Technical FAQ

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Any cabling needs to be able to handle minimum 15 amps draw. If your cabling to the unit is insufficient it will either cause a voltage drop and the dish will reboot or it will not be able to draw enough current to boot the dish.

We recommend no smaller than 12AWG cable. If you are running cable any longer than 3m to the unit, then at least 10AWG. If your dish won't boot please read the FAQ item below titled ''Can't get internet or the dish app just shows the dish as disconnected or connects then just disconnects?" to troubleshoot the issue.

Cigarette sockets are notoriously inconsistent and unreliable. If you are using a cigarette socket it needs to be heavy duty and rated at least 15 amps. Even then we have seen poor fitting sockets that don't provide enough power. If you are using a cigarette plug and experiencing issues. We suggest you first set the unit up with a direct connection to the battery via Anderson, confirm it's working and then troubleshoot your cigarette plug wiring.

If you do have any installation questions though or require any help or support getting up and running, we're here to help. 

Check out our how to guide How to connect/remove the dishy adapter to the DC-Fi

The Gen 3 plug fits through the supplied RJ45 waterproof cover without any need to cut the plug.

We'll have a full step by step guide with photos coming soon, for now follow these steps.

1. Unscrew the grommet cap from the back of the cover
2. Remove the grommet from inside the back of the cover
3. Slide the grommet cap onto the dishy cable first
4. Wrap the grommet around the cable in front of the cap
5. Push the Dishy plug through the back of the main body of the cover
6. Screw the grommet cap on loosely
7. Follow the how to guide for the gen 2 here for connecting the cable to the DC-Fi with the cover installed  How to connect/remove the dishy adapter to the DC-Fi

The status light on the top of the unit will give you an indication of the current state of your wifi/internet connection

Solid blue = Wifi router is booting up (the wifi network will not be available)

Flashing blue = Wifi is up but the dish has not fully connected to the internet yet

Solid White = The dish is booted and connected to the internet

When it is flashing blue, you can connect to the wifi network on your phone/tablet and you will be able to see the status of the dish (eg booting, finding satelite) via the Starlink app. See 'Can I still use the dish app to control the dish?' below for more details on using the Stalrink app

The remote control only works when the main power switch on the front of the unit is in the off position. That is, it is depressed and not inset into the switch plate. 

The remote control has an on and off button, these will operate the unit's power accordingly while the main switch is off. 

The reason for this is that the main switch acts as an override. In the situation the remote fails for any reason (flat battery, breaks, lost), you can still operate the unit. 

The remote is a standard 433mhz remote control used by most garage door openers. If it is broken or lost, you can purchase one from anywhere that sells replacement garage door remotes. If this happens get in touch and we can take you through how to reprogram the unit to work with the new remote

The unit has both 5G and 2.4Ghz wifi networks setup as a single network. Your device will select the best network to connect to automatically. The wifi network details are:

network name:  Starlink

password: starlink

Go to http://192.168.8.1  in your browser. the default admin password is exploreourwa 

To change the password see our video guides here

Check out our video guides here

Absolutely. Connect your phone to the wifi network of the unit. Open the app and you will be able to see the dish status and stow/unstow/reboot the dish from the settings page in the app. 

You do not need to login to the app to see/control the dish. However, you do need to be logged in to set the sleep schedules.

Note- You cannot use the router status/settings page in the app. You are no longer using the original router as our unit has it's own wifi router built in. ps. ours is better anyway ;-)

See our step by step guide Dishy Boot Sequence to see how you can see the status of your dish in the starlink app and what to expect when using the DC-Fi unit

See above re controlling the dish with the app.

Once you have connected and have the app open on the dish page. Click 'settings' and you can use the slider to stow/unstow the dish

Yes absolutely, in fact we highly recommend you setup sleep schedules so that you don't accidentally leave your dish on all night while you have no solar.  

Dish sleep schedules will put the dish to sleep at the times you specify in the app. While this doesn't switch off our wifi power unit entirely, it drastically reduces the power consumption to around ~5w

To turn on sleep schedules (See above re controlling the dish with the app)

Once you have connected and have the app open on the dish page. Click 'settings' and you can set the sleep schedule there. You need to be logged into the app to adjust the sleep schedule.

We recommend disabling 'snow melt' in the dish app options just so you don't accidentally waste any power.

The 'snow melt' function can use a lot of power which may blow the fuse supplied with the unit.

While the unit will support the power required for 'snow melt', sustained regular use may impair the longevity of the unit and we do not support the use of snow melt under the warranty. 

You need a CAT6A S/FTP* Ethernet cable. We recommend no longer than 10-15m, but use the absolute shortest cable you can for your application. 

If you're in Australia, you can purchase these from a Altronics or Jaycar or there are many sites online. 

