Winegard Road Trip T4 Satelite Dish

YES, he is correct - Suggest you contact these folks, and they will help you get what you need.

Search results for "D*TV for RV's" (solidsignal.com)

Yes, the technician is correct. Look for a Winegard Trav'ler dish as a replacement or any portable tripod DIRECTV SWM HD dish that is capable of receiving 99, 101, and 103.

@patinwi 

The tech was correct. Going forward you must have a slimline SWM dish on a tripod sled mount or the Winegard Trav'ler. You will need a H or HR model (or R22) for the receiver.

DirecTV stopped offering SD-only service in late 2015 as they were getting ready to shutdown the SD-only/MPEG-2 feeds. Many RV users never updated their setups. And unless that RV is permanently parked being used as a traditional residence, it is on your cost to update it.

The tech was not authorized to work on an RV unless as stated it is permanently parked.  You need to go to an RV dealer that installs DTV for service and to install the new dish if you want it.

I'm afraid that's between you and Leasure Travel Van. DirecTV can't help with this. 

@patinwi 

You paid Van City RV for equipment and install. That means your dispute is with them, not DirecTV.

As the MPEG-2/SD-only shutdown hasn't completed, this is a gray area for 3rd party/RV retailers. They are unloading stock while this may still work in some areas. Some of the old dishes though are SD-only for DirecTV are SD/HD for Dish Network, further giving those retailers some breathing room in their favor.

As you've already tried to resolve with the seller (Van City), you could try a BBB complaint. If the seller was fully aware it was DirecTV you were planning on hooking up in the RV, not being advised of the limited time for the T4 is a concern. Not a guarantee, but is a shot and if nothing else can leave a paper trail for future issues like this.

You ordered an RV with that dish, you got an RV with that dish. They are not going to change it unless you pay for it.

  A little late  to comment but not true you have no service. We have a T4 and got a Direct TV DVR HR24 which works fine. The catch is the T4 is for SD only, not HD. So your picture will not be as clear and there may be some channels you cannot get. For Example we get CNN I (International) on ch 361 (?) but cannot get CNN on Ch 202 (HD only). If you want full HD you will to put a different antenna up there as mentioned above.

DirecTV has been 'slowly' shutting down the MPEG-2 feeds. Origionally it was going to be a complete hard shut down but do to some internal issues (unknown what) and happening during the height of the pandemic it appears to be stepping down in stages.

Eventually the MPEG-2 feeds are expected to be completely shut down. The MPEG-4 feeds do carry SD and HD, but unknown how long the SD part will last. A lot of the old RV dishes/domes are SD-only for DirecTV but SD/HD for Dish which results in some misinformation going out from sellers of RV dishes.

Taking over a setup with an old one may be fine for a while, but I would not spend money to install brand new a legacy setup. Remember that SD-only TVs haven't been made in over a decade so it is an HD world now.