How do you know if your hotel has the DIRECTV Residential Experience?

DIRECTV’s Residential Experience is awesome. I mean, who doesn’t want the same DIRECTV that you have at home? It’s easier for hotels to manage, it works super well, and the latest generation includes DVR function in every room.

There are a lot of DIRECTV systems in small hotels and not all of them have the full residential experience. It’s a shame, because a lot of hotel owners don’t realize how putting a newer system into the hotel can improve guest satisfaction and save money. But I’ll get to that in a bit. First, here’s how you can tell if you’re in a hotel with “DRE.”

If you press the {MENU} button and can go to “Settings&Help” and “Settings”…
If you have nothing but standard definition programming…
If you don’t see the DIRECTV logo when you change channels…
If you have any remote but the DIRECTV Hospitality Remote

…then you don’t have DRE. For example, recently I was in a hotel that had almost everything you’d need for a DRE installation including the right kind of receivers, but they weren’t running the DRE software meaning that anyone could go in and do things like change favorites lists or reboot the receiver. That probably causes problems for the hotel manager on a regular basis.

So why should a hotel manager care about DRE?

  • DRE will make it easier for your staff to manage the TV. You can fix most problems right from the front desk and stop a lot of those problems from happening at all because a lot of menus are hidden from the guest.
  • DRE will help you stop internet congestion. When you put in DRE, the guest gets a selection of free on-demand titles that are pre-downloaded to your property when internet is demand is low. Guests will choose these programs instead of hogging your bandwidth with Netflix or Hulu.
  • DRE stops lines at the front desk because with the right software you can have automated checkout and messages in the room.

Why will a hotel guest care about DRE?

  • No one watches truly live TV anymore. The latest DRE systems let you pause live TV just like you do at home, plus rewind and fast forward. Why should you live without that stuff?
  • You’ll get less expensive pay-per-view options and tons of free on-demand content. In some cases this even includes HBO and Showtime content.
  • All DRE installs come with an anti-microbial remote because, you know, eww.
  • The latest DRE systems let you record programs while you’re out playing and watch them later. You’ll see your recordings on the TV instead of on a tablet or phone.

Even if the hotel’s only a few years old, it’s worth upgrading to DRE. There are a lot of programs that make it easy and quick and most of all inexpensive. As a hotel owner you could be offering your guests the next level of entertainment and not worrying about Wi-Fi congestion. There’s practically no downside!

About the Author

Stuart Sweet
Stuart Sweet is the editor-in-chief of The Solid Signal Blog and a "master plumber" at Signal Group, LLC. He is the author of over 10,000 articles and longform tutorials including many posted here. Reach him by clicking on "Contact the Editor" at the bottom of this page.