Sky vs UPC on price

Ranicand

I have a dish and I have cable so I can jump ship one way or the other depending.

After one of my Sky Plus boxes broke and they tried to give me a crappy used box I changed to UPC DVRs full pack.

If I want HD in the future I will consider the best deal.

However on price alone I think UPC beats Sky on the basic lowest sub.

http://www.upc.ie/television/digitaltv/value

http://www.sky.com/portal/site/ireland/products/packages

mjsmyth

Just looking at the UPC site, is The Den - RTE 2 channel not just normal RTE 2??? Seems a bit cheeky adding it in there like it is an extra channel.

Ranicand

mjsmyth wrote: »

Just looking at the UPC site, is The Den - RTE 2 channel not just normal RTE 2??? Seems a bit cheeky adding it in there like it is an extra channel.

Yes thats a good one.

JDxtra

Ranicand wrote: »

I have a dish and I have cable so I can jump ship one way or the other depending.

After one of my Sky Plus boxes broke and they tried to give me a crappy used box I changed to UPC DVRs full pack.

If I want HD in the future I will consider the best deal.

However on price alone I think UPC beats Sky on the basic lowest sub.

http://www.upc.ie/television/digitaltv/value

http://www.sky.com/portal/site/ireland/products/packages

And your exact question is? Some points to note...

- You won't get HD with UPC anytime soon. HD will cost you €15/month extra on Sky.
- In my opinion the "basic lowest sub" on both services is a waste of time. You are better off opting for the standard €30-ish packages - unless money is really, really tight.

qhe0i9zvfgdou8

You are better off opting for the standard €30-ish packages - unless money is really, really tight.[/quote]

A lot of people pay for the basic package because they cant get decent reception of RTE, TG4,or TV3 any other way which is a disgrace but thats a whole other argument.

watty

Satellite beats UPC on lowest price:
30 to 40 decent TV channels and 10 to 15 decent radio channels free.

in most areas satellite is better quality picture than UPC,

Ranicand

JDxtra wrote: »

And your exact question is? Some points to note...

- You won't get HD with UPC anytime soon. HD will cost you €15/month extra on Sky.
- In my opinion the "basic lowest sub" on both services is a waste of time. You are better off opting for the standard €30-ish packages - unless money is really, really tight.

Well in my case I agree the lowest sub is pants.

I am on the top package with UPC with phone and broadband also so having the 3 together works out good for me.
If Sky gets a lot more HD channels I may swap back that is the nice thing about choice.

My question is about old farts and people who just want the basic channels I think UPC has a better value deal right now.
I will agree the picture on Sky is better but most people would not notice and not the people on the cheap package.

Fat_Fingers

So people on basic channels are old farts!!!! :eek::mad:That's it!! I'm off to see my TD!! Oh, you are in some trouble young lad!

Seriously, ok, i know you didn't mean it that way. :D
I think looking at the channel lists i would be of opinion that most people that can get RTE receptionon on antenna and live in the house are not subscribers to either.

I know for I (and my friends) will find that a waste of money. You get Irish channels on the antenna and all the BBC's , ITV's , UTV, CH 4 group of channels and other stuff free of the Sat. Huh, i guess I'm now in your category of "old farts"

Ranicand

Fat_Fingers wrote: »

So people on basic channels are old farts!!!! :eek::mad:That's it!! I'm off to see my TD!! Oh, you are in some trouble young lad!

Seriously, ok, i know you didn't mean it that way. :D
I think looking at the channel lists i would be of opinion that most people that can get RTE receptionon on antenna and live in the house are not subscribers to either.

I know for I (and my friends) will find that a waste of money. You get Irish channels on the antenna and all the BBC's , ITV's , UTV, CH 4 group of channels and other stuff free of the Sat. Huh, i guess I'm now in your category of "old farts"

Well the basic UPC digital has all your Rte and TV3 together with all the British channels along with a few Sat channels like Sky 1 and 2.

On Sky using other channels you can get ITV 2 3 and 4 and BBC regions but the old farts would never figure that out.

People like me will never be loyal to either and I will swap and shift to suit myself.

