[ideashappen]

I have 3 receivers already installed. 1 quad lnb. 1 free slot on my multiswitch on the physical dish. No HD receivers.

The question is...... can I not just take the feed coax in the back of my receiver out , use a multiswitch or splitter to split the signal from there and install a 4th receiver??
I have done this with bell many times but there seems to be a conflicting perception about this type of splitting when it comes to Shaw Systems.
an installer said no but when speaking with Tech at Shaw he says theoretically it could work as long as I am not using a stacked system of which I am not. Once I do it see if both channel 299 and 301 work as one is horizontal and the other vertical with their respective voltages of 13v & 18V

The reason is I cannot go back to the original multiswich installed on the dish itself because the wiring is all underground then up a 22' tower.
Much easier to from one receiver to the next.
Thanks

Before I posted I read quite a bit of the forum threads and this looks like an awesomely helpful site guys.

 

[Pinza]

I have done this with bell many times

Well if you did, you would know it does not work fully, not with Bell and certainly not with a Quad LNBF with Shaw.

You need a dedicated line from the Quad LNBF.

 

[987654321]

The only way to do it is to change to a stacked system. You would use the 2 lines from 2 LNBFs at the dish hooked up to a multiswitch.

 

[Jables]

No. It may work some of the time, but it should be immediately obvious why it won't if you consider a situation where one receiver off the split line gets tuned to a channel on F1 and the other receiver to a channel on F2. Or one to a channel on F1 with H polarization and the other to a channel with V polarization.

Sorry.

 

[Sirius Guy]

Once you have 2 sat reception needed , you need 4 lines into an external multiswitch to get proper operation on either Bell or Shaw. The Shaw lnb has a built in mulitswitch so a dedicated line from the dish to Rx will work for Shaw as well.

 

[SD 630 Support]

Hi ideashappen,

If you're looking for more details on the technical reasons you can't split the lines off your non-stacked Quad LNBF, refer to this post:

In the Shaw Direct world:

There are 2 satellites up in space, Anik F1R and Anik F2. A "tone" is sent from the receiver to the LNBF/multiswitch to switch between each satellite. Basically, you can have either F1R or F2 coming down a single line a time.

There are also 2 polarities on each satellite, Vertical and Horizontal.
- With a non-stacked LNBF, you can only have either vertical or horizontal coming down a single line at a time. "Voltage" is used to switch between the two polarities.
- With a stacked LNBF, the frequencies are "stacked" and both come down the same line at the same time. You can still only have either F1R or F2 down that line.

If you split a stacked line, you can only ever have 1/2 of the total channels coming down the line at a time - either all F1R, or all F2. You will be able to tune 1 receiver to a vertical channel (e.g. 299) and 1 receiver to a horizontal channel (e.g. TSN - 400 Classic/111 Advanced). Both channels should work at the same time.

If you split a non-stacked line, you can only ever have 1/4 of the total channels coming down the line at a time - either F1R Vertical, F1R Horizontal, F2 Vertical, or F2 Horizontal. As long as both receivers are tuned to the same type of channel, you're good. If one attempts to tune to a different type, you'll lose signal on one or the other receiver.

 

[RaymondT]

Just to add to what the others said. Back when Starchoice operated on one satelite and first offered the service to the public, they tinkered with a few different systems. For instance, if you signed up in 1999, you would get an LNBF with two outputs, one dedicated for each receiver. In 2000, they offered a new "stacked" LNBF with a single F-type connection where both horizontal and vertical polarity channels were sent down one coax line. According to their literature, you could split the signal up to 200 times with a DC-pass splitter. When this system was offered, Starchoice would have to "map" your receiver to this system with a simple command to allow it to receive the channels properly.

Even after they launched the second bird, we could still use our round satelites pointed at the original bird with our stacked LNBF systems since limited programming (HD/french) was put on the new bird. Once HD went mainstream, we all had to switch to elliptical dishes with the new quad-head (non-stacked) LNBF. For years, all new installations have been using this new dish. The days of a single coax line going into the house are history. A few people still use round dishes but are limited in the channels they can receive.

We keep getting repeated threads about the use of splitters. Due to frequency switching with the quad heads, conventional splitters will not work. You need a (powered) multi-switch if you exceed the 4 outputs provided at the head.

One of my best investments was a 5/16" - 12inch long drill bit, readily available from a number of tool stores. Adding extra lines in a house is pretty easy with it. When going through an inside wall, I drill about an inch off the floor, right through the solid wood part of the wall frame and through the trim boards. The holes can be filled easily if the coax is ever removed and the risk of drilling through power wires is zero.

 

[classicsat]

They had stacked dual dishes.

To my memory:

Summer 2000, Navigo receiver line (401) and single stacked dish launched.
By summer 2001, elliptical stacked was the norm. I began with Shaw in October 2001, and that is what I got (with a 301 receiver), and still have.
I have seen at least one elliptical dish with a single (presumably stacked) LNBF. I thing by 2002 or 2003 they switched to the quad.