Newby Satellite Questions

[Ron3rd]

Wife and I bought our new to us 5er a few weeks ago and the seller threw in a Pathway X1 Dome and VIP211Z receiver, all new in the box, never used. They were purchased however about 3 years ago. I'm going to be signing up with Dish on one of their pay as you go plans.

So my questions are; is this a good dome to use for the current satellite service with Dish?

Also, I notice everyone's pushing the Wally receiver. What's the difference in the Wally and the one I have? Is the one I have current enough to still use?

[Ron3rd]

Thanks for the good info folks. Looks like I'm all set.

[Sandia_Man]

We have VIP211z and it has been working well for many years, added hard drive and see no reason to get a Wally. Used it initially for our manual setup residential sat. antenna, currently using it with a King dome and it starts setting itself up as soon as we plug into shore power, 2K watt inverter, or Onan genny. Since we often leave our rig unattended making it easy for others to walk away with it, we chose to roof mount our automated sat. antenna dome, it is easily removable in case we need to place it elsewhere when trees or other obstacles are blocking southern skies.

[lryrob9301]

My 211Z was put in service 8 years ago and is still working just like new with an addon hard drive. The Pathway X1 will work fine for DISH especially in the western USA. The only time you may have problems is in the upper northeast due to the western arc 129 satellite elevation angle being low, and some HD local channels only being available on the eastern arc satellites.

[2112]

I've been using the 211 with a basic dish for several years and an quite pleased.

[Ron3rd]

Thanks for the info Bill. I'm going to take your advice and go with what I have. The seller even threw in the tripod for the dome too.

[jorbill2or]

What you have... dome and 211 will work fine .. the “newer” wally has a new interface / guide that looks like the hopper guide and has a few advantages in speed of loading. But it still works fine and will take the addition of a hard drive to record while your away my suggest is Use what you have. See how you like it and the programming. Many in fact prefer the older 211’s as they are simpler and don’t have the occasional glitch that the wally with its programming may have.