, they say. After that software download was done, the Hopper rebooted again and the setup process continued. It instructed me how to pair the remote to the receiver and the setup wizard also set the TV's video resolution. Once the setup wizard completed it left the receiver at the screen to call to activate.

When my receivers were shipped to me I was told by DISH to hook up the Hopper and all the Joey's first before contacting them to have them activated, so now it was time to hook up the Joey's!

I received three Joeys so I went through and hooked them up one by one. (DISH recommends that you hookup the Joeys be connected one at a time and let the software download to it before hooking up the next one.) But the hookup of each Joey was easy and the software downloads went fast. Once all the receivers were done and ready it was time for me to get them activated!

Because the Hopper and Joeys were not released yet I could not call in and have a CSR activate them for me. Instead I had to email my contact to get them activated. I shot off my activate request email and then sat and waited for them to be activated. While it didn't take long them to get them activated it still felt like a million years to me as I am a geek and wanted to play with my new toys! However soon, with little fanfare the receivers were activated and we were off and running!

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Section 3: 922 Deja Vu - Parental Controls

I grabbed the remote and quickly went through all the menus on the Hopper system. Those who have a DISH Slingloaded ViP 922 HD DVR will feel very comfortable with the Hopper and Joey system as most of the menus and features are excactly like the 922. Owners of DISH's 922 will get a feeling of Deja Vu as the systems look and act so much alike, but for people who never experienced the 922 they are going to say "wow!"

The first thing I wanted to do was set the remote control to be able to control my television. So I quickly found the remote control setup. I easily programmed the remote to control my TV, but it could only power off and on and control the volume on my TV. I was unhappy as I couldn't figure out why it wouldn't let me change the inputs on the television using the input button on the remote. After tinkering around for about 15 minutes trying all kinds of different codes for the remote I finally figured out the issue… for some reason DISH ships the Hopper and Joey with "Limited Mode" turned ON. By turning Limited mode off in the settings I was now able to change inputs on my TV using the DISH remote.

One thing that impressed me about the Hopper was how snappy it felt. In fact the entire system seemed faster than the 922.

I then went in each room and tested each Joey and programmed each remote (again turning off the Limited Mode feature.) It was truly like having a DISH receiver in each room. The picture quality was sharp and vibrant on each television. It felt cool having full HD with a networked DVR in every room.

The Hopper doesn't really come with an instruction manual, just mainly a full color glossy "getting started" guide, so I jumped in to set up parental controls which I did from my Hopper. The parental controls, while easily laid out, were still confusing to me. I wanted to have all receivers have access to everything except for my 9-year-old son's room where I wanted to block out R-Rated movies in his room. I couldn't figure out how to set up the Hopper so that just his room was subject to parental control. I set the Hopper so that it would block out the R-Rated content, but this meant that every time I wanted to watch an R-Rated program on any television I would need to enter a password to watch that program. It wasn't until a few days later that I learned that I must setup the parental controls on the Joey itself where I wanted to block content… so now I could block the R rated stuff from my son's room but have everything else wide open in the other rooms! There is nothing that I read saying that this must be done in each room, so I am giving you the tip now so you are not confused like I was. The Parental control works well once you enable it correctly and DISH has made it easy to copy your parental control settings to other receivers in your house.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Section 4: It's Prime Time Anytime!

One of the Hoppers major new features is the addition of PrimeTime Anytime, it should be noted that this feature does not come enabled by default on the Hopper. If you want to use PrimeTime Anytime you must enable it yourself and it's easy to do in the main PTAT tile. It's a simple A or B selection (And if you ever want to disable it you can do it anytime except when PrimeTime Anytime is actively recording.)

I let the Hopper load up with one night's worth of PrimeTime shows and then we jumped in. My wife was happy to see all her favorite shows recorded without her needing to set a single timer. In addition we found that we discovered many new shows we had never watched before -- many we found very enjoyable.

