This is all new to me so I have a lot of questions. We have Dish at home. The main receiver says Hopper Sling and has a plastic card (data card?) that says G4. We also have Joeys in the house.We recently bought a 2008 Winnebago that had a Dish Tailgater and a satellite dish hard mounted on the roof of the RV. There were 2 dish receivers, 1 for each satellite dish. We don't generally watch much TV and I decided to sell the tailgater and that receiver. We just didn't have the extra room in our small RV to haul it around with us. I know it would provide better reception than the crank up roof model, but that isn't what I need to know. Our next campsite has great line of sight of the southern sky so I am trying to figure out what I need to hook this stuff up.I am thinking of leaving behind the receiver that was in the RV as I'd have to call and get it added to our system. Using logic only, I assume that I'd have to unhook and bring my main Hopper receiver as I think the Joeys need to be connected to the main receiver to work, right? If I am wrong, can I just bring a Joey and use that as my receiver? What will I be giving up? If I need to bring the main Hopper receiver will it be a problem if I unhook it from my home system and then re-install it when I return? I apologize in advance for the "see spot run" type of questions but I hope someone will help me out and explain how this all works together. I do have the instruction manuals that came with the RV and I plan to read them when we arrive at our site. I assume those will tell me how to find the satellite and what cables I need to hook where. I just want to be sure I bring the right stuff with me and get this right the first time. Thanks!

ol' yeller wrote:This is all new to me so I have a lot of questions. We have Dish at home. The main receiver says Hopper Sling and has a plastic card (data card?) that says G4. We also have Joeys in the house.We recently bought a 2008 Winnebago that had a Dish Tailgater and a satellite dish hard mounted on the roof of the RV. There were 2 dish receivers, 1 for each satellite dish. We don't generally watch much TV and I decided to sell the tailgater and that receiver. We just didn't have the extra room in our small RV to haul it around with us. I know it would provide better reception than the crank up roof model, but that isn't what I need to know. Our next campsite has great line of sight of the southern sky so I am trying to figure out what I need to hook this stuff up.I am thinking of leaving behind the receiver that was in the RV as I'd have to call and get it added to our system. Using logic only, I assume that I'd have to unhook and bring my main Hopper receiver as I think the Joeys need to be connected to the main receiver to work, right? If I am wrong, can I just bring a Joey and use that as my receiver? What will I be giving up? If I need to bring the main Hopper receiver will it be a problem if I unhook it from my home system and then re-install it when I return? I apologize in advance for the "see spot run" type of questions but I hope someone will help me out and explain how this all works together. I do have the instruction manuals that came with the RV and I plan to read them when we arrive at our site. I assume those will tell me how to find the satellite and what cables I need to hook where. I just want to be sure I bring the right stuff with me and get this right the first time. Thanks!Not that easy. You would have to take the hopper and what they call the Node for it to work. Not sure where your Node is, but mine is by the dish on the house. supposedly the closer to the dish the better is. Also depends on what type of dish you have. It it a manual dish or automatic. More info would be needed.try hooking up before your trip would be my recommendation.

Figured it wasn't that easy. As the RV has a Dish dish already installed shouldn't that have a node attached to it? Is the node specific to the receiver? I can't hook it up at home as I don't have that line of sight from the RV roof. I've been reading here and elsewhere. It appears that the Joeys are not stand alone devices as I suspected. The RV does have a non DVR Dish receiver in it. I may just bite the bullet and have that one activated if it isn't too expensive. The RV is at the storage lot so I can't be more specific right now. I plan to bring it home tomorrow to pack for our trip so I can check out what is there better then. This isn't hugely important as it is only a 5 day trip and usually we just watch DVDs at night. I just thought that it would be a good opportunity to get it set up. Thanks!

Your Hopper/Joey will only work correctly with an open-faced portable dish or a rooftop Winegard Travler.You can't really use your Tailgater to hook up your Hopper.Since you probably already have a VIP211 receiver for your Tailgater, it would be much more easier to just reactivate your 211 receiver & then use the Tailgater.

Sorry if I wasn't clear, I sold the tailgater. All I have now is the Dish on the roof of the RV and the receiver for it. I called Dish today and guess I'll activate the old 211 receiver for $7 a month and forgo the DVR player. I'll attempt the 211 hook-up next week when we are at the beach and have good line of sight.

ol' yeller wrote:Sorry if I wasn't clear, I sold the tailgater. All I have now is the Dish on the roof of the RV and the receiver for it. I called Dish today and guess I'll activate the old 211 receiver for $7 a month and forgo the DVR player. I'll attempt the 211 hook-up next week when we are at the beach and have good line of sight.You can add an external USB hard drive (up to 2TB) to the VIP211 and get the DVR functions for a one-time $40 fee.

