New Directv receiver/old dish

Great to hear that it worked as it should once you made the changes.
Enjoy!

I just want to follow up with you gentlemen. Bill, your advice was spot on. YC1 and az99; the tips you offered were very valuable too. With all of the knowledge gained here I was able to get it working. One of the biggest trip-ups I had was not being able to see the menu while working with it in the trailer. I was too dumb to simply hit the exit button (thanks Bill) and get out of that "searching for signal" screen. Once I was out of that I was able to go to the setup proceedure. As soon as I selected 01 then selected "multiswitch" the lights on my Winegard dish control lit up in the proper sequence. I then hit the search button for the dish and she took right off. The receiver timed out once while waiting for the dish to locate the satellite but I just clicked the "look for satellite" button on the screen again and it kept going. I scrolled around and found the satellite signal strength meter so I was able to see when the dish locked on. It was then just a matter of waiting until the receiver got done downloading whatever it needed and I had a picture.

So, you guys all get a big pat on the back and a heartfelt thank you. Randy

IIRC the easiest way I found to do it was before you unplug it at home, just remove the satellite input. Then go into the menu and change it to 18" dish. Then put in MH.

When I would then bring it home just connect everything back as normal and turn it on. It would automatically reset to the SWM setup on start up.

Good luck. You should be able to access the menu when plugged in or not but you don't want to do it while connected to your home SWM dish as it will not allow you to move to multiswitch.
Sometime you have to push the exit button or menu several times or any odd button but finally it will let your menu button work.

Thanks for all the help. I did try something since I first posted; maybe it was dumb but I did it. The Winegard AS-2003 has the capability to supply 2 receivers. According to the instruction manual there is a primary and secondary receiver. I assume that the primary supplies power to the LNB. So, having an old style receiver, I hooked it up to the primary cable from the dish and powered up. The Winegard took right off and went through its usual search and then stopped; once again I assumed that it had found its target. I then hooked the new receiver up to the secondary dish feed, thinking that I might see something. It just read out "searching for signal".

So, apparently, I must make the changes like Bill and YC mentioned. The problem is that the only way I can access the menu feature is when it is connected inside the house. I am wondering if I should attempt the menu access without the input and output cables connected to the receiver? When I do look at the menu and the "setup" area, about the only things I see are 3 options indicating things like, "restore to factory defaults" etc. This is acompanied by a warning on the screen that I am about to lose my settings. This is where I chickened out. When I access the "satellite" settings; the only thing it will do is start checking signal.

I am going to give it another whirl; now that I have the step by step directions provided by Bill. Thanks again for all of the expertise.

donn0128 wrote:
Be aware you will also need a B band converter for each input signal unless you convert to SWM

Why? 18" dish on only 101º sat.

The D12 is not an HD receiver so you won't need any B-Band converters. You don't need to make any changes to your RV setup. You just need to reset the satellite receiver parameters as mentioned by YC1 above.
You will go to Menu>Setup>Satellite and then Repeat Satellite Setup. Select the 18" round option (01) and this will change the SWM switch type to Multi-switch and the receiver will again output LNB voltage.

You will either need to convert your trailer to SWM or go to setup and change the receiver settings, or buy a newer antenna system.. Be aware you will also need a B band converter for each input signal unless you convert to SWM

In your house he converted to SWM. Single Wire Multiswitch. With this setup you only need one coax from the dish. That wire is fed into a splitter device and power is sent up the coax from a small power supply versus the receiver sending power.

The box is programmable. Go to the menu and tell it you are using an 18 inch round dish. You may be able to discern where to make the changes when you get to the setup area now you know the difference.

So to recap, you need to tell the receiver it is not to be setup as SWM.

If they provided you with all HD receiver boxes you will need to make a favorites list different from the sticks and bricks setup.