One of the most
popular questions from potential subscribers is, "What if I want
to watch DIRECTV on more than one TV?"
At AMERIDISH, our answer is, "Enjoy!" The fact of the matter
is that multi-room systems with DIRECTV are
extremely common. Here is how it all works...
SPLITTING
Each TV that receives DIRECTV service must be
connected to a DIRECTV receiver.
The great part is, you can hook as many TVs to a single receiver as
you want! Think of the receiver like a VCR - you can hook up as many
TVs as you'd like, and they will all show what is currently playing
on the VCR, or in our case, the receiver. We call this "splitting"
because it is done with a simple coaxial splitter.
The picture below helps to illustrate this.
For
customers who do not view their multiple television sets simultaneously,
this approach is adequate. Remote control extenders or RF receivers
can also be incorporated with the multi-room system so that upstairs
viewers can access the downstairs receiver conveniently (or vice versa).
MIRRORING
Some customers operate
more than one television in their households at once. For these households,
it is inconvenient to be unable to view different programs simultaneously
in different rooms. These customers, therefore, use a different approach
to their multi-room system, called "mirroring." This multi-room
approach uses multiple receivers to control independent TV sets. In
this way, viewers of multiple TVs can each watch different programs
independent of the other televisions in the house. The picture below
helps to illustrate this approach.
As
you can see, in the mirroring approach there is never a conflict in
viewing separate programming on multiple TVs. For this convenience,
DIRECTV charges a Mirroring Fee of $4.99 per
extra receiver per month. So, for example, if a customer wished to
subscribe to Total Choice Plus with Local Channels ($39.99/month)
for a 2 room system (shown above), the monthly rate would be $44.98.
Take a look at the cable comparison to
see how well this stacks up against the local cable "competition"...
HYBRID
The average US household owns 2.6
televisions - let's round up and say 3, shall we? For some customers,
connecting a DIRECTV receiver to all 3 TVs is
the perfect solution. These customers pay an additional monthly fee
of $9.98 (2 x $4.99), and they receive DIRECTV
service on all 3 TVs in their house, each television independent of
the others.
For most, however,
the dual-mirroring fee is unecessary. Many customers use the "hybrid"
approach, combining both the splitting and the mirroring multi-room
solutions. For example, John Smith may have 3 TVs - one in the living
room, one in his bedroom, and one in his daughter's room. John himself
either watches the TV in the bedroom or in the living room - but never
both at the same time - and his daughter seems to watch her TV 24/7.
So John uses the hybrid approach shown below.
As you can see, John
is never bothered by having 2 TVs powered by the same DIRECTV
receiver, and John's daughter is free to watch whatever she would
like, regardless of where John is watching television. In this way,
John saved himself $4.99 per month in mirroring fees, or about $60
per year!
For
a more complete look at multi-room costs, click here