Dish For Dummies | Good Sam Community

ol__yeller
Explorer II
Jun 05, 2015
Thank you everyone for your knowledge. This is a new experience for me. As we don't watch much if any TV while camping, I probably won't add the DVR capability. I wasn't aware that Dish uses 3 satellites and I'm pretty sure mine is a manually adjusted dish atop the RV. If I am hearing you correctly does this mean when I get a signal, I will only get some programming? To get other programming, can I readjust the dish (sounds like a pain)? If we find ourselves on more longer trips, I may upgrade the dish to newer technology but for now I just wanted to see what I have. I know having a rooftop mounted dish limits line of sight so I will have to consider that in my decisions. Also we only have one TV in the RV.
Bill_Satellite
Explorer II
Jun 05, 2015
ol' yeller wrote:
Sorry if I wasn't clear, I sold the tailgater. All I have now is the Dish on the roof of the RV and the receiver for it. I called Dish today and guess I'll activate the old 211 receiver for $7 a month and forgo the DVR player. I'll attempt the 211 hook-up next week when we are at the beach and have good line of sight.

Even this will likely leave your options highly limited unless the roof top antenna is an auto pointing antenna (dome or Winegard Trav'ler, which it likely is not).
An antenna that you must manually point or is an auto pointing antenna with only 1 single LNB (the eye at the end of the antenna arm) can only receive 1 satellite and Dish uses 3 to provide all of their programming. Additionally, if you have more than 1 TV and you want to watch programming on more than 1 you will likely need 2 receivers or a 211K (not 211Z) so you have a coax output so you can at least watch satellite in SD on the 2nd TV.
Dutch_12078
Explorer II
Jun 05, 2015
ol' yeller wrote:
Sorry if I wasn't clear, I sold the tailgater. All I have now is the Dish on the roof of the RV and the receiver for it. I called Dish today and guess I'll activate the old 211 receiver for $7 a month and forgo the DVR player. I'll attempt the 211 hook-up next week when we are at the beach and have good line of sight.

You can add an external USB hard drive (up to 2TB) to the VIP211 and get the DVR functions for a one-time $40 fee.
ol__yeller
Explorer II
Jun 05, 2015
Sorry if I wasn't clear, I sold the tailgater. All I have now is the Dish on the roof of the RV and the receiver for it. I called Dish today and guess I'll activate the old 211 receiver for $7 a month and forgo the DVR player. I'll attempt the 211 hook-up next week when we are at the beach and have good line of sight.
TechWriter
Explorer
Jun 04, 2015
Your Hopper/Joey will only work correctly with an open-faced portable dish or a rooftop Winegard Travler.

You can't really use your Tailgater to hook up your Hopper.

Since you probably already have a VIP211 receiver for your Tailgater, it would be much more easier to just reactivate your 211 receiver & then use the Tailgater.
ol__yeller
Explorer II
Jun 04, 2015
Figured it wasn't that easy. As the RV has a Dish dish already installed shouldn't that have a node attached to it? Is the node specific to the receiver? I can't hook it up at home as I don't have that line of sight from the RV roof. I've been reading here and elsewhere. It appears that the Joeys are not stand alone devices as I suspected. The RV does have a non DVR Dish receiver in it. I may just bite the bullet and have that one activated if it isn't too expensive. The RV is at the storage lot so I can't be more specific right now. I plan to bring it home tomorrow to pack for our trip so I can check out what is there better then. This isn't hugely important as it is only a 5 day trip and usually we just watch DVDs at night. I just thought that it would be a good opportunity to get it set up. Thanks!
kmbelt
Explorer
Jun 04, 2015
ol' yeller wrote:
This is all new to me so I have a lot of questions. We have Dish at home. The main receiver says Hopper Sling and has a plastic card (data card?) that says G4. We also have Joeys in the house.

We recently bought a 2008 Winnebago that had a Dish Tailgater and a satellite dish hard mounted on the roof of the RV. There were 2 dish receivers, 1 for each satellite dish. We don't generally watch much TV and I decided to sell the tailgater and that receiver. We just didn't have the extra room in our small RV to haul it around with us. I know it would provide better reception than the crank up roof model, but that isn't what I need to know. Our next campsite has great line of sight of the southern sky so I am trying to figure out what I need to hook this stuff up.

I am thinking of leaving behind the receiver that was in the RV as I'd have to call and get it added to our system. Using logic only, I assume that I'd have to unhook and bring my main Hopper receiver as I think the Joeys need to be connected to the main receiver to work, right? If I am wrong, can I just bring a Joey and use that as my receiver? What will I be giving up? If I need to bring the main Hopper receiver will it be a problem if I unhook it from my home system and then re-install it when I return? I apologize in advance for the "see spot run" type of questions but I hope someone will help me out and explain how this all works together. I do have the instruction manuals that came with the RV and I plan to read them when we arrive at our site. I assume those will tell me how to find the satellite and what cables I need to hook where. I just want to be sure I bring the right stuff with me and get this right the first time. Thanks!

Not that easy. You would have to take the hopper and what they call the Node for it to work. Not sure where your Node is, but mine is by the dish on the house. supposedly the closer to the dish the better is.

Also depends on what type of dish you have. It it a manual dish or automatic. More info would be needed.

try hooking up before your trip would be my recommendation.

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