As for a seminar, that's really a discussion with Jim. I think the agenda is full. And I'm not sure how confident we can be that any of us can explain accurately how Directv is going to act.
Gary,
I also get my home package with Direct TV as far south as Florida and as for north as Canada. I am not a guru on this stuff but I have all my boxes listed at our home address in NY and assume that is why. I however have the equipment Porthole is talking about for sale which if you are interested we can talk about. TV4RV tripod, swm1 dish and signal meter. If interested PM.
Jim
When it comes to satellites and the respective services, one needs to do their home work. First understand the law https://www.fcc.gov/media/television-broadcast-stations-satellite and second have some knowledge of the technology and the respective services policies. Flexibility is the key, but it takes a fair amount of homework to achieve that goal.
After searching for info, I think a lot of the new answers are resulting from confusing and incomplete information at the Directv end. The requirement for you to get agreement from the local station seems to be related to residences in a served area, where you want DNS on an exception basis for some good reason.
The FCC documents say that RVs are exempt and are considered "unserved household". AT&T's Directv documents also says this and link to the FCC document.
I have some difficulty with the term "permanently attached" but have decided that it is about having equipment only used in the RV, and not shared with a residence, rather than about the mounting technique for the dish. If you move the equipment between residence and RV, they cannot legally give you DNS.
This seems to have triggered renewed emphasis on a requirement for a separate account for the RV, which requires a 2nd programming package. To avoid redundant expense, they say you can suspend one or the other accounts up to 4 times per year to avoid a huge increase in billing. When I set ours up some years ago, they required the 2nd account to be created, but after many phone calls decided to merge the 2 accounts so I only need 1 programming package. I did have to get separate receivers for the RV. But I don't know if they're still willing to create a 2nd account and then merge them.
Duane, I have two DVR's from DTV. You can only have one Genie but if you require more tuners another two tuner DVR will be supplied.When I required about a second DVR receiver to keep in the trailer I was advised DTV allows only one DVR per account.
I'll consider ourselves lucky since I still am not sure what DNS is or why I would need it. Our TV viewing is no different when at home or on the road. The only real difference is how I get the picture from the blue sky to Deb's TV
Dan, you should know, whether you have a problem or not, it would ultimately be up to supreme court to decide what convoluted reason lawmakers had when putting pen to paper.
Besides, "recreational vehicle" is already defined by the US Tax code. The FCC reg just adds confusion. And here is the specific text from the previously linked FCC code:
24 CFR §3282.8
(g) Recreational vehicles.
Recreational vehicles are not subject to this part, part 3280, or part 3283. A recreational vehicle is a vehicle which is:
(1) Built on a single chassis;
(2) 400 Square feet or less when measured at the largest horizontal projections;
(3) Self-propelled or permanently towable by a light duty truck; and
(4) Designed primarily not for use as a permanent dwelling but as temporary living quarters for recreational, camping, travel, or seasonal use.
Some knuckle head in Washington could counter we don't qualify according the the above.
400 square feet is now out the window.
"permanently towable" You would need a subsection to define that
Full timers would be non qualified based on the last line.
And, that FCC reg does not even address boats - which the US Tax code does for the same tax proposes that covers RV's. SAT TV for boats has been around for quite some time, long before it was available for RV's.
When I required about a second DVR receiver to keep in the trailer I was advised DTV allows only one DVR per account.
When I required about a second account I was advised only one account per address.
Duane,
I'd also like to be able to just place an order to a service provider and not have to investigate rules and regs.
But RVers don't have anyone lobbying on their behalf when it comes to Satellite, or Cable TV, or Telecommunications in general. So things get done that make life difficult for us. And the regulations are often confusing to the people who have to implement them.
In 2012, the major cable companies went to the FCC asking permission to drop analog cable service and to encrypt all digital signals. IIRC, around 50 groups expressed various objections and an accommodation was carved out for every one of them. RVers and campgrounds didn't participate and got no accommodation. So now, at some RV parks, to get cable TV, you need to use a set top box. And of course, in many RVs, hooking up a set top box is not a small deal. If RVIA or a campground association had been paying attention, that whole mess could have been avoided.
Same thing with satellite. There's no one speaking for RVers. So regulations get put into place that negatively affect us.
In 2012 we were staying in a state park east of Grand Junction, CO. There was no radio or TV reception or internet. The only way to get news was via satellite. We needed local stations, but weren't allowed to get them because the Grand Junction local stations weren't available on satellite. And because we were located in the Grand Junction TV market, we weren't allowed to have the Denver stations, even if the spot beam reached us. We needed information on the fires that were burning near us and in many other Colorado locations, but the rules denied us important safety information. I think the RV industry needs to lobby for us to be allowed access to ALL local stations while traveling - without a phone call.
Duane, I have two DVR's from DTV. You can only have one Genie but if you require more tuners another two tuner DVR will be supplied.
Peace
Dave