H23-600 receiver smoked

First off, directv is unable to activate receivers from third-party sites like eBay because they were previously on another person’s account and cannot be reactivated on a different one. 

Second, you cannot reuse the card in your old receiver for this one. Each card is paired with the respective receiver and cannot be swapped. Asking DIRECTV to swap the cards usually won’t result in a successful outcome.

You should have checked here before buying the receiver. DIRECTV would have been able to get you a replacement free of charge if you had the Protection Plan or otherwise the cost of shipping ($19.95).

Try to get your money back on eBay from the seller. Then, ask DIRECTV for a replacement receiver. They will likely give you a Genie client rather than another HD receiver like an H23 (H24, H25). 

So how do I tell if I have a protection plan?  Is that the 10.00 per month that that have been billing form 2008 (over 1600.00 total for the H23-600) ?   Are there new standalone options?   Also what happens when the chip card gets damaged(and you know that happens) ? So, are you saying DTV would just trash the receiver because THIER new card would not pair with THIER receiver? Why have a chip card then ? 

I cannot cable into my garage because I would have to go underground so the H23-600 works (or worked) well as a standalone.  Are there new standalone options?  Or should I just bail and stream.   I pay AT&T close to $3600.00 a year Im starting to think it just isn't worth it ;-( 

You are not paying $10 a month for the receiver. You are paying $10 a month for HD service, no matter how many HD boxes you have. There is $7 for each additional authorized TV, regardless of model box or TV without box (built-in client).

Cards are paired to the receiver so you can't just swap it between boxes. Plus owned boxes went away years ago, so eBay tends to have stolen or leased boxes, or just so old it is no longer activatable anyway.

Call DirecTV for a warranty replacement on your original box. Should just be $19.95 delivery, assuming you didn't purchase to own it ($399) where the warranty is long gone. Hopefully they still have some H24s. If just H25, that may need a tech if you don't already have SWM and have the older multiswitch instead.

Juniper, thanks for the info.  Im thinking that they dont have any standalone receivers or they would have offered me that option for a replacement.  Both of the agents I spoke with barely spoke English so I had a hard time communicating with them ;-(  Ill try customer service again but Im going to research streaming options now. 

Supposedly stock of non-Genie boxes have dwindled. Some claim they are completely out. AT&T appeared to be pushing customers to a all-in-one setup removing their personal freedom of equipment. I am very against that concept and sincerely hope the new co-owner brings back the flexibility.

You could try an authroized retailer such as Solid Signal. A HD non-DVR would be $199 (unless cost is raising for higher demand/lower stock). That is the one-time lease cost so would come with a 24-month agreement once activated. Assuming you don't have a SWM setup, you want an H24, not H25.

However, if you have any other boxes, what are the model numbers? Just want to be sure you have all reasonable options to consider.

While it doesn't that they are leased on that site they are and that is what they are charging.  You call DTV to activate them.

Three power supply capacitors on my H23-600 failed.  The top's of the 3 were swollen from building up pressure.  If pressure builds up high enough the tops pop at the groves, this lets the smoke out.  The supply output zero volts with these bad caps.  Two were nichicon 2200uF 16V, one was 1000uF, totalling 5200 uF.  Replacement is simple if you have a soldering iron and desoldering wick.  After removal found none were shorted but they were seriously degraded reading 13 uF, 249 uF, and 151 uF.  The capacitance of the 1000uF capacitor also got smaller the longer the meter was hooked up to it.  I had a 10,000uF 16V capacitor on hand (Digi-Key pn 1189-1125-ND) and replaced the three with that one, now my receiver works again.  Or, you could swap the power supply card from the ebay receiver into your receiver.  This way the numbers don't change.

I had same experience 2 years ago with DirecTV not willing to activate an ebay purchased receiver.  The year before they activated a similar receiver no problem.  They've also sent me replacement cards with different numbers than the original cards, so cards are not receiver specific.  So I think this is a (dumb) policy decision, not a technical decision.  I'm 25 year customer, used to be very happy with them.  Their old policy encouraged loyalty.  Their revised policy encourages switching over to streaming.     

@ecbarnum 

Access Cards each have a unique number. What happens is once paired to a receiver they cannot be paired to another. It is a one-way transaction.

Starting with the original Genie (HR34) boxes are lease-only with earlier models discontinuing owned options shortly after. In the last few years they stopped activating old boxes altogether, requiring return (or recycle of non-returnable models). Most owned boxes were SD-only so long discontinued. Going forward DirecTV is now on SWM and 

It is against the TOS to open leased receivers even if DTV doesn't want them back.  There where counterfeit capacitors being sold around that time so that is why they failed.