A note on cable length:

While any length up to ~75m is theoretically possible, just keep in mind that if you are using the original dishy cable, it is already 25m long. Any cable you use to extend this further is increasing the distance the power and data have to travel to/from your dish. The longer the cable, the more power it will use and potentially slower speeds you will experience.

*S/FTP stands for shielded foiled twisted pair. The individual twisted pairs are wrapped in a foil tape before being wrapped in an overall flexible yet mechanically strong braid screen. The additional foil on the twisted pairs helps to reduce crosstalk from adjacent pairs and other cables

We have seen in some instances the wifi 5 router is running an old version of it's software which is causing the slow speeds. 

If yours is still running slow, see our video guide here on how to perform the simple upgrade process. Or if tech really isn't your thing please get in touch and we can either update it for you if you can bring it in, or walk you through it over the phone 

Older versions of the firmware on the wifi 5 router had some issues with wifi calling. Follow our  video guide here guide to upgrade the firmware. The Standard wifi 5 routers can take 5 or 10 minutes before wifi calling becomes available on some phones.

It is likely whatever 12v source you have the unit plugged into is not providing enough current. The unit needs to be able to draw up to 10 amps (12+ amps Gen 3) from your battery in order to boot up the dish. If you are connecting the unit to cabling that is too small gauge, it won't be able to draw enough current when the dish tries to switch it's radio on.

If you are having issues then the best approach is to go through the steps below with the unit connected via Anderson as directly to the battery as possible. 

As a rough guide if you are able to see how much current (amps) is being drawn from your system via your battery monitor or you have an ammeter you can plug in front of the device, you should see the following happen

1. If you can see how much power your system is using, at this point make a note of it so you have a baseline. If you can do this with nothing else drawing on the battery like fridge etc that would be best, but not end of the world if not.
2. Disconnect the dish from the unit. Power on the unit and wait until the wifi comes up and you can connect to it. 
3. Connect your phone to the wifi, it will say no internet available. If it asks to use the network anyway or always connect, choose that option.
4. Now plug the dish in. With a minute or so you should see power usage start to go up. With nothing else drawing on the battery this is roughly what you should see, times are very approx. 

Gen2

• 1-2 minutes 0.85 - 1 amp
• 2-4 minutes 1 - 3 amps
• Then a jump to 7 - 9+ amps for a brief time. 
• Then back down to fluctuating between 2.5 - 5 amps

Gen3

• Will jump immediately to 9+ amps and fluctuate between 9-12 amps for a few minutes before starting to settle down and eventually come back to the 3-6 amp range

Note- If you do have other things running at the same time, your looking for you baseline number plus the above. So if you baseline is 2 amps, then the starting you'd be looking for 2.85 amps as the Gen 2 starting point

That didn't happen? OK so...

• If the power never changes, then for some reason the dish isn't getting any power. For gen 2 if you're using our starlink cable adapter, make sure your starlink plug is all the way into the connector. The back end of the starlink plug should be below the lip of the connector.
• If you're seeing power go up, but it never gets up to the highest levels, there's a good chance however you have the unit plugged in is not able to supply the load required. Is the cable too thin for the length? Can the socket you're using supply 15amps? 
• If the unit completely flicks off and on as it begins to jump to the high load draw, the voltage protection is cutting in. Again are you cables the right size for the length or if you have a Lithium Battery, the BMS may be cutting in. Give us a call and we'll tell you how to disable the built in voltage protection.

We recommend no smaller than 12AWG cable. If you are running cable any longer than 3m to the unit, then at least 10AWG.

Cigarette sockets are notoriously inconsistent and unreliable. If you are using a cigarette socket it needs to be heavy duty and rated at least 15 amps. Even then we have seen poor fitting sockets that don't provide enough power. 

The best approach when you first get the unit is to connect it directly or as directly as possible to your battery via the Anderson cable provided. Test the unit is working with you dish, then work out your installation. That way you can easily identify where any power issues might be. Drop us a line if you need any advice.

The dish connection is perfectly stable. We've only see this behavior on the older wifi 5 router with older firmware. 

The app periodically sends a status request to the dish to see if it is online. Before the app receives the response, it sometimes times out and displays the dish as offline, then as soon as it receives the status update from the dish it shows as online. 

Once you are connected and you have internet access, the best thing to do is do speed tests, both in the starlink app and using other services like speedtest.net. This will confirm you have a good connection. 

If you want to see that the flicking between disconnected and online is not related to dropouts, you can also view the 'statistics' page in the starlink app. You will be able to see that there are no more or less connection dropouts than if you were using the starlink router.

That's a lot to digest, so of course if you need a hand just reach out, we're happy to help.

See our DC-Fi User Guides for some videos and step by step guides on how to do things.

There are a few more general questions in the main FAQ on the the product page

Or if there's anything we've missed please just drop us a message in the website chat or click the Facebook button below to connect to us on Facebook and message us there