Black Boxes: Echostar Dish 4900 OpenTV Satellite Receiver

by Don Collins
Summer 2001

DISH Network
(800) 333-DISH
www.dishnetwork.com
$299 + $22/month programming fees (50 channels)
Installation fees: check current promotions

One of the relatively new and rapidly proliferating interactive-television platforms is OpenTV. OpenTV incorporates Web browsing and MPEG technology into TV broadcasts so viewers can interact with data and graphics embedded in the broadcast signal. EchoStar incorporates this technology into its Dish 4900 OpenTV Satellite receiver offering interactivity, VCR control, a customizable electronic program guide (EPG), an Event Timer and Dolby Digital output. If you're looking for a reasonably-priced satellite receiver with interactive capability, keep reading, this may be just what you're looking for.

All Signals Go
The Dish 4900 comes with a 20-inch satellite dish and a dual-LNBF (low noise blockdown converter/feedhorn) hookup, which supports a second receiver for multi-television households. Once we set up the dish - easier said than done (you might want pay to have it installed), the rest of the hookup was a piece of cake. We connected a VCR and a television and inserted the smart card (which allowed us to access the channels we subscribed to and get software updates) into the slot on the front panel. There are varying rates for program packages. We had the minimum of 50 channels, but there are 100 and 150 channel packages available.
The heart of the Dish 4900 is its 48-hour, customizable electronic program guide (EPG). One of the nicest aspects of the interface was that it had a preview window that so we could watch a show as we browsed the EPG. To help manage the guide, EchoStar included the ability to customize it into four screens, each with its own name and the information of up to 30 programs. We could also have the EPG list only those channels that we subscribed to, saving us time as we surfed. Additionally, the 4900 had eight pre-selected theme channels: Movies, Religious, Sports, News/Business, Series/Specials, Music/Art, Family/Kids and Education. These theme channels gave us the program listings for a selected category at the press of a button.

Smarter Television
With all its promise, OpenTV is still in its infancy. We were able to find just one channel of our 50 that had OpenTV interactivity: Dish Network's Instant Weather. Using our remote control, we could select not only the state and region but the city as well. We got a five-day forecast for beautiful spring weather. This will be a great feature when more networks start to utilize the OpenTV services.
In addition to the interactive abilities of OpenTV and the EPG, the 4900 made our TV smarter in other ways. Using the Event Timer, we could program the Dish to automatically activate our VCR to record a show via an infrared signal.
We wanted to tape CNN's Money Watch while we were away, so we set the timer to signal the VCR to record the show and had the options of taping daily, weekly or Monday-through-Friday program times.
We could also use the Event Timer to alert us to the beginning of a program. For instance, while we were watching the news, a small flashing icon appeared on the screen reminding us that a film was starting on another channel. By clicking the icon, we went directly to that show.

All Hooked Up
The Dish 4900 is a great satellite receiver that offers some promising interactive television features. This reasonably-priced receiver is the perfect way to get hooked up to receive satellite television and go interactive.

Smart Specs
Outputs: Composite x 2, S-video, Dolby fiber optic, Phone jack for PPV