On the basic packs once a company grabs the business they have it.
I still say the basic UPC pack is cheaper and better value.

bk

Personally I have to say that UPC basic package is actually quiet well put together and much better value then Sky's basic package IMO.

With Sky for the same price you can only take two mixes (two categorys), UPC seems to have a much broader range of channels, with pretty much the most popular channels from each category.

You have Film 4, Discovery, Nickelodeon, MTV, Sky, Virgin, Dave, Living, Prramount, etc.

With the exception of the Den, it looks like UPC carefully picked the channels. The channel list looks like it pretty much closely matches the 40 top channels per their viewer ship figures.

I see this as been more competition for Boxer, then Sky, this line up from UPC offers almost twice the number of channels as boxer for €2 less.

Now you bundle this we cheap and fast phone and BB, I can see why it would be quiet attractive.

200motels

I think Sky is better than cable ie picture quality etc, but if we could get ITV, BBC 3, 4, etc on the EPG so we can record them with SKY+ it would be much much better.

Ranicand

Well choice is a nice thing.

O7Pat

bk wrote: »

With Sky for the same price you can only take two mixes (two categorys), UPC seems to have a much broader range of channels, with pretty much the most popular channels from each category.

You have Film 4, Discovery, Nickelodeon, MTV, Sky, Virgin, Dave, Living, Prramount, etc.

.

In fairness for 3 mixes you should get most of these on sky, (with a host of other channels u don't get on upc)

bk

O7Pat wrote: »

In fairness for 3 mixes you should get most of these on sky, (with a host of other channels u don't get on upc)

True enough, but it would be more expensive and still no BB and phone, which makes UPC very attractive.

bk

bk wrote: »

True enough, but it would be more expensive and still no BB and phone, which makes UPC very attractive.

When I moved in to my new flat I was willing to compromise on the television side of things if I could get broadband from UPC. I applied and the website claimed it was in my area, but they later got back to me to say it wasn't. So since I couldn't get the broadband I cancelled the TV order and went with Sky - without the broadband UPC wasn't much good to me.

Sir Oxman

Karsini wrote: »

When I moved in to my new flat I was willing to compromise on the television side of things if I could get broadband from UPC. I applied and the website claimed it was in my area, but they later got back to me to say it wasn't. So since I couldn't get the broadband I cancelled the TV order and went with Sky - without the broadband UPC wasn't much good to me.

Snap.
Was prepared to go tv/bb/phone with upc but after telling me they could deliver, they couldn't.

Sky being installed next Saturday

professore

JDxtra wrote: »

And your exact question is? Some points to note...

- You won't get HD with UPC anytime soon. HD will cost you €15/month extra on Sky.
- In my opinion the "basic lowest sub" on both services is a waste of time. You are better off opting for the standard €30-ish packages - unless money is really, really tight.

Really ... I would disagree unless you're big into sport or endless film reruns.

Trampas

UPC lose out big time is in new estates. A bloke in work and I when we moved into our houses different areas UPC weren't in the area or couldn't even give a date so Sky came in and cleaned up cause only ones to offer TV.

UPC dvd is a joke. may aswell have your own vcr cause you can't record and watch another channel at the same time which Sky can do.

No sign on UPC coming out with interactive.

UPC are the ryanair of digital. gets your digital tv but maybe not to the exact location

zilog_jones

bk wrote: »

Personally I have to say that UPC basic package is actually quiet well put together and much better value then Sky's basic package IMO.

With Sky for the same price you can only take two mixes (two categorys), UPC seems to have a much broader range of channels, with pretty much the most popular channels from each category.

You have Film 4, Discovery, Nickelodeon, MTV, Sky, Virgin, Dave, Living, Prramount, etc.

With the exception of the Den, it looks like UPC carefully picked the channels. The channel list looks like it pretty much closely matches the 40 top channels per their viewer ship figures.

+1 Those "mixes" with Sky do not make it look very appealing at all if you're looking for a basic package. I don't care about the movie channels and I'm not really pushed with sports channels (still get Eurosport and Setanta Ireland anyway), but outside of those two genres the only significant channel missing from UPC's basic package is National Geographic and maybe the other ITVs (are they even any good?). Not having BBC3/4 on the Sky EPG is also a joke at this stage TBH.

Trampas wrote: »

UPC dvd is a joke. may aswell have your own vcr cause you can't record and watch another channel at the same time which Sky can do.

Sorry but you're completely wrong. The UPC DVR can do exactly this. The only thing it can't do is some form of series link.

bk

Trampas wrote: »

UPC dvd is a joke. may aswell have your own vcr cause you can't record and watch another channel at the same time which Sky can do.

Actually the UPC DVR can do this, what it can't do, which the Sky box can do, is record 2 channels at the same time while you watch a pre recorded show off the HDD.

As all the hardware is in the UPC box to do this (namely two tuners), it would seem to just need a firmware upgrade to enable this functionality. I believe the same DVR box in other UPC countries can do it already. So just a matter of time.

O7Pat

bk wrote: »

True enough, but it would be more expensive and still no BB and phone, which makes UPC very attractive.

True, but up to then in the thread we were just talking about tv, only marginally more expensive if looking at 2/3 mixes with a much broader range

ROC1977

UPC is cheaper. I have it at the moment ,as I just moved house. I did have the full sky package.

Main difference is the service. Sky's service is much better. Interactive, news, sports, champions league. Picture is sharper doesn't go off like UPC, UPC tends to freeze every so often. EPG is much better on sky, reminders series link.

As soon as sky BB hit Ireland, I'm back to sky.

Oh yeah if you want to get BBC3 and 4 ITV2 etc on EPG. All you need to do is remove the viewing card. Turn off the power on the sky box for 24 hours (mine is a spare for multiroom) Turn it back on without the card and your box resets to all the freeview channels. No RTE or TV3. But back to UK settings 101 bbc 1 102 bbc 2 etc etc ITV1 ITV2 Bbc 3 and 4 all on the EPG. Handy when theres a match on the tv you can just send the misses up stairs for (soap channels)Corrie etc.

O7Pat

ROC1977 wrote: »

UPC is cheaper. I have it at the moment ,as I just moved house. I did have the full sky package..

In fairness you have to compare like with like, are u comparing the full sky package with the full upc package?? Otherwise saying "upc is cheaper" doesn't really make any sense.
Plus when comparing various packages important to note that there is always a wider range of channels with sky.

ROC1977 wrote: »

Oh yeah if you want to get BBC3 and 4 ITV2 etc on EPG. All you need to do is remove the viewing card. Turn off the power on the sky box for 24 hours (mine is a spare for multiroom) Turn it back on without the card and your box resets to all the freeview channels. No RTE or TV3. But back to UK settings 101 bbc 1 102 bbc 2 etc etc ITV1 ITV2 Bbc 3 and 4 all on the EPG. Handy when theres a match on the tv you can just send the misses up stairs for (soap channels)Corrie etc.

Prob easier to just tune in bbc3/4 and the utv's etc on other channels.

Or if you want to do it the way mentioned you shouldn't need the 24 hrs anymore

ROC1977

tuning BBC 3 onto "other channels" doesn't give you the EPG. Ya prob less than 24 hours to re set. But thats just what I did.

Ok for UPC to get skysport and movies and the top channel pack it cost 72 euro a month, or 864for the year. And for sky 71 euro a month, or 852 for the year.. UPC free connection, and no need for a land line. Sky 50 euro connection
So 852+50= 902 for a year. Not to meantion the line rental for the phone which you have have connected for 12months as part of the contract. So you can add another 20-25 a month for line rental. Thats why sky is more expensive than UPC.
But I prefer Sky and I know you can get around the line rental side of things, but average Joe doesn't.

bk

O7Pat wrote: »

True, but up to then in the thread we were just talking about tv, only marginally more expensive if looking at 2/3 mixes with a much broader range

True, but then most people aren't just looking at TV anymore, Sky might wish it was so, but it isn't.

This is pretty much proven by the fact that Sky offers BB via ADSL2+ in the UK. It was the only way for them to compete with Virgin Media.

O7Pat

ROC1977 wrote: »

tuning BBC 3 onto "other channels" doesn't give you the EPG. Ya prob less than 24 hours to re set. But thats just what I did.

Ok for UPC to get skysport and movies and the top channel pack it cost 72 euro a month, or 864for the year. And for sky 71 euro a month, or 852 for the year.. UPC free connection, and no need for a land line. Sky 50 euro connection
So 852+50= 902 for a year. Not to meantion the line rental for the phone which you have have connected for 12months as part of the contract. So you can add another 20-25 a month for line rental. Thats why sky is more expensive than UPC.
But I prefer Sky and I know you can get around the line rental side of things, but average Joe doesn't.

Sorry I should have mentioned that it doesn't give the channels on the epg, just I find it easier to have them in other channels that swaping out the card. In fairness alot of average Joe's would know and indeed there is still people that would have a phone line and be paying line rental even if they didn't have sky (or indeed don't have sky) Also get broader range of channels with sky.

True, but then most people aren't just looking at TV anymore, Sky might wish it was so, but it isn't.

This is pretty much proven by the fact that Sky offers BB via ADSL2+ in the UK. It was the only way for them to compete with Virgin Media.

True, with u all the way, was just saying in this particular thread that was the first mentioned of bb/phone. Lot of people still just looking at the tv issues cause even where upc is available bb is not always an option.

ROC1977

Sky is the better service, better mix of channels I agree with O7pat. Only thing that p1sses me off with sky is installation fees and the line rental crap. I mean I was with them for 5 years, and when I decided to move last month and didn't want a land line, I was basically told tuff sh1te. I know I could use my old dish but decided to give chorus a try as I wanted the 20meg BB as well an no land line. But nothing but bother with the BB but thats another story. As soon as Sky get BB in Ireland I might change back to them.

O7Pat

there was talk around here (boards) of sky willing to waive the phone line bit for a €37.50 fee provided you didn't want multiroom. Ya the reintroduction of the install fee was a bummer. Since I left chorus I see they now have an admin charge to change the package that you are on - are they really trying to compete at all

ROC1977

Charges do my head in. I mean you do all the admin yourdself online. And they still want to charge. Like banks charging you for taking money out of the ATM!!! aughhhhhhhh..........:mad:

O7Pat

In fairness can change without charge on sky, only restriction is that you cann't go back down to a lower package for one month which is fair enough.

Man if you still paying bank charges to use your atm card you need to change accounts or banks. Loads of options out there that don't charge.

ROC1977

lol that was just an example of stupid charges. I remember when I got the full sky package about 5 years ago it was 59 euro. And since then on average about every six months it went up a euro. All the way to 71 euro for the same package now.

kenco

I looked into this a while back for some older family members and while the initial sales pitch they got on the door from Sky seemed cheaper when you actually did the sums it was not. Also the stinger of the phoneline required all the time made it a non runner (especially as one of the said family was thinking of getting rid of the landline)

I called Sky for them and appealed to commen sense on the phone line but to no avail. Got them both then on UPC DVRs which they love. Ok the service is poxy and the boxes do need reboots, etc, etc but all in all it was not significantly more expensive than the basic service they already had

O7Pat

kenco wrote: »

I looked into this a while back for some older family members and while the initial sales pitch they got on the door from Sky seemed cheaper when you actually did the sums it was not. Also the stinger of the phoneline required all the time made it a non runner (especially as one of the said family was thinking of getting rid of the landline)

I called Sky for them and appealed to commen sense on the phone line but to no avail. Got them both then on UPC DVRs which they love. Ok the service is poxy and the boxes do need reboots, etc, etc but all in all it was not significantly more expensive than the basic service they already had

Suppose it depends what you looking for, poxy service reboots etc. And with upc you have to pay extra (€5 per month) for the dvr/"sky+" type service, ok the new prices similar to the old analogue prices so presume thats what you mean.

ROC1977 wrote:

lol that was just an example of stupid charges. I remember when I got the full sky package about 5 years ago it was 59 euro. And since then on average about every six months it went up a euro. All the way to 71 euro for the same package now.

I am with you, it is an expensive service, but our chat was on the price of one v. the other.

Either way it is defo expensive and there is alot to be said for the option of rte, tv3, all the beeb, itv's ch4, m4, e4, f4, etc etc all being available for free.