Over the few weeks of having the Hopper and Joeys, we have grown to love the PrimeTime Anytime feature. We have found that at times it can get confusing especially when trying to tell what we have watched and what we have not watched. A number of programs my wife was going to skip because the screen said we have watched them but we had not… instead my older son watched a number of the shows on his TV. It indicated on the screen that the shows were already watched. I would love to see a feature so that the PTAT listings are on a per receiver basis, so this way we can hide shows which we have watched or don't want to see to make the experience less confusing but keep the shows there for other family members in the house who would want to watch those shows on their televisions.

If you can learn to get by its quirks then PrimeTime Anytime is one reason alone why you would want to upgrade to a Hopper system. I am willing to bet a lot of people will find themselves watching more prime time television on their own schedules I know that has been the case for me and my family. This increased viewership for prime time network programming should make the TV networks happy.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Section 5: True Multiroom DVR and other New Features

The second major feature of the Hopper platform is that it is a true multi-room HD DVR system, meaning you can record something in one room and watch it in any room. For me this feature has come in very handy over the past few weeks and my family is loving this feature as well. However, there is one major annoyance with having a shared DVR setup like that and that problem is clutter. The issue is everyone's recordings show up in the DVR listings. My kids love to record everything, my 9-year-old son has all kinds of recordings for all of the cartoon shows he loves and my 18-year-old son likes his teen age reality shows like Jersey Shore. So if I want to watch one of my shows I have to wade through the DVR listings past their recordings until I find mine.

My suggestion to DISH is to have a setting for default folders for every Hopper and Joey, so that by default when someone hits record that recording goes into the default folder for that receiver. When you hit the DVR button you see the recording for that receiver (plus see selections for "Richard's Recordings", "Zack's Recordings" etc…) which will help cut down greatly on the DVR clutter, while still making all recordings available everywhere. It should be noted that users CAN make their own folders but each timer needs to be set to record to that folder, all recordings from that receiver will still go into the main folder if a folder is not specified when setting up a timer. Also if you are watching a show and want to record the rest and press record the remainder of the show will be stored on the main DVR folder.

I would also like to see private folders be made so that I can record shows that I might not want other in the house to see or even know I have recorded into my own password protected folder. I don't want friends coming over and hitting the DVR button to see that the last recording was Playboy's "Naughty Amateur Home Videos." Instead I would like recordings like this tucked away so you can't even see they were recorded unless you have the password for that private folder. The Hopper has on-screen locks of course, but it is a lock per channel, not by folder. This would allow me to lock out the programs within the folders, but I'd rather have the entire folder locked so I only have to insert my password once.

Another new feature the new system has is Blockbuster @Home. You can enable Blockbuster by plugging your Hopper into a broadband connection. What's neat about the Hopper and Joey is that by plugging in Ethernet into your Hopper your Joey's can access all the broadband content that DISH offers. The improved search and filtering built into the Hopper / Joey system makes it easier to find what you want to watch, and besides Blockbuster @Home you also have access to DISH's VOD services which offers a variety of pay and free VOD content. Once again if the Hopper is hooked to broadband then the Joeys can access the VOD content as well.

Another new feature is collapsible channel categories, so channels that are grouped together such as the DISH Music channels, SiriusXM channels, RSN's, NBA Leagues Pass & NHL Center Ice. So if you want to tune to any of these channels just click on the + sign and the channel lineup for those categories will be expanded for the selected category. If you want to tune directly to a channel such as Sirius 7's on 7 you would punch in 9907 on your remote. This makes browsing the guide much faster.

It should be noted that the Hopper has a number of channels in different locations then they are on other receivers. For example on older receiver the Sirius Channels are found on channel 6001 – 6099. However, on Hopper, it's just channel 99. All of the HD channels in the 9000 channel range are GONE on the Hopper; instead the channels show up where their SD versions are shown. So for some people the channel moves might take some getting used to. I know I was one who would normally tune to the 9000's channel range for my HD channels.

