After a —literally— eleven year stretch with no new receivers for commercial customers, DIRECTV has started to ship the H44 receiver to commercial customers. The H44 is not a new design. It’s the same device that was originally rolled out to residential customers as the Genie Lite in 2015. You can read my original review here. This move was made to get a new product for commercial customers as quickly as possible. Engineering new receivers takes years, while repurposing an existing design can be done very quickly.
In its residential life, the H44 was a receiver that allowed you to add a DIRECTV-branded hard drive to make it, essentially, an HR44 Genie DVR. That design never sold well, with most customers simply opting for the HR44 off the bat. However, my personal H44 was a real workhorse and I liked that it was far smaller than the HR44 with the same features.
In commercial life, the H44 is a replacement for the H25. While it is larger than the H25, it offers better airflow and a more modern design. This new design allows it to use the same user interface as the Genies rather than the old interface that DIRECTV walked away from four years ago.
One more thing before I get to it…
You can get a commercial H44 receiver from Solid Signal. It’s the latest and greatest commercial receiver. Yes, it’s a little bigger than an H25, and no it won’t work with non-SWM systems. But assuming those two things are ok with you, it’s really the right choice for you moving forward, until something even newer comes out for commercial customers.
Putting the H44 in commercial mode
When the H44 comes to you, it may still be in residential mode. In residential mode, each H44 uses five tuners. That can make it a little hard to install ten receivers. For that reason, we recommend that the first thing you do is download new software to it. This step isn’t generally necessary, but it’s a good idea here. Reboot the receiver and when you see the initial welcome screen, press 02468 on the remote. The software process can take up to 20 minutes, and you can do as many receivers as you want.
When you get to live TV, press MENU then go to Settings, Satellite, and press SELECT to go into Satellite Setup. Press the RIGHT ARROW to highlight any of the options on the right.
DO NOT PRESS SELECT AT THIS POINT. If you do, you’ll have to reboot and start again.
While any of the options is highlighted, Press 49757 on the remote. You will be asked to press DASH to confirm. This is a one-way trip. You can’t put the receiver back into residential mode once you do this.
The receiver will restart and when it does, you should be in commercial mode. You can confirm this by entering Satellite Setup and checking signal strength. If you see one tuner, you’ve done it right.
Once the receiver is in commercial mode, you should also be able to select 18″ Round in satellite setup so you can use the H44 with single-satellite dishes. This is important for customers with mobile or marine setups.
Need help?
Your friends at Signal Group can help you get these receivers activated quickly and can help you through the rest of the process. Call us at 888-233-7563 during East Coast business hours and we’ll be happy to get you the support you need. If you call, we can also send you a detailed PDF showing this process that you can take with you.
