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I dont agree, by the time you have added on all the options the price isn't much different, although it is a bit cheaper.
Alternative to Sky
- Thread starter CliffyG
- Start date
I dont agree, by the time you have added on all the options the price isn't much different, although it is a bit cheaper.
Caporegime
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There is no alternative to sky tbh. Not one which offers the exact same service. They have exclusivity over certain channels like sky atlantic, their box is also the easiest to use by a mile and i love the way it integrates with the phone app. i used to find alternative recordings between 2-4 am within seconds and set them up for all my favourite shows so i could watch and record other stuff during the day which didn't have alternative recording times. However 99% of the stuff is re-runs it's a lot of money for very little new content every week.
netflix - expensive for ultra HD (which offers the best quality of stream), full of old content, limited exclusive content, once you have had it for 1-3 months you will struggle for content. i think it's worth maybe paying for 1 month a year and just binge on what you have missed out during the previous 12 months. it's easily do-able. it's not as good as what people make it out to be. after the first 3 months you will find your watching it less and less.
prime - see above same as netflix really
virgin tivo - much better broadband service, poorer tv offering, box isn't anywhere near as slick, it's probably the closest thing to sky but if sky was a 9/10 this would be a 7 or 8. price wise it's similar to sky.
the problem i find is there is only a handful of shows i actually like watching so i don't think it's worth paying £1000+ a year for a handful of shows. if you order a lot of stuff from amazon then i think prime offers the best value for money.
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netflix - expensive for ultra HD (which offers the best quality of stream), full of old content, limited exclusive content, once you have had it for 1-3 months you will struggle for content. i think it's worth maybe paying for 1 month a year and just binge on what you have missed out during the previous 12 months. it's easily do-able. it's not as good as what people make it out to be. after the first 3 months you will find your watching it less and less.
prime - see above same as netflix really
virgin tivo - much better broadband service, poorer tv offering, box isn't anywhere near as slick, it's probably the closest thing to sky but if sky was a 9/10 this would be a 7 or 8. price wise it's similar to sky.
the problem i find is there is only a handful of shows i actually like watching so i don't think it's worth paying £1000+ a year for a handful of shows. if you order a lot of stuff from amazon then i think prime offers the best value for money.
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Associate
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Virgin,NowTV,Netflix,Amazon Prime thats about it.
Disagree, but i'll say no more.
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Sky Sports on BT can be recorded. All the internet channels can be recorded. You can even record two OTA channels and an internet channel at the same time or did you just mean off NowTV?
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Am getting pixilation occasionally, how is this possible when the cable is supposed to be free from interference.
On top of that my V+ HD box has nearly gone out the window on 2 occasions. Once you get past the even worse than Tivo interface it's just downright shoddy. Occasionally it starts humming quite loud, not particularly suitable for the bedroom. I recorded Vikings the other day, the program just hung at 28 minutes, I couldn't manually go to a point further in time then all programs stopped displaying. Tried to restart the box and it never came back up so I just unplugged it till the morning. Last night pixilation on my UFC recording made it unwatchable, wondered if it was all the FF I was doing to skip adverts etc so tried to reboot the box. Didn't come back up, rebooted it again, still didn't come back up so just left it unplugged. Am going to be ringing up and ranting at their customer service tonight.
I'm so used to Sky just working and being slick that this is quite a transition, poor equipment is just not helping with that. Just gotta keep thinking of the saving!
On top of that my V+ HD box has nearly gone out the window on 2 occasions. Once you get past the even worse than Tivo interface it's just downright shoddy. Occasionally it starts humming quite loud, not particularly suitable for the bedroom. I recorded Vikings the other day, the program just hung at 28 minutes, I couldn't manually go to a point further in time then all programs stopped displaying. Tried to restart the box and it never came back up so I just unplugged it till the morning. Last night pixilation on my UFC recording made it unwatchable, wondered if it was all the FF I was doing to skip adverts etc so tried to reboot the box. Didn't come back up, rebooted it again, still didn't come back up so just left it unplugged. Am going to be ringing up and ranting at their customer service tonight.
I'm so used to Sky just working and being slick that this is quite a transition, poor equipment is just not helping with that. Just gotta keep thinking of the saving!
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I dont think any of the V+HD STB's are new so you likely have a refurb. My V+HD is just the same as yours and I wouldn't dream of having it installed in a bedroom. The TIVO interface is slow and poorly laid out so you wont get any improvement on that. If it wasn't for the ugly Sky dish I would have cancelled VM TV long ago and gone to Sky. The BB on VM is excellent though.
Associate
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Virgin Media TV will cost £54.25 pm plus a one off upfront charge of £9.99
NowTV will cost £53.96 pm plus a one of cost of £39.99 but you don't have a recording capability.
With VM you have to spend another £17.99 for a phone line but you would have to do the same with NowTV although not compulsory.
Are my figures wrong?
£40 is the new smart box, you can still get the ethernet box for £15, 3 months movies are £10 on ebay and so are the entertainment packages. That's £10 a month for movies and entertainment.
My parents recently had their V+ box replaced with a TiVo for free. Was a second box, main was already a TiVo.
Apparently they're upgrading the network and the V+ is incompatible so, when you're affected by the upgrades, you'll get a free box. Could try asking them when your area will be done or even complaining that others are getting the upgrade for free so why should you have to wait etc
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I was comparing prices for all channels, movies and sport.
Yeah rip off prices, no idea who pays nowtv prices when vouchers are online for a few quid.
They flat out refused to swap it for free and said it would be £5 per month extra.
The engineer visited today with a replacement box which wouldn't boot then the next one did the same. Turns out they wouldn't boot while connected to HDMI. He blamed my TV, booted it without the HDMI plugged in, then connected it and buggered off. It's a brand new Panasonic, less than a week old! He didn't even try it on the TV downstairs to see if the problem followed the box.
I've just been emailed some blurb from Virgin:
Yet I only get free weekends and get charged 26ppm at other times! The company really is a shambles and I'm sol close to telling them to take everything away, have till tomorrow to make my mind up.