Sunday, September 23, 2012

Starchoice Upgrade

Yesterday I tackled a small job in the motorhome that I had been putting off. The Starchoice receiver in the front of the motorhome was standard definition which worked fine with the old monster CRT TV that came with the unit. A couple of years ago we upgraded to a new digital TV but never upgraded to a high definition receiver. We had an HD receiver in the guest room in the house that hardly ever gets used so I decided to swap them out. Guests can put up with standard definition.

First I dealt with a slight de-lamination problem in the plywood enclosure for the receiver. I took the face piece off,  squirted a little wood glue into the end grain of the plywood and clamped it overnight. That fixed it. When I took the face piece off I began to wonder if I had enough room for the HD unit which is much wider than the old unit. I measured and found I had a quarter of an inch to spare. I was good to go!

I passed the power cable out the back (they could have made this a little easier to do!) with a minimal number of scratches on my arm and hooked the receiver up to the TV and to the video distribution box that sends the signal to the entertainment centre on the outside as well as to the bedroom TV.

Now all I have to do is to take the Starchoice PVR receiver out of the bedroom in the house and install it in the bedroom of the motorhome shortly before we leave. Norma has it loaded with about a hundred movies we can watch while parked overnight in Walmarts and Pemex stations. Having two receivers also allows me to watch "guy stuff" (hockey and football) in the living room while she watches her programs in the bedroom. Life is Good!


8 comments:

  1. Sounds good to me! My late DH watched NASCAR, while I watched what I wanted to on another TV.

    Happy Trails, Penny, TX

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    1. The older I get, the more NASCAR I watch. It is not really a Canadian thing but it probably brings back memories of how I used to drive my dad's car.

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  2. Nice you got the digital receiver installed and all is good. We have two tv's a well but don't watch enough tv to bother with the other one.

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    1. George, I have spent too many hours out in the blazing sun or in a rainstorm setting up the dish to be able to say this.

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  3. A job well done - you are so organized - it shames me.

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    1. Not organized at all mi amigo. I have been putting this off for at least two years and it was only a half hour job.

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  4. Good job, Croft. That's exactly what we do too - 2 TV's solves a lot of problems on rainy evenings.

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