The DISH Hopper / Joey does not have the DISH Home Interactive feature. In addition when you are watching commercials that say "Press Select Now to tune to HBO," these triggers do not function on the Hopper / Joey system.

The interactive applications that the DISH Hopper / Joey support are currently the same apps someone can find on a 922. To me these apps feel dark and unfinished and take away from the Hopper / Joey experience. The best app of the group is the Weather Channel app which is fast and zippy on the Hopper system and a new MLB Network app which features bright vivid colors and looks great on any HDTV!

Announced for the Hopper and Joey but not available in my testing is HBO and Cinemax on-demand content which is supposed to be delivered via satellite to the Hopper's massive hard drive. Other features that were announced at CES for the Hopper which were not currently available on my test unit included the interactive apps from Facebook and Pandora, Bluetooth Audio Support and two Hopper support. I'm told many of these are coming soon.

Just like the 922 the Hopper supports DLNA which means by using a compatible DLNA server you can enjoy your music library plus a variety of live internet-based content on your Hopper and Joey setup. In my tests I have been subjected to a number of beta software releases So in my tests DLNA worked great one day but didn't work at all the next day. However I should note that the S203 release software has come out and so far I have not had any issues accessing DLNA, so I am hoping that bug is fixed and the only reason I am pointing it out now is just in case the bug is not fixed so you can't say I didn't warn you.

Hooking up a DISH Sling Adapter turns your Hopper into a TV Everywhere device. With the Sling Adapter and Hopper you can enjoy your Hopper setup anywhere on your mobile device or computer. In my tests when someone connects via Sling they take control of the next available tuner on the Hopper. If someone is watching TV on that tuner when Hopper connects it goes to the next available tuner. It's not the most elegant setup but it works. When you are using the DISH Remote Access or DISHOnline all recordings on your 922 are shown in your DVR listings including your Prime Time Anytime shows!

I tested my external USB hard drive from my 722k with the Hopper and was able to enjoy my recordings from the external device.

Because so many SatelliteGuys members asked I enabled and tested IR remote support on my Hopper and Joeys. I am happy to report that all existing IR remotes as well as Harmony Universal remotes work in IR mode on the Hopper and Joeys.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Section 6 - Tuner & OTA Talk plus Final Thoughts

Now two things I have not talked about so far which are by far the most controversial features (or missing features) of the Hopper and Joey setup those being sharing 3 tuners on 4 TV's and Over The Air television support.

First, the tuners: for a majority of DISH's customers, 3 tuners will be MORE than enough, but for my family we have found ourselves fighting almost every night once PrimeTime Anytime kicked in. When PTAT kicks in one tuner is devoted exclusively to the PTAT recordings. That leaves you with 2 live tuners. If you have other timers set then you are down to one or no available tuners, meaning you can only watch what's recording or watch a recorded show off the DVR. Durring our first night we had the new setup and everyone was already fighting over the tuners. My wife wanted to watch a show on the Discovery Channel, my 18-year-old wanted to watch Jersey Shore and my 9-year-old wanted to watch Pokemon -- it was a real dilemma. Other times tuners are not available because the person who was watching TV forgot to shut off their Joey when they were done, in turn locking that tuner out to others who want to watch TV. The only way to grab that tuner is to join the tuner by pressing the red button on the remote and then change channels which then effectively releases the tuner.

One feature I would like to see added to the Hopper/Joey is an administrator mode so that I can better manage my system. If one of my kids goes outside to play but leaves his Joey on I would like the ability to remotely turn his Joey off and release his tuner. I would like to be able to set timers so that my kids can't watch television when they are not supposed to. And if there is a fight by family members over tuners I would like an administrator to decide who gets a tuner and who does not.

