Anyone have this? I have a 7100 that I bought a few years ago. I went with it over the TiVo and ReplayTV because I was already using Dishnetwork, and I liked the fact that I could put in a bigger HD myself. So I bought it and swapped in a 30 gig HD, and lived with paying $9.99 a month for the service.

Forward to today. They now have a new type of dishplayer called the PVR. There is no monthly fee. So I start doing some research...

Mine is powered by Microsoft. Recently it has gotten extremely buggy, dumping the tv listings once a day, etc. It has always been a little buggy, but not awful. I found out that Dishnetwork and Microsoft had a pretty decent falling out. The Dishplayer doesn't receive much support, but they still let you pay the $9.99 a month, and I think MS still gets a cut.

So I think about selling mine and upgrading for only $150, which would pay for itself in 15 months. So naturally I go to EBAY and see what Dishplayers go for, expecting them to be crap because of the above mentioned reasons.

Turns out that they go for some serious coin, which confused me. I found a seller and asked him why that was. I explained that I wasn't bidding on his, had one, etc. and just wanted to know the scoop. He informed me that Dishplayers are in demand because of how easy they are to hack.

Talk about a subculture of people. Most of what he emailed me sounded like what computer talk must sound liek to a novice. IT blew past me, so I did some research. I read about how people program their cards, then the sat. companies send out an ECM (electronic countermeasure) and then they go back and reprogram again, etc. True nerds, most of them, but we all have our hobbies. And some of the sites are supposedly owned by DirectTV to spy on the hackers, etc. WILD stuff.

Well, it turns out according to this guy and what I read, that because of the bad blood between Dishnetwork and MS, there really isn't a good way to ECM the dishplayers (The standard line is Charlie won't screw with Bill ). So, you don't have to reprogram the Dishplayers.

Now all that means nothing to me. Unless there was a "hack" button on my remote (I need to make up a fake remote...that makes me laugh ), it isn't something I would be into.

So, anyone else have a dishplayer and have "buggy" problems with it? It seems like a natural to sell mine and upgrade based on ebay value, but I really like my interface, and the ability to upgrade the HD again.

Obviously we can't discuss hacking cards, and stealing sat. here, but anyone else looked into it (not as something to do, but just researching)? What a bizarre subculture. I saw boards like our with the rudest people in the world etc. Reminded me of 8mm when they went to the underground porn areas. SEEDY!

[cough]directivo[/cough]

Somebody's been "forum-challenged" lately.

That wasn't an option when I bought mine, plus my other TV with seperate receiver is Dishnetwork, and I don't want to switch everything away from Dishnetwork. I actually like the programming, etc. too much to switch. My friend has Directv, and I have never been jealous.

Man, that is exactly how I felt. It was truly weird. It was as though I had walked into a Star Wars board where people discuss the benefits (and technological disparity) of adobe huts with no doors while having hovercrafts.

i've looked into hacking my directv tivo.....but i've never owned or considered dish.

there is an entire subculture for tivo hackers too. although, i don't think it's as fervant as the dish folks....primarly because of the ms thing.

i love my sat-t60. can't image how i lived without it!

ack. where are we?

I have the Dish 508 PVR unit that I assume you are talking about upgrading to...It has a 70 hour hard drive but you can't change the drive...It is indeed free on a monthly basis and shows you the schedule 8 days in advance...plus some other cool features (DD 5.1 passthrough via optical cable). I Like mine... there is a cool (non-hacking) dishnet site that has all kinds of info, I'll find it and let you know the addy.

I've hacked my Directivo; I put in a bigger harddrive (if you can call that hacking). Now I have 70+ hrs worth of time instead of 35.

BTW, try this site for all the info you'll ever need on Dishnet receivers:
www.dbstalk.com
Very nice people there. It seems like they are one of the forums that Dishnetwork actually looks at.

How much are they going for at eBay? You should still be able to get the DishPVR 501 for about $199 from DishNetwork directly. There is also a new DishPVR (don't know the number) that has built-in PIP, allows you to record 2 diff channels at once and has a 120-hr hard drive. I think it's 120-hr. Anyway, those are going for about $450-550, I think. It's been awhile since I shopped for one, so I don't remember.

Just buy it... don't mess with hacking it... and let that be that. People who hack their satellite receivers obviously can't afford to pay $50 a month for TV (I thought McDonald's paid more, but I guess not).

