ntl rip off basic cable

a bientot

BASIC CABLE TV ntl PRICE v. BRUXELLES
One of the last acts by the former cable regulator, Etain DOYLE, was to sanction an increase in the price of the Dublin basic cable service by 38% in order to subsidise the fledgling digital service while at the same time ntl reduced its basic service by three quality channels..........replaced by three dubious ones.
Every cable household (Dublin, Galway and Waterford) now pays 60 euros per year for a service that most people do not and in many cases will never avail of: digital extra packages.
Now that there is no further price controls on cable/mmds services ntl and Chorus can charge what they like................
Compare the price of basic cable in Dublin with Bruxelles:
Bruxelles: 123euros24 for 39 basic channels (multi-lingual) and 50 radio stations.
Dublin: 218 euros for 14 channels (mono-lingual plus 'must carry' TG4) including four for children and about 10 radio stations.
Readers are invited to give prices and number of channels in basic cable from the other 23 countries......

Why do we put up with this?

Big Ears

Becasue u cant afford sky/ can think of something better the do with the money u save from not having sky

raphaelS

Just for info, in France, one of the Cable operator (Noos):

It seems that this is only digital now, couldn't find the basic...
38 TV Channels (7 internationals) + 33 radios : 11€ + 9 € for the terminal: 240 € year

Source: http://www.noos.fr/noos_prospect/noostvnet_selection.php


Another one (Vialis):
The basic package is 13.45€ month/161.40 year
18 TV/ 26 Radios

Source: http://www.vialis.tm.fr/hp_tv_int/offres.html

carrolls

Originally posted by Big Ears
Becasue u cant afford sky/ can think of something better the do with the money u save from not having sky

What?
You don't need money to avail of a pretty comprehensive package on Astra.
All you need is a Digibox and a FTV card.
You Get
BBC1,2,3,4 CBeebies, CBBC, BBC News, Sky News, ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5, Performance, + lots more, plus about 60 great radio stations.

Cost per Year, NOTHING.;)
Nobody needs NTL.

SteM

Originally posted by carrolls
What?
You don't need money to avail of a pretty comprehensive package on Astra.
All you need is a Digibox and a FTV card.
You Get
BBC1,2,3,4 CBeebies, CBBC, BBC News, Sky News, ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5, Performance, + lots more, plus about 60 great radio stations.

Cost per Year, NOTHING.;)
Nobody needs NTL.

Rubbish. This always comes up whenever anyone starts a NTL V Sky argument too. People forget that not everyone is allowed to put a dish on their property. It's a toss up between rabbits ears or NTL for most people renting in Dublin.

sceptre

Originally posted by SteM
Rubbish. This always comes up whenever anyone starts a NTL V Sky argument too. People forget that not everyone is allowed to put a dish on their property. It's a toss up between rabbits ears or NTL for most people renting in Dublin.

I'm not allowed to have a dish on my "property" (I'm not being sarcastic, I rent so 't'ain't mine). Georgian building, protected front, you know the drill. Dish works quite well in my bathroom.

JHMEG

He means that the price rises on ntl analog are to subsidise the digital service. If you don't take up the digital service you are still paying in part for it.

Agree with carrolls. Just got rid of ntl. Went the free satellite route. Recommend it to everyone! (if I didn't have dsl, eircom would have got the bullet too...)

John R

Originally posted by carrolls
What?
You don't need money to avail of a pretty comprehensive package on Astra.
All you need is a Digibox and a FTV card.
You Get
BBC1,2,3,4 CBeebies, CBBC, BBC News, Sky News, ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5, Performance, + lots more, plus about 60 great radio stations.

Cost per Year, NOTHING.;)
Nobody needs NTL.

Cost per year - not nothing. There is a small charge for the card and it will need replacing every few years, also there is a cost and a difficulty in acquiring one here.
I know that some people can get them easily but for those who don't the cost is whatever rip-off merchants that advertise as experts charge. For example this joker €190 for a card!!!

I am not saying that ntl is not a rip-off just that FTV cards are not a mass solution.

Mossy Monk

Originally posted by John R
€190 for a card!!!

only an idiot would pay that and sadly idiots exist

carrolls

Originally posted by John R
Cost per year - not nothing. There is a small charge for the card and it will need replacing every few years, also there is a cost and a difficulty in acquiring one here.
I know that some people can get them easily but for those who don't the cost is whatever rip-off merchants that advertise as experts charge. For example this joker €190 for a card!!!

I am not saying that ntl is not a rip-off just that FTV cards are not a mass solution.

£23.50 for 5 years (Yes Five years, not 'Few Years') viewing is not a bad deal. Ok cards are hard to come by, but last time I checked, everyone knows someone who knows someone living in the UK or NI. Just ask. All they can say is NO.
I have been using FTV for three years now, and I was a Satellite newbie three years ago. Yet I had absolutely no problems getting the card.
All I can say is going back to low-tech 4:3 Chorus would be a nightmare for me now.
Even if you don't aquire a card, you will still get all the BBC and FTA channels anyway. Its still a better system than Chorus.

JHMEG

F2V cards are readily available on ebay.co.uk. Twice the price of buying a new one, but that is the only way someone who has never had a sky sub can get one -- at least that's what the lady on the other end of the phone @ free2view said.

I recently bought a 2nd-hand digibox with f2v card for £65 sterling. Add the dish, splitter box and a couple of tvlink eyes and the whole lot came to the cost of a year's rental of ntl (at current ntl prices). And the picture is crystal clear, unlike ntl. And in stereo (UK channels are in mono on ntl in Galway and Waterford, even tho the sub costs the same as Dublin).

PWEI

How would one go down the free Satellite route? I'm in Swords so its either Sky or Chorus.I rang Sky and they don't to know you unless you have a landline and we all know that Eircom are the biggest rip off in the country.Chorus's basic cable package is €25,it was €22 and then out of the blue they upped it to €25 without going through the regulatory board.So I thought about getting Chorus digital cause it works out a little cheaper than Sky.With Sky Sports,three movie stations and basic package its €55 a month.Trouble is,it is very basic there's only about 24 stations compared to about 200 on Sky.I know most of the stuff on Sky is rubbish but for €55 I'd be expecting a bit more!!

carrolls

Originally posted by PWEI
How would one go down the free Satellite route?

Buy a Digibox on ebay.
Buy a Universal LNB and Dish on eBay.
Install the dish.
Connect LNB to said Digibox via Coaxial cable.
Hey Presto, Digital TV.
You need to go one step further to get ITV, Channel 4 and Five. You need a P2 FTV card. Cost £23.50.
You need to get a UK citizen (With a UK address and postcode) to order this for you.
Here is the site http://www.free2view.tv./index.htm

JHMEG

Just to add to carrolls post: buy your dish and LNB locally. You can get the lot from Electroplus in Beaumont for 50 euro. Helluva lot cheaper than paying for one to be posted over from the UK. Electroplus seem to be one of the few satellite places open on saturdays, which is handy.

Digiboxes are going for as little as £20 on ebay.co.uk.

And buy some satellite grade coax cable. 20 euro for a 100 metre roll.

Oh, and a couple f-type connectors.

[AFAIK, you need someone on the UK who had/has a sky subscription to get a P2 card. Not as simple as just phoning and giving a UK address]

JHMEG

Follow up to my own post: as and from the 31st of January, Free2View cards are no longer officially available. Ebay is the only source for them now.

a bientot

This thread seems to have gone away off course.....
I introduced the topic purely as a price issue in the context of Rip Off Ireland ....

OK, perhaps there is little hope of a price reduction but it would appear that those who are passionate about English are being looked after very well indeed with all these children's channels in the ntl basic but what about those others who speak other languages such as Spanish, German, Italian, Portuguese, French etc ?
Why should they be discriminated against in this particular Union country , holding some sort of a presidency at present?
In Helsinki, Finnish is the main language of the capital and country yet the very basic (cheapest)service offers a number of channels in English, French (TV5) and Spanish (TVE).
As these 'other' language channels are provided FREE to European cable services there was no reluctance to provide a multi-lingual service....

Surely it would be far more sensible for ntl and Chorus to provide at least four channels/frequencies in four local languages on a voluntary basis in the very basic service than to have same imposed by the European Commission. Only Ireland and Great Britain seem to have hang ups about what exactly the word 'multi-channel' means/implies........all over the European mainland it means multi-lingual so a 'tough' directive from the Commission wouldn't cause sleepless nights for cable company managements there.

Cén fáth nach bhfuil Eire oscailte ar an domhan mór gan cinnsireacht na Sasanaigh nó na Puncáinigh ar na mean cumarsáide?

carrolls

Originally posted by a bientot
This thread seems to have gone away off course.....
I introduced the topic purely as a price issue in the context of Rip Off Ireland ....

Whatever your motives for introducing the thread, people have offered alternatives
if you are feeling the pinch of the NTL price increases.
A bit of gratitude goes a long way on these forums. Start your reply with "Thanks for the advice but..." in future.:mad:

a bientot

I do appreciate the time taken by people to read my posting and rightly 'carrolls' takes me to task for not acknowledging this and the various suggestions.... but again I must emphasise that ntl is discriminating against those of us who are 'mainland inclined' and our numbers are growing and will grow even more from 1 May 2004.
How can I explain that I respect your right to watch views and impressions of the world as seen from Great Britain and the U.S. and if one has no access to cable/satellite one can see these views reflected through RTE/TV3 almost word for word repeating what has been said a few days earlier on CNN or Sky News.
International News in Ireland is decided by what Sky is showing not on what European mainland news media regard as International News. The other copycat activity we engage in is to watch these tiresome sit coms and soaps, admired and loved by many, from the anglophone world and to decide our daily agenda on this basis.....even the make of our washing machines..............
But why do small aspiring Union countries accept that culture has to be seen from many sources not just the anglo-saxon one?

Equality is all I seek with thousands of others in Dublin in that our cable tv service reflects our Europeness side by side with our U.S./Britishness as appreciated by a majority of our fellow Dubliners.
It is not possible to have that without a multi-lingual cable tv service for all and there are enough frequencies available in the basic (or 'normal cable' as ntl calls it) to satisfy all.

By the way I'm still seeking contact with cable subscribers (English or French speaking) who would be prepared to give me details of the cable companies services in the ten new Union countries.

carrolls

What you want is simply not going to happen, because both Ireland and the UK
have the lowest multilingual skills in the EC. Therefore the cable companies cater for the lowest common denominator of viewership. English speaking channels.
If you feel so strongly about it, why not set up your own cable service?
PS, I don't mean that in an insincere way.;)

Reyman

I've found this thread very interesting - I didn't know it was so easy to 'escape' from this NTL shambles!

Anyone know the approximate size of the dish, the direction it has to be pointed and the elevation? I'm quite restricted in roof positions

I notice someone succeeded in getting one working from a bathroom ! How about an attic -- difficult I suppose they must need line of sight on the Satellite with no obstruction?

John R

Originally posted by Reyman
I've found this thread very interesting - I didn't know it was so easy to 'escape' from this NTL shambles!

Anyone know the approximate size of the dish, the direction it has to be pointed and the elevation? I'm quite restricted in roof positions

I notice someone succeeded in getting one working from a bathroom ! How about an attic -- difficult I suppose they must need line of sight on the Satellite with no obstruction?

The dish size and direction are different depending on location but here are some (very) approximates, it's been a long time since I put mine up.
Dish size: 60cm (sky minidish like the thousands attached to houses around the country)
Direction: approx 35degrees east of due south
Elevation: approx 40degrees from horizontal

You need line of sight, people can get them to work through glass, but not roofing material.

Reyman

Thanks -- that's a very clear explan.!

Final question --- what's an LNB?

Capt'n Midnight

What do you call the small box attached to a satellite dish ?
- A council house.

LNB - it's the thingy on the arm of the dish - it amplifies the weak signal from ~ 36 thousand miles away ( a wee bit further than terresterial television) and sends it down the cable to the decoder which extracts the pictures from the signal. SKY dishes use a special rectangular bracet on the dish arm so you have to use a SKY LNB with a SKY DISH - but you can use any dish with the SKY digibox or a SKY dish with other satellite receivers. Everyone else on the planet uses a curcular bracket (40mm ?)

Reyman

Thanks - know it all now.

Wife's kicking up about the house looking like a 'Skanger's' , but I think I'll put it up anyway!

Sounds like the business!

carrolls

Maybe the 'Skangers' have got it right in this case.:D

shoegirl

Cable companies are a particular rip off.

From time to time Lidl do deals on analgogue dishes etc. About 60 euro if I remember correctly. But you might be better off just stuffing it and making do with rabbits ears . . . most of what is on TV is crap anyway, and you are probably paying for stations you will never watch. Thats the way I see it anyway.