Sky worth getting these days?

TriedandTested

TriedandTested

TriedandTested

Soldato
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Used to have it years ago but got fed up with the repeats and lack of decent stuff.

Is it still the same?

Reason i'm asking is that i'm really tempted to get SKY+ HD for the new footy season and also enjoy movies/music/stuff on Sky 1.

Questions:
Are all their channels in HD?
Is Sky+ really that good?
What package would you recommend?
Is it possible to have one person (me) watching one thing and another person in another room watching something else?

Thanks!
 
I think you'll find that not an awful lot has changed... still loads of repeats, and advert breaks so long that you can forget what programme you were actually watching before it comes back on.

On HD, the general opinion seems to be that what there is, is good, but there's so very little HD programming available at the moment that it really isn't living up to the hype. I think SD is going to be the dominant format for a few years yet, so I certainly wouldn't pay £10 a month for a HD service until substantially more content becomes available.

To answer your questions:-
1 No, all the channels are not in HD, not by a long way. Even then some of them are mostly showing upscaled SD programmes.
2 Sky+ is good, probably the best PVR system there is in terms of ease of use - but then it costs another £10 a month for, well what exactly? You already own the hardware, what additional service is being provided?
3 If you're going for it the only way to do it is to go for the lot, although it'll cost you a fortune it's the only way to get a decent selection.
4 Yes, its called Sky Multiroom, and it costs (you guessed it!) £10 a month. Basically they relocate your old Skybox to another room and you get a duplicate viewing card. Why this means another monthly charge is beyond me, but then before the only option was to buy a complete second subscription.

So, in summation, the programming remains average, HD is overrated (for the moment) , and it is an absolute rip-off. But then Sky effectively have a monopoly in the subscription TV market, and monopolies are rarely good for the consumer.

Me, I'd go for a Freeview PVR instead. Basically you'd get Sky+ without the monthly charge, and Freeview is getting better all the time. You can now get E4, more4 and Sky Three, and FilmFour is starting on July 23rd. A good choice would be the Humax PVR-9200T which costs from around £200ish. A bit more to pay initially perhaps, but then there is absolutely no subscription to pay - add up all those Sky charges and you could easily pay £200 to Sky in three months.
 
Tried&Tested said:
Used to have it years ago but got fed up with the repeats and lack of decent stuff.

Is it still the same?

Reason i'm asking is that i'm really tempted to get SKY+ HD for the new footy season and also enjoy movies/music/stuff on Sky 1.

Questions:
Are all their channels in HD?
Is Sky+ really that good?
What package would you recommend?
Is it possible to have one person (me) watching one thing and another person in another room watching something else?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

1) no, there are only a few HD channels. Sky One HD, Sky Sports HD, Sky Movies 9 and 10 HD, BBC HD and a 1 or 2 others like National Geographic HD. all the rest are SD and even then, some of the HD channels show upscaled content

but its worth noting if your a sports fan, all of the stuff on sky sports HD is proper stuff, and quite a few of the american shows like 24, are shown in true HD on Sky One HD. Personally the extra £10/month and £300 is a bit steep for what you get. But then early adopters allways pay the price

2) Sky + really is that good. One of the most intuitive systems ever invented. And the best bit, is series link. Just find the programmes you want to watch in the guide, eg Top Gear, 5th Gear, 8 out of 10 cats etc..

then just press the green button and it automatically records every ephisode in the series, and even takes account of schedule changes due to sports running over time etc..

3)the family packages gets you all the channels apart from the movies and the sports, and a few other independant channels like Disney, Setana , Porn etc..

4) if you take out the movies, you get multiroom free. and yes the 2nd box can watch whatever you want upstairs, as there is a separate LNB feed to the box, hence why your getting charged another subscription fee of £10 as theres another tuner.

personally we get a lot out of Sky because of all the childrens programmes. not to mention the stuff that gets shown early on Sky One like Lost and 24. And some of the best stuff out there, like UK TV people, UKTV gold etc.. you need top up tv for on freeview anyway.

a lot of it is re-runs, but when they have every ephisode ever filmed to go at, chances are you'll find several to watch you havent seen before.
 
Sky+ for me is the only reason to get sky at the moment. The repeats and programming are still just as dreadful. A challenge for most sky users would be to not use the BBC/Terrestrial freeview channels for a week. You'll soon realise how much crap there is on sky.
 
Tried&Tested said:
Used to have it years ago but got fed up with the repeats and lack of decent stuff.

Is it still the same?

Reason i'm asking is that i'm really tempted to get SKY+ HD for the new footy season and also enjoy movies/music/stuff on Sky 1.

Questions:
Are all their channels in HD?
Is Sky+ really that good?
What package would you recommend?
Is it possible to have one person (me) watching one thing and another person in another room watching something else?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

1. About 5 hd channels lol.
2. Other pvrs come with almost the same software, even windows mce has it built in. Only buy it for freeview if its cheaper than others that have the same size hdds.
3. Minimum unless you watch loads of sport, the movies are crap, only sky ones worth watching for 24/lost/battlestar etc.
4. Yes if you have 2 boxes 2 cards and both wired up to the satallite.
 
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DJ Baz said:
2 Sky+ is good, probably the best PVR system there is in terms of ease of use - but then it costs another £10 a month for, well what exactly? You already own the hardware, what additional service is being provided?
Click to expand...

If you have either Sports or Movies, the £10 subscription for Sky+ is waived.
 
I'd only ever get Sky for the sport. I've got freeview at the moment but even that has gone downhill lately. It's full of those 24 hour quiz programs now ITV Play etc.
 
Personally for me, sport is the only reason to get sky, as its the only premium content you can't get elsewhere really.

Personally I'm not that fussed by movies as I can rent dvds instead, and for series like 24 I never have the time to watch them each week, so just buy the dvd instead and watch it in big chunks. The hundreds of other channels I could quite happily live without, the sport is a different matter.
 
Sky+ is the only reason for a non-sports fan to get sky.

I've got a Humax 9200T, and I still pay for sky+. It's just so much easier to use than any current Freeview PVR.

If someone sold a Freeview PVR that did series links, and had an easy to use menu system, I'd happily pay £5 a month to subscribe, and bin sky. All it really needs is a decent EPG, continuously broadcast at a reasonable speed. The current Freeview EPG is too limited, and too slow, for proper PVR functionality.

Maybe Digiguide should team up with a PVR hardware manufacturer, and rent some bandwidth to broadcast their excellent EPG?
 
Even their hd channels like national geographic and discovery have the same programs on everyday. I thought the discovery channel was supposed to be about animal documentaries, but there doesn't seem to be any on sky, must just be the American version that has them I guess.
 
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Now that SKY broadband has become free I would say that its well worth looking at. For a fiver a month you can get up to 8mb broadband with a 40gb cap and for a tenner you get up to 16mb broadband with unlimited cap.
Lets hope NTL revise their prices or I may just swop.
 
Sky worth getting these days?
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yes if you like tv and do not think it is expensive

very subjective

Sky HD footy is great... if you are a footy fan I think it is a must

in fact if you like sport and can afford it, it is a must
 
dmpoole said:
Now that SKY broadband has become free I would say that its well worth looking at. For a fiver a month you can get up to 8mb broadband with a 40gb cap and for a tenner you get up to 16mb broadband with unlimited cap.
Lets hope NTL revise their prices or I may just swop.
Click to expand...

Seconded.
 
Apar from the sport, movies etc, another reason why I got Sky was that Channel 5 (analgue and digital) was terrible, even with a new aerial.
 
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