I had a 7100 Dishplayer and Dish Network. I switched to DirecTivo a year ago or so because the Dishplayer was ultra-buggy and Dish would take no responsibility for it. I "upgraded" (the correct term for hard drive replacement, not "hacked" which is fixing it to get the service without paying) the hard drive in the 7100 to 120GB, which was ~100 hours. I've also upgraded the DirecTivo to 150GB which is ~137 hours. I recommend, in the strongest possible terms, switching to DirecTivo. I used to have to check on the Dishplayer every morning to make sure it hadn't crashed or deleted all my programs. With Tivo, I've left the unit untouched for weeks at a time only to return and find everything is there and working beautifully and never have a moment's concern if it's functioning properly. Oh yeah, two tuners, as well (record two things on different channels...even while watching an already recorded program - which means it can do three things at once). I haven't had any experience with Dish's newer PVRs, but from what I hear on the boards, they are pale imitations of Tivo. The picture quality on DirecTV is also much better (though Dish may have improved since I used them last). Switching is no big deal, you can leave the existing cables in place and reuse them, though you'll want to add another cable to utilize the two-tuner record capability.

The point is, you're hanging on to an obsolete product. Dish Network would love nothing more than for every Dishplayer ever sold to suddenly vaporize. It has been a thorn in their side for years. You really should move on to 21st century technology, whether it be DirecTV or Dish PVR.

Now, if you ever do, ask me about the (purely legal) tricks to keep your older units still operational.

There are some people who will argue that the DishPlayer is the most stable Dish Network receiver out there, and as long as you know what you are doing, this is true. Believe it or not (I have seen official numbers to prove it) the 501/508 has a fail rate a lot higher than the Dishplayer. I honestly don't know why you are paying the monthly fee, because last time I heard, they were giving that for free. My opinion, save up for a 721 or wait for the 921 to show up. Those are some top notch receivers.

Yes -- the 721 was the new receiver I was talking about. Thanks.


Too bad they made it "silver-only" or I would have bought one already. Why silver? I never did understand that move in the electronics industry. NOTHING in my living room is silver. NOTHING in my living room will ever be silver unless charcoal becomes obsolete and I can find nothing in that color again.

By the way, anyone with a DishPVR 501 notice the new feature they downloaded to the receiver? That's one thing I love about the DishPro receivers. (Do Tivo and Direct constantly upgrade their receivers?)

We now have SUPER SLOW MO' !!!!

While you have a program paused, hit the forward button. Instead of automatically jumping to 4x speed, you can first see 1/15x, 1/4x, 1x, then 4x, 15x, 60x, and 300x.

It's a sweet feature they added -- just in time for Super Bowl! Now you can make your own instant replay calls in slow motion.

Yes they do, in fact Tivo just released a new automatic software upgrade which, among other things, allows you to sort the recorded programs list (called "Now Playing") three different ways (by date recorded, date to expire, and alphabetical). We've had slow-mo for a long time, and have frame by frame advance as well. Also apparently coming up is the ability to create program folders in order to tidy up the Now Playing list (for instance, you create a folder called "Friends" and only see that on the main screen, then you click on it and see all of the individual Friends recordings.) Something which will be quite nice for those of us with the huge harddrives...my Now Playing list has around 75 titles at the moment! It'll be nice to move those 13 Sopranos titles into a single folder.

Good thread!

I am thinking I need to jump from cable to one of the two sat+recorders.

On the hacking- man do I agree. I looked into it about a year ago and it seems like you need to reprogram your card every month or so. Then you might need a new card every once in a while. Add all the work finding downlading and installing the hacks and it seems like it would be cheaper just to pay.

Now how do I explain paying for porn channels

The Dish PVR's now have frame by frame too...as well as the sorting options for recorded shows...it was updated 1/9/03

To clarify, when I was talking about hacking my DP, I was only saying that this seems to be why they have a lot of value...they don't have to be reprogrammed often (ever?) but I don't have any reason to hack it for "free" channels. It never seems like the premium channels have anything on, I own all the movies on Pay-per-view, etc.

Anyway, my dilema is that I have a hard time giving up something that people want, even if I won't use it for that. Maybe I should check out not paying for the $9.99 per month service. It has felt like they were screwing me on that one.

And from the research I did, it looks like hacking for free tv is about like brewing your own beer to save money...it just ain't worth it. Looks like the guys who do it for a hobby do it just to see if they can outsmart, outhack, etc. "the man" which is interesting. And the rest of them are just trying to convince people to send them a bunch of money so they can scam them

I'll look into the 721 and 921

That's not entirely true. It's surprisingly easy to hack, especially with a dishplayer. Takes about 20 minutes... how do I know you ask? Because "my friends" old roommate had a dp7100 and showed me... i mean 'my friend' how to do it. Now I have dish too except I opted for the 6000 model (no free tv )

That's the HDTV model correct?

How many HD channels are available now? I saw a commercial for all the HD Discover channels, but last I checked DishNetwork didn't carry all/any of them.

If they carry them now, how's the picture? Is it true 1080?

Thanks. Interested to know. Interested in spending $500!!!

Dishnetwork has:

Discovery HD
PPV HD
Shotime HD
HBO HD
CBS HD

I think that is it, but I'm not sure.

On the commercials for it, it was told that all 9 of the "Discovery" channels are now available for HD... does DN carry all 9?