whats the point in paying for Sky Plus

Ulsterman 1690 · 14-08-2005 1:11pm #1

Cant one accomplish the same with
1) The "Autoview" feature on a bog standard digibox
2) A "phantom PVR" cable and
3) Either a HDD, DVD (or even a humble VHS) recorder ?

Without having to pay their ripoff £10 a month sub

Round Cable · 14-08-2005 1:19pm

I agree it's a rip-off, however with your set up, would you be able to record two channels?

14-08-2005 1:42pm

Theres certainly questions about paying for a feature when you are on the family pack.
Of course its free when you have 2 or more premium channels like I have.

Why I like it as opposed to what Ulsterman suggests? Answer obviously it's a one stop shop with out the clutter of having two machines to do the one job.
Being able to watch one programme whilst recording two more is handy too and often happens at primetime.

Should we have to pay for it? Well yes and no.
No would be the preference but then Sky own the system and are the monopoly with it,they are selling a system at a rate that the market can obviously bear.

Ulsterman 1690 · 14-08-2005 2:10pm

Of course its free when you have 2 or more premium channels like I have

That may be true but what about those of us with FTV systems :mad:

14-08-2005 6:08pm

Ulsterman 1690 wrote:

That may be true but what about those of us with FTV systems :mad:

Well it's an innovation by Sky,why shouldnt they charge for it, it's their EPG service,their platform and not yours.

It's not free to those with premium channels either of course,it's just worked into the price.
So in the long term those with premium channels would be better off getting sky plus for the benefits and handyness of it.

I couldnt be without it tbh.

Ulsterman 1690 · 14-08-2005 10:13pm

Well it's an innovation by Sky,

Hardly Its just a glorified video at the end of the day

why shouldnt they charge for it,

Because people have already paid for the equipment why should they pay again to be able to to use it ?

it's their EPG service

Hardly at the end of the day its based on tv listings which are in the public domain

their platform and not yours

Nope the "Platform" is the Astra 2/Eurobird cluster of satellites owned by a Luxembourg company SES

Sparky · 14-08-2005 11:19pm

whats your gripe against it, the majority of sky+ users have a premuim channel,

and to your tv listings answer, yes your right there in the public domain but sky maintain a constant service with the listings, have you ever noticed if a football game runs over 5 mins later the epg listings will change to reflect this.

also you pay for a laptop, then you pay to use certain software on it. like skyplus had the additional software of recording, you pay for that by paying whatever 10 euros or so or subscribe to a premium channel.

i dont see anything wrong with the service, its something id now say i couldnt live without, like instant rewind for instance.

SPDUB · 15-08-2005 2:04am

I remember Barry Fox reporting that if you stopped paying the subscription not only would it stop recording programmes any more but you couldn't access any recordings on it including the ones made while you were still paying the sub

Anyone know if that is still the case?

Ulsterman 1690 · 15-08-2005 7:12am

and to your tv listings answer, yes your right there in the public domain but sky maintain a constant service with the listings, have you ever noticed if a football game runs over 5 mins later the epg listings will change to reflect this.

Analouge TV has a similar feature Its called PDC

also you pay for a laptop, then you pay to use certain software on it.

Yes but its a once off payment not an ongoing tenner per month subscription

15-08-2005 8:47am

Ulsterman 1690 wrote:

Hardly Its just a glorified video at the end of the day

Well buy yourself a different glorified video then.There are plenty of people happy to subscribe to sky plus independently of your views on it.

Because people have already paid for the equipment why should they pay again to be able to to use it ?

Because its an innovation and Sky are charging for that innovation,ie a recording device integrated into their EPG.
It's a handier device for sky than the alternative much like taking a direct flight to your destination may be more expensive than flying via another city.

Hardly at the end of the day its based on tv listings which are in the public domain

Yes but we are talking about the extension of use of said listings via a Sky owned handy innovation and not just the listings,

Nope the "Platform" is the Astra 2/Eurobird cluster of satellites owned by a Luxembourg company SES

Incorrect thats the transmission network.
The platform is the Electronic programme guide and associated mechanisms on which Sky provide the suite of channels for you.

Yes but its a once off payment not an ongoing tenner per month subscription

Theres a lot of pc software that people must pay an annual subscription for if they want to use it.

