TechWriter, I have the DirecTV Genie in my house. As I said the signal goes over coax from the dish to the main box as well as all the receivers. Then from the main box and the receivers I have HDMI cables going to the TV. I'm just going by what the DirecTV installer told me and that was that I could not get a true HDMI picture on my TV without using the HDMI cable from the boxes to the TV. And (I may be wrong on this) I don't think the little boxes that feed the other TV's in the house even have a cable out jack on them. I think they only have HDMI out. I think the main box has a cable out so I guess I could always go try and hook up a piece of coax to it and feed it to the TV and see what the picture looks like, but for now I'll trust what the DirecTV installer told me.