I had the 722k for many years. I finally, sort of happy, had the Hopper and Joey system installed.

It has one Hopper, one Super Joey and one regular Joey. Both Joey's are using their factory remotes. While I have a TSU-9400 controlling the Hopper via an IR emitter on the front.

I am finding out that the Hopper needs to "see" the factory remote. The Pronto becomes useless, front panel becomes useless as well as the iPhone app from Dish. I even reprogrammed the Pronto to emit IR, instead of using the RFX9600. Still no go.

Am I doing something wrong here? Or do I really have to keep the batteries in a remote that I will never use?

KOT

Edit: Changed title from "Dish Hopper and factory remote has to keep batteries in. Huh?"

You're doing something wrong. I just popped th batteries out of my Hopper remote to confirm, and it confirmed. You're doing something wrong ;-)

Sorry, I should've mentioned. It takes about 5 to 10 minutes before the Hopper doesn't respond.

And about a minute for it to work again after batteries are installed.

KOT

Ugh, the batteries have been out for over 30 minutes. I've been testing it every now and then and it continues to work.

The only issue so far is the fact that it lost NESN HD. Then when I checked other HD channels, they weren't working either. Then all of sudden, they worked again.

The batteries are still out. I know that when I first got the Hopper, I left the batteries in the remote. Can't remember when exactly the Hopper didn't work.

Perhaps if one or both of the Joeys remotes are used is when the Hopper will not work.

I know I have more testing ahead for me.

KOT

Dude, my batteries have been out of the remotes for 2 years. And you can select in the menu what channels show and you can create custom lists

You're probably the victim of your brain taking a couple of things that happened at the same time, and deciding they were causally related (not casually, causally). We people type beings do that all the time.

There must be something wrong with my Hopper.

Last night I've "unpaired" the remote. And it continued to work.

Even though this is unrelated to the remote, or function of the receiver per say. The Hopper changed channels twice on me. I was watching NESN, Red Sox game, at 9 and 9:30 it changed channels. Which happened to be the channels that there were DVR events on. Despite having 5 tuners to choose from, it would change the channel that the Hopper is watching to record the DVR. When I pressed the red button to find out what tuner is available. I would find out that there are 2 or 3 other tuners that are free. Even with this recording that no one was watching at the time.

Problem two, or 3 depending on how you want to look at it. When I changed it back to NESN, it was completely blank. Changed it to another channel, again blank. Checked several other channels, all of them blank. I opened my iPad to watch the game on there via Sling, it worked. So I pressed the red button and went to Join the same channel that the iPad is on... Blank. However, a message came up on the iPad stating that someone joined the viewing, which was the Hopper.

Anyways, I have video of the blank video. So I'll be sending that in on a USB drive to Dish with this receiver.

KOT

Dish sucks!

Plates too.

Here's a little update.

I've received the new Hopper. The problem with my channels pixelating is now happening every day. There are two ways of fixing it. One is to reset the Hopper. Two, would be to reset the power plug on the Super Joey. I already reset the Joey and that had no affect. Only the Super Joey did, other than the Hopper.

I have also discovered that I can get it to work with out resetting either the Hopper or Super Joey. And that is to press the skip back 10 seconds at least once. So that I won't be watching a live program. I honestly don't know if this would've worked on the other Hopper though.

One thing that I've learn though. Is not to listen to what the folks at Dish tell me. "Lets reset the Hopper."... I already know what that would do. They're probably just saying it to get me out of their hair.

So could it still be the Hopper? Sure. Could it be the Super Joey, most likely. Could it be something else, a NOD? Perhaps.

This much I know, when the Super Joey and Joey were not used for 3 weeks due to me being alone. The problem never occurred. Now that everyone is home, it's occurring. Which is why I am pointing my finger at the Super Joey.

What do you all think?

Oh, I have not paired the factory remote to the new Hopper. So I am not leaning towards that.

KOT

The Hopper and the SuperJoey are the only actual tuners in the system. The regular Joeys are simply streaming from the tuners on those other boxes. The more tuners in use (multiple joeys, multiple recordings) the more buffering and network (Mcoa) traffic there is. It's important that when a "joey" is done watching TV, they turn OFF the joey. That releases a tuner (and associated buffer memory) back into the system. If all joeys are "ON", but not being used, it really drags the system down.
I've done lots of multi-hopper and 5-7 joey systems (haven't used a super joey yet) and any time there is a problem, it's the unused Joeys being left on tying up the system....

That make sense.

Though my problem right now is the fact the TV that is hooked up to the Hopper is the only one affected. And when the Super Joey is unplugged, the Hopper all of sudden works. As I've had it on Live viewing, when the signal is pixilated. So both the A/V is messed up. So when I'm downstairs at the Super Joey I can hear the audio from the Hopper fix itself as soon as the Super Joey is unplugged.

I have a tech coming out Tuesday, so I'll keep this updated.

Originally I was going to have the SJ replaced. But I thought what if the NOD is bad. Besides, the tech who installed the SJ didn't ground that wire from the dish. Doubt that's the cause, but I still like to see it grounded.

KOT

If you are a dealer that isn't setup to do satellite installation & service - then times like this is why it is VERY important to have a working relationship with a 'local' satellite dealer.
If you think the idiot they are sending out for free from the 1-800 number, is going to have any clue what is happening or able to troubleshoot this, you are dreaming! I mean you could get lucky but I doubt it.
My $0.02

+1
Switch to directv

I have dish. I hate dtv. It's all subjective.