should I go for sky ?

iMax

Can someone who has experience of both give me a quick "which is better" (or point me somewhere).

Currently have UPC with the standard "digital" service (small pace box) in two locations in the house with an analogue signal in the third.

Had sky round the other night with a half price offer for HD - €24.50 for the box & €40 installation with a standard box for multiroom free.

UPC also have a HD offering & it would cost about another €7.00 per month (with €80 installation).

The main reason for holding onto upc this long has been the promise of BB which now looks like being a further 2 years away. But this was also before they launched HD.

So bearing in mind recessionary times etc. Which is the better option. Is sky HD better than UPC HD ?

Sports don't interest me & buy movies on dvd & bluray so that's not important

p15574

Or there's Freesat, which has no monthly charges - but you have the upfront installation costs. Might be worth considering getting Sky in for a year so they do the dish installation etc, then cancelling in a year's time when you then own the equipment, and watch FTA (Free To Air) tv using Freesat or any FTA box (including the Sky box you'd have). You'd then have to get the Irish channels separately though.

enfant terrible

If you take the cheap Sky HD box you will have to pay for the HD pack for 12 months.

The HD pack is 14 something euro extra a month.

If you take the 6 packs(around 30 euro a month) without sports or movies with sky you'll get the HD documentary channels, MTV HD, BBC HD, Sky 1 HD, ITV HD (other channels), Eurosport HD, FX HD, Rush HD, Sci Fi HD, Sky Arts HD, Sky Real Lives and Luxe HD.

If you then cancel the HD pack after 12 months you will still get the following HD channels without paying 14 euro a month.

BBC HD, ITV HD, Luxe HD

ITV HD can not be tuned in yet on some HD boxes but will be available to all HD boxes once the new EPG has been fully rolled out.
ITV HD has to be manually tuned in and accessed via other channels.

bk

Sky might offer a better service, but would likely work out a lot more expensive.

Specially if you want multiroom. Sky is an extra €15 per month per extra room. That is on top of €15 for HD and if you don't currently have a phone line you would need to get one at €25 per month.

So for the standard 6 packs (no sport and movies) it would cost per month:
- 6 packs: €32
- HD: €15
- Multiroom 1: €15
- Multiroom 2: €15

€77 per month (excluding line rental), I'd imagine that is a lot more then what your currently paying for UPC.

rcunning03

iMax wrote: »

Can someone who has experience of both give me a quick "which is better" (or point me somewhere).

Currently have UPC with the standard "digital" service (small pace box) in two locations in the house with an analogue signal in the third.

Had sky round the other night with a half price offer for HD - €24.50 for the box & €40 installation with a standard box for multiroom free.

UPC also have a HD offering & it would cost about another €7.00 per month (with €80 installation).

The main reason for holding onto upc this long has been the promise of BB which now looks like being a further 2 years away. But this was also before they launched HD.

So bearing in mind recessionary times etc. Which is the better option. Is sky HD better than UPC HD ?

Sports don't interest me & buy movies on dvd & bluray so that's not important

I had both.

Sky has a bigger range of channels and plenty more HD. Also you get sky one HD which is really good. They also have sky anytime where you can watch any programs you missed. You can also log on to your sky box via the internet and record something so you can watch it when you go home. You can also view sky anytime over the internet.

UPC have BBC 3,4 and HD on their epg and is cheaper. They also have a couple of local stations, mostly crap but the occasional good program on them.

I really like BBC4 and BBCHD but sky has a bigger range of channels and it has skyone HD. I left sky for upc cause I was having difficulties getting a proper reception and it use to fail on a regular basis and that's why I switched.

I would go with UPC unless you had to have skysports HD. The only thing you would miss is skyone HD and it's cheaper

whosedaddy?

rcunning03 wrote: »

I had both.

Sky has a bigger range of channels and plenty more HD. Also you get sky one HD which is really good. They also have sky anytime where you can watch any programs you missed. You can also log on to your sky box via the internet and record something so you can watch it when you go home. You can also view sky anytime over the internet.

UPC have BBC 3,4 and HD on their epg and is cheaper. They also have a couple of local stations, mostly crap but the occasional good program on them.

I really like BBC4 and BBCHD but sky has a bigger range of channels and it has skyone HD. I left sky for upc cause I was having difficulties getting a proper reception and it use to fail on a regular basis and that's why I switched.

I would go with UPC unless you had to have skysports HD. The only thing you would miss is skyone HD and it's cheaper

As you had both, how does the picture quality of the SD channels compare?

rcunning03

whosedaddy? wrote: »

As you had both, how does the picture quality of the SD channels compare?

UPC sd channels through the HDMI are of the same quality as sky, but if your not going to have upc through the hdmi, sky is better. Noticably better but if you have ntl hd the differnce is not noticeable.