SKY HD

BIGbungle · 26 Feb 2006 at 10:40

Sclodion said:
Indeed, all US HD services are delivered via premium satellite or cable services such as Dish network, DirecTV, Comcast etc.

They are all pay subscription models. The US has a lot of HD pay for view sports aswell.

Incidentally, George Bush signed the Digital switch off Mandate yesterday, 2009 is the analog switch off deadline. Theres not really any digital terrestrial service in the US (some pilot schemes), so I expect that airspace is going to be a great opportunity for the TV providers to rollout digital terrestrial HD.

This bodes well for the UK getting HD freeview at some point in the future.

Ive got THIS will i be able to get terrestrial HD in the future?

Sclodion · 26 Feb 2006 at 13:50

BIGbungle said:
Ive got THIS will i be able to get terrestrial HD in the future?

No way of knowing unfortunately. Theres been no announcements of any kind regarding HD on freeview. Assuming Freeview does do HD in the future and they stick with MPEG2, then your box would be capable of decoding it.

If any other format (eg: MPEG4 or WM9) is chosen for HD (they can't change the format of the standard definition signals), then none of the so called HD compatible DVB-T interfaces will work and we'll all need to go out and buy new freeview boxes.

BIGbungle · 27 Feb 2006 at 21:36

I see sky have done a new deal with Buena Vista International to broadcast Disney content in HD. SOURCE

Sclodion · 27 Feb 2006 at 22:11

BIGbungle said:
I see sky have done a new deal with Buena Vista International to broadcast Disney content in HD. SOURCE

And disney have also said any company wanting to broadcast their content must convert it using my companies products to ensure the quality meets their stringent demands

Which was nice.

IceBus · 28 Feb 2006 at 14:27

Anyone else get the update email today that had no info whatsoever in it?

dayloon · 28 Feb 2006 at 19:37

It's certainly going to be a lot earlier than July. The start of April certainly seems favourite at the moment for potential launch date. Rumoured price seems to be £299 for the box and £9.99 / month for the service. Sounds reasonable to me to be honest

Eliot · 28 Feb 2006 at 19:45

dayloon said:
It's certainly going to be a lot earlier than July. The start of April certainly seems favourite at the moment for potential launch date. Rumoured price seems to be £299 for the box and £9.99 / month for the service. Sounds reasonable to me to be honest

i thought it was 400, maybe even 500. also i do agree with the april thing, it seems to be moving fast now. new hd channels popping up every day, theres about 10 atm.

Simon · 28 Feb 2006 at 23:20

Discovery HD (ch 525) is this HD. My Dad was saying the channels had all changed around earlier. Does this mean sky have started sending out HD signals?

dayloon · 1 Mar 2006 at 07:16

Eliot said:
i thought it was 400, maybe even 500. also i do agree with the april thing, it seems to be moving fast now. new hd channels popping up every day, theres about 10 atm.

Originally people were thinking £400/500 but that wasn't based on anything. It was just basically guess work. I obviously don't know for sure but i've read several sources which say the price for the unit has been leaked and it's going to be £299. I think they probably realise that asking people to pay £500 for the box then 9.99 / month subscription is probably going to put some people off.

MouseMat2004 · 1 Mar 2006 at 09:48

My Telewest HD box is being fitted 18th March

£10 per month extra but no initial price for the box (It's got a 160GB HDD like Sky+ too)

I dont think I'd pay £300 for the box though.

norm · 1 Mar 2006 at 09:49

If you look on the Sky guide at present they have HD channels up as PPV. That would certainly bring in more revenue than a flat-fee I'm guessing. And as there isn't that much HD content about at present you'd get bored within a month with what's being screened.

But it's all academic because Sky is a ripoff and always will be.

Attu · 1 Mar 2006 at 15:08

norm said:
If you look on the Sky guide at present they have HD channels up as PPV. That would certainly bring in more revenue than a flat-fee I'm guessing. And as there isn't that much HD content about at present you'd get bored within a month with what's being screened.

But it's all academic because Sky is a ripoff and always will be.

The HD channels that are on the Sky EPG arnt Pay per view they just tell you to phone to get info on how to ge the channels which in turn tels you to go totheir web site.
They wont make the individual channels PPV, it will be a monthly fee thats tied in with what ever package that you subscribe to.
As for not much content, most of the big US series are now in HD and just about all films are transfered into HD before SD DVD's are made, also Descovery have been filming in HD for a good few years now.
Sky have also been filming Football in HD since the begining of the season and have said they plan to start videoing most major sports in HD amd the BBC also video a lot of content in HD these days. Also dont forget its not hard to transfer anything thats been filmed on 35mm and above into HD so i think there is plenty of HD material out there to keep us amused.

Andy

Eliot · 1 Mar 2006 at 15:58

sky imo is amazing, especially what theyv'e given us now, i like the feature where u can set a redinder for a program by its advert

BIGbungle · 5 Mar 2006 at 09:45

as for the lack of content argument I was in the USA 2 years ago and went to a home cineama exibition and HDTV was being broadcast then. After seeing the demonstration over there I knew Id have to get HDTV as soon as it came out over here. Thats why I got my 43" pioneer plasma last year.

BIGbungle · 6 Mar 2006 at 21:30

Next monday 13th March The Gadget Show on channel five at 7:15pm is doing a special program about Sky HD. Might be worth a look

Rotty · 7 Mar 2006 at 01:18

Are they going to aim HD at the mass market or just enthusiasts , if their intention is the mass market then there is no way they will get away with charging extra on the subs

pinkaardvark · 7 Mar 2006 at 03:40

Rotty said:
Are they going to aim HD at the mass market or just enthusiasts , if their intention is the mass market then there is no way they will get away with charging extra on the subs

They'll do what they always do, ie hit the early adopters first and hardest and then slowly scale down prices and increase content to bring in a larger market share. Bear in mind that SKY HD is also a PVR just like Sky+ so there's a lot of non HD TV owners who may consider it wise to buy something that is HDTV ready rather than pay for the existing sky+ box even if that means they can't currently get the full benefit.

Hilly · 7 Mar 2006 at 19:57

Is there any way of not using Scart for Sky ?

I have a 26" Philips LCD, and the quality through the scart is appauling. What i'd like to do is hook it up through VGA. Would improve the quality so much.

Is there any way of doing this ?

Tesla · 7 Mar 2006 at 20:24

hilly said:
Is there any way of not using Scart for Sky ?

I have a 26" Philips LCD, and the quality through the scart is appauling. What i'd like to do is hook it up through VGA. Would improve the quality so much.

Is there any way of doing this ?

JS Technology may produce (probably do produce) a box that will take a scart, upscale it to HD res and output it via VGA.

It would improve the picture somewhat but Sky seems to have a lot of MPEG noise on a fair few channels so that may be the problem.

Try switching active control off on the TV aswell.

wandgrudd · 7 Mar 2006 at 20:37

Tesla said:
JS Technology may produce (probably do produce) a box that will take a scart, upscale it to HD res and output it via VGA.

It would improve the picture somewhat but Sky seems to have a lot of MPEG noise on a fair few channels so that may be the problem.

Try switching active control off on the TV aswell.

well thay make a box that takes a scart and turns it in to vga but not one that makes it HD.