For my household in order to restore sanity I will need to add a second Hopper to my setup. However as of this writing the dual node needed to make it all work is not available. It would not surprise me if it is a few months before we see a fully working two Hopper system. I should note that before upgrading to a Hopper in my house I had a total of 5 dual tuner DVRs. To those SatelliteGuys members who need more than 3 tuners I would suggest holding off on upgrading for now.

Another missing feature which many want is Over the Air ATSC tuner support. We here at SatelliteGuys have been told by DISH to expect OTA support sometime this summer. For me missing OTA support is not too much of a big deal since we get all our locals in HD from DISH. However, I have to admit I was missing OTA support when one of our local over the air digital sub channels (which is an Antenna TV affiliate) aired all the episodes of The Monkees over the weekend to pay tribute to the late Davy Jones. I would liked have recorded some of those episodes on my DVR for later viewing. DISH says they are working on this as an added feature. If you are in need of OTA support then I would suggest holding off on upgrading to a Hopper system.

But with all that said, except for the two issues I mentioned above the Hopper is a cut above any other system I have used. For the majority of people reading this I believe they will want one and want one now. Even though I was using beta software everything ran extremely well. I felt like I was using real software that was good enough for public release, in fact I got to be honest – I was surprised on how solid the Hopper operated.

The Hopper system might not be finished and polished upon release but it works well enough to release it as it is. And the DISH and EchoStar teams have done an amazing job getting this product out the door in the 1st quarter as they promised at CES. And as time goes on, Hopper users are going to see the continued evolution into what could become the best whole home DVR ever made.

My thanks to everyone at DISH and EchoStar who have made this SatelliteGuys First Look possible! We mean it when we say you will not find more Hopper information then you do right here at SatelliteGuys.US! Just another reason why we are America's Satellite Information Source! If you would like to help us "keep the lights on" and continue bringing you this in depth new product coverage please consider becoming a Supporting Pub Member, for more info please CLICK HERE.

Thank you again, we hope you have enjoyed our FIRST LOOK on the new Hopper and Joey from DISH!

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

It is now officially March 15th so we can now officially release our First Look!

This First Look took many hours of work not just by me but by our staff who worked hard to correct my work. We have the greatest staff anywhere and I thank them all for their help! I also thank my wife for putting up with all of this!

Enjoy guys!

 

[DustoMan]

Great write up, Scott! I can't wait to get mine.

 

[bondfool]

Thanks for your diligent reporting, Scott!

 

[rdinkel]

Well done, Scott!

Bob

 

[Wescopc]

Thanks for all of your hard work and those who support you!
Bob

 

[Lt Disher]

Thanks for all your work here Scott. Great job.

 

[sca]

thats some really good info, scott! thanks a bunch. one thing i learned from your post was that ptat uses one of the three tuners. my training never covered this. so...which tv plays the ptat? with 3 joeys, is the 'dominant' joey the first one powered up?

 

[tulok]

I saw that you had PlayOn. Whenever I use it on my 922 I notice that anything I play freezes at 65 minutes & won't go any further. Does the Hopper have the same problem?

 

[Tyralak]

Great work, Scott! I plan on ordering mine first thing tomorrow.

 

[sca]

i may have found the answer to my question above. disable ptat to have 3 tuners all the time.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

I saw that you had PlayOn. Whenever I use it on my 922 I notice that anything I play freezes at 65 minutes & won't go any further. Does the Hopper have the same problem?

I had ESPN 3 playing today and if I remember correctly I had it going for over 2 hours. Dont know if that has anything to do with the Hopper or the machine that PlayOn is running on.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

i may have found the answer to my question above. disable ptat to have 3 tuners all the time.

Bingo!

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

thats some really good info, scott! thanks a bunch. one thing i learned from your post was that ptat uses one of the three tuners. my training never covered this. so...which tv plays the ptat? with 3 joeys, is the 'dominant' joey the first one powered up?

Yes first come, first served.

 

[memo90061]

Wow thank you!! It seems like a great system. I want it! hahah.