LFCFan · 15-08-2005 1:25pm

Sky Plus is the Dogs Dangly Bits. Couldn't live without it at this stage. We have the premium channels so there's no extra charge and when you consider you can easily spend €60 or more on a night out these days, €60 a month for Sky+ is worth it IMO.

marksi · 15-08-2005 3:24pm

I previously had a normal digibox and a Panasonic VCR which would automatically go into record when an autoview was activated.

But now I have Sky+, and yes, I do begrudge paying Sky an extra £10 to make it work, however now I wouldn't be without it.

The main difference between what I was doing before and what I have now is that I can record two channels at once while watching something I've recorded before, and have a simple guide to all the things I have recorded. When I recorded stuff onto video I often forgot what was on the tapes. Plus, your recordings have much better picture quality than VHS, and I have 20 hours available without changing tapes. I can increase this to 80 hours if I buy a new hard drive.

watty · 15-08-2005 4:20pm

Of course SkY+ is excellent etc, but Sky have almost UK/Irl monopoly on susbscription Sat broadcasting and a virtual monopoly on NDS CAM usage, so while lots of alternatives exist for FTA or other Sat Suppliers, Sky+ is the _ONLY_ proper integrated PVR solution for Sky Pay Channels.

So they get away with the tottally unjustifiable "recording rental".

AFAIK, it won't playback without a valid sub card.
There are TWO layers of encyrption, one is the on air encryption and the system records the signal without decryption, so of course playback is like live watching inc need for correct card. The system applies additional encryption so even the FTA channels won't play back if you stick the disk into something else!

dahamsta · 15-08-2005 4:23pm

Ulsterman 1690 wrote:

Hardly at the end of the day its based on tv listings which are in the public domain

Which Sky have compiled into electronic format that you can use on your box. Do you know how much time it would take you to do that?

I'm not a huge fan of Sky, but this is a really silly thread.

adam

Strasser · 15-08-2005 5:55pm

marksi wrote:

The main difference between what I was doing before and what I have now is that I can record two channels at once while watching something I've recorded before, and have a simple guide to all the things I have recorded. When I recorded stuff onto video I often forgot what was on the tapes. Plus, your recordings have much better picture quality than VHS, and I have 20 hours available without changing tapes. I can increase this to 80 hours if I buy a new hard drive.

Not to mention you can start watching a programme you are recording before the recording has ended. Like a lot of Sky+ features it might not sound like much but when you start using the features they are excellent, really useful.

bk · 15-08-2005 6:06pm

Earthman wrote:

Because its an innovation and Sky are charging for that innovation,ie a recording device integrated into their EPG.
It's a handier device for sky than the alternative much like taking a direct flight to your destination may be more expensive than flying via another city.

FYI, there is nothing innovative about Sky+, this sort of technology was innovated by ReplayTV and Tivo in the US. Tivo was even available in the UK for a while on both NTL and Sky.

Personally I have a US Tivo connected to NTL, works great and no subscription. Disadvantage is that it took a lot of hacking to get working and it isn't as easy/well integrated as Sky+. On the upside you can do lots of cool stuff with the Tivo such as control it over the web, stream shows to PC, copy shows to PC for editing and burning to DVD.

bk · 15-08-2005 6:10pm

dahamsta wrote:

Which Sky have compiled into electronic format that you can use on your box. Do you know how much time it would take you to do that?

While I don't know what format Sky+ uses, it isn't actually that difficult. I do it for my Tivo and my friend does it for his MythTV setup. See www.xmltv.org for details.

However it doesn't work quiet as well as Sky+ system which can dynamically change.

dahamsta · 15-08-2005 6:42pm

That was my point bk.

(I'm just about to build a MythTV rig.)

adam

Capt'n Midnight · 15-08-2005 7:40pm

watty wrote:

AFAIK, it won't playback without a valid sub card.

AFAIK, it won't playback without a valid sub for the channel you recorded which is valid at the time you play it back.

So get movie sub for a month, record all the movies
and then cancel the movie sub, since you don't want to pay for repeats
and you can't watch them

Oh and SKY didn't design their system to be inter-operable so it's amazing at how well people have got other PVR's to work.

bk · 15-08-2005 11:29pm

dahamsta wrote:

That was my point bk.

Sorry Adam, I must be away from Cork for too long, I'm not getting the sarcasm anymore, like a tick Dub

whats the point in paying for Sky Plus

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