Chorus line up v NTL line up

katieboo

Having recently moved back to Cork from Dublin I feel like I am being completely ripped off by Chorus. NTL has so many more channels than Chorus even though you pay the same for both. Any idea's on when Chorus might catch up?

ethernet

UPC might make some changes for the better for both NTL and Chorus. Expect things to improve when analogue cable is turned off.

Did you consider getting satellite TV instead? No shortage of free channels, let alone subscription channels.

maxg

There is not much difference between Chorus cable Cork and NTL cable Dublin.
As fas as I remember 2 or 3 channels.

watty

It will soon be the identical digital service and rebranded to UPC

icdg

But are you on cable or MMDS? MMDS will, unfortunately, always be a subset of cable, this is the case even for NTL MMDS customers. The capacity simply isn't there to allow the system to carry the same amount as cable.

This brings back the differening strategies of NTL and Chorus prior to the merger. NTL always saw MMDS as a filler service for areas that simply couldn't be cabled. Chorus saw it as their bread-and-butter and many areas that would have been cabled under NTL got MMDS instead because it was cheaper for Chorus to do it that way. If you're on MMDS, well, maybe now UPC will adopt the NTL strategy of cableling where possible, but don't hold your breath...

Solair

If it's not MMDS are you perhaps on the basic digital package on cable where as you were on the Digital Max pack in Dublin ?

Might be worth checking out.

The Cork and Dublin digital Cable packages are now almost identical.

Analogue cable's a whole other different story though. I'm no longer familiar with what Chorus are carrying on Analogue cable in Cork, from what I gather, most of the analogue encrypted services have, or are actively being replaced by digital.

Also, the UPC Mediabox DVR should be available in Cork rather soon.

I think Chorus in Cork are upgrading people to digital cable from MMDS in urban areas though too. There is a major incentive for them to do so as it means that they can sell them triple play products - i.e. tv/broadband/phone.
MMDS should really only be a last resort, it's not really a very compeditive product when compared to Sky Digital and it's certainly not in UPCs interest to have urban homes served by MMDS as they will bleed subscribers as people switch to Sky Digital.
What I've heard is that generally what happens is one or two households switch to Sky and within 6 months Chorus have lost an entire estate. Neighbours see the advantages straight away ...

Where as with cable, because there are no antennae and a decent line up of channels, people are more loyal.

There were plenty of cases in Cork where Chorus not only didn't cable new areas, but actually provided digital TV via MMDS in already cabled areas!! Particularly where the cable infrastructure was old / fault prone.
Also, if you wanted channels which were not supplied on analogue cable, and chorus didn't provide digital cable in your area, they'd switch you to MMDS (so short sighted that it boggles the mind! Total madness.)
Remember, the initial line up on Chorus digital cable was exactly the same as MMDS - so, there was no incentive for their sales people to push cable, nor for their engineers to worry about installing it.

I remember when we moved house, Chorus quoted us over €700 to do 'engineering works' to run cable to our home. You can see the nearest cable tv trunk from the house but they simply wouldn't run the cable and hard-sold MMDS. We went with sky. Now they're pushing to trying and get the same people they didn't want do do business with to get cable and have cabled the few homes in the area that were out of the network's reach and are more than willing to do whatever engineering works are necessary.

There's been a major mindset shift! They're mainly pushing it as more channels + broadband.

The result of the Chorus years has been that Cork went from having a very high level of cable uptake (comparable to Dublin), to rapidly declining number of cable customers, particularly since the launch of Sky Digital. Chorus basically shot themselves in the foot by neglecting the cable infrastructure so badly. UPC are really going to have to work very hard in Cork to reverse this trend!
Not cabling new housing developments was about the most idiotic marketing I have ever seen from any company. Even if they were cash-strapped could they not see that MMDS was highly limited technology and that it was going to be struggling against sky ? While cable has a much stronger position and a brighter future.. !?

It's no wonder Chorus was in receivership !!

What you're seeing already, and will see more of is Digital Cable from UPC being a standardised product across the whole country. Cork would certainly be one of their prime targets. The big divide is no longer Chorus and NTL areas, it's Cable v MMDS.
I honestly don't see MMDS having much of a future unless it does something to improve the channel line up though. There are technologies out there which could make much better use of MMDS' limited bandwidth and provide a line up that would be more comparable with cable.

zilog_jones

Pretty much the same thing happened in Limerick - the cable system was neglected, many estates built after the '80s weren't cabled due to lack of funding/lazyness/whatever, and since they took so goddamn long with the digital upgrade (digital cable only became available to this side of town in the last few months!) many customers in cabled areas were just given digital MMDS.

From what I've seen, many people are reluctant to switch over to digital cable as they are not sure they'll still get analogue cable (i.e. for other rooms). The flyers they continuously send out are not very informative...