Ntl Digital Advice

decies

Just on to ntl digital about another Problem regarding my Second small pace digital box the first one replaced this day last week and now the second one had the picture frozen when i came home and your not subscribed to chanell message on living tv!!!!!!

I rang them and the advice unplug box take the card out and give the chip a wipe probably dust.

What are the odds i wont have to ring them later i recken 1000/1!!!!!
Also have no mgm on small pace box but have it on larger box in front room.
She said the signal was down on the small box only!!!!!!!!!!!!
Give me strength

LegacyUser

decies wrote:

Just on to ntl digital about another Problem regarding my Second small pace digital box the first one replaced this day last week and now the second one had the picture frozen when i came home and your not subscribed to chanell message on living tv!!!!!!

I rang them and the advice unplug box take the card out and give the chip a wipe probably dust.

What are the odds i wont have to ring them later i recken 1000/1!!!!!
Also have no mgm on small pace box but have it on larger box in front room.
She said the signal was down on the small box only!!!!!!!!!!!!
Give me strength

Is it an error 1003 that you get. Please take out and put your smartcard back in?? Then it tells you your not subscribed to the channel?

I have the same box as you - 2 in fact and both are NOT working

decies

yep error 1003.basically this particular pace box is inferior to the older models this from an ntl technician!!!!!!!
I cant keep taking half days from work for these so called experts to call!!!!
NTL DIGItal is basically rubbish why do people stick with it.
Two reasons
A,Cheaper than sky
B, Not suitