SkyHD card and box, how much ?

KdjaCL

How much are these things going to cost when they come out?

Got my 1st "please buy one" letter from Sky when i ordered another card.

Will it be €299 for the box and another €20 for the subbie as is standard Sky pricing for new things.

And why do we need a box?/ Or is to decode the HD signal and recode it to work on a non HD tv as with the normal boxes


kdjac

Sparky

you got a letter about the HD box??

ive heard it will be £500




we need the box because the HD signal will be in mpeg4 and to send HD to your plasma lcd a component/DVI/HDMI which is required to link it up to your panel

Also even if you dont have a HDTV you can watch HD content as it states through a SD output.

KdjaCL

Looks nice but whats it for

Assuming you have a HDtv and a box to receive sky signal why do we need a HD box?


/Ah it has HDMI slot and built in Sky+ which needs a subbie to activate. And of course the signal protection, well worth £500 .....not




kdjac

Sparky

ive edited my post above

Mossy Monk

Sky had their first live HDTV demonstration not too long ago and made an announcement which said that it will be affordable for the mass market, whatever that means is another thing

Sparky

mossy i mentioned a point on another topic about sky making it free to top tier packages and making the customer only buy the HDbox, so could this be what they mean.
If so im buying, i want to put my sammy 32" to good use

Mossy Monk

i really dont know what they mean but i am planning on having a HDTV compatible tv by the summer so i am very interested in what they do. over price it and i will wait

ixtlan

I was going to wait until 2007, but I'll have to see if I can restrain myself from buying a HD TV and getting SkyHD next year.

At the moment I have a 32" CRT and on that I can see the results of Sky's low bitrate, particularly on Sky 1/2/3 and even on the movie channels. You can see the pixelation... No there's nothing wrong with my box/TV. I'm just fussy. However everytime I notice this I think that things will get better when HD arrives.

This also leads to a worry though that if I do get a 37" TV, and have to watch SD Sky programs I'll go demented (bigger the screen the more noticeable the bitrate problems)

We'll see if they start starving the HD channels of bandwidth as time goes on.

Ix.

L1011

MPEG4 and HDMI or not, the Sky Digibox isn't even equipped to handle standard DVB-S MPEG2 HDTV signals, so a new box was essential either way.

rabbitinlights

Ive talked to a few Sky reps about it and it seems that the box will be about €500 and if your on a higher sub, there wil be no payment increase. They will only be 5-6 channels going high Def @ the launch:

1 x movie/music/news/film/sport etc @ 720p

They will increase the channels/Quality as the year goes on.

The World Cup is the first major sporting event that will be filmed in 1080p HiDef, They would be mad not to have it sorted for that.

DMC

Well, Sky dont have the rights to the World Cup. BBC and ITV have the rights, and only the BBC of those two have HD plans for next year.

Sky will be hoping that the BBC are ready.

Sparky

rabbitinlights wrote:

Ive talked to a few Sky reps about it and it seems that the box will be about €500 and if your on a higher sub, there wil be no payment increase. They will only be 5-6 channels going high Def @ the launch:

1 x movie/music/news/film/sport etc @ 720p

They will increase the channels/Quality as the year goes on.

The World Cup is the first major sporting event that will be filmed in 1080p HiDef, They would be mad not to have it sorted for that.

ha knew it
as a subscriber to sky world sky+ and multiroom i dont mind forking out 500 quid for a HD box as id rather put my HD tv to good use.

BTW some people talk about bad bitrate on sky1/2/3 and sky movies, i agree with that. But ive noticed some of the adverts are really good quality, especially on a lcd panel.
example ive seen is the nutragrain ad.

Mossy Monk

rabbitinlights wrote:

They will increase the channels/Quality as the year goes on.

no doubt that Discovery will be one of the first. also perhaps NASN should consider it too but i doubt it

byte

Yes, I do believe Discovery will be launching a HD channel. Then the obligitory Sky Sports HD and Sky Movies HD channels. Most likely a Sky One HD channel too, as some of their US imports are recorded in HD.

I can't see the point of a music HD channel though I suppose, every little helps!

BTW, are they deliberately putting too many channels on each transponder, to make HD look all the better?

cormacl

With non-Sky HDTV-capable receivers and the other CAM-based means of using ones Sky card in non-Rupee hardware, I'm wondering if we'll see many go that route instead of forking out €500 to own a DVR and lease the recordings.

Charlie

I know this sounds like something your mam would say, but compared to other digiboxs the design of this one looks very sleek and desirable. Puts a few of the next-gen consoles to shame looks wise. €500 though is steep considering a fair portion of their target market probably already owns a + box, which they could have forked out €300 for. This whole thing about charging for the hi-def service is tight aswel(unless you subscribe to sky world). I was in canada during the summer and hi-def is'nt charged extra for, the hi-def channels are just part of the epg there.

Ulsterman 1690

BTW, are they deliberately putting too many channels on each transponder, to make HD look all the better?

Do bears go poop poop in the woods :rolleyes:

Expect quality on non HD channels to deteriorate even further once HD arrives. Its a disgrace that $ky (and On Digital/Freeview) were let away with selling non HD ready boxes in the first place. For petes sake everyone knew that HDTV was coming and Japan have had it since the late seventies :mad:

JimmySmith

I wont be getting it for even €300. Would love to have it but at over €300 is a ripoff. See how much the sky+ boxes came doen in the first year.

Actually now that i have voip and no phone line i doubt sky would give it to me unless they could dial home over the voip.

L1011

Erm, 1997 - HDTV DVB didn't exist, MPEG4 didn't really exist, DVB-S2 didn't exist

The Digibox would have been a bloated, overheating, £1000 heap of ****e, and HDTV would be back to the analogue days of 1 channel a txp

Same goes for ONDigital.

JohnC.

HD channels from Sky will be Sky Sports, Sky Box Office, 2 Sky Movies channels, Sky One and Artsworld to begin with. Discovery, National Geographic and BBC will also be available in HD, although I'm not sure if that will be from the very beginning or joining a little later whenever they are ready to start.

Ulsterman 1690

Erm, 1997 - HDTV DVB didn't exist

Except in the USA

In 1997 It wouldnt exactly have been rocket science to come with a HDTV ready digital box even if it was just HD ready through software upgrades

L1011

Ulsterman 1690 wrote:

Except in the USA

In 1997 It wouldnt exactly have been rocket science to come with a HDTV ready digital box even if it was just HD ready through software upgrades

That wasn't DVB.

The processors suitable for STBs available in 1997 wouldn't have been able to handle software decoding of MPEG2 PAL resolution, let alone being software upgradable

Its fantasy to think that Sky could have pre-equipped for HDTV. Absolute fantasy, because the technology just -did not exist-, and there was no way in hell they could have produced an upgradable machine.

Before anyone suggests it, the expansion bus in the Digibox isn't fast enough - 20MB/sec - to cope with an addon HDTV unit.

Uncle Grueber

Are Sky definitely going to be broadcasting in 720p? It's a pity, I was hoping for 1080i.

Mossy Monk

apparently 720p is the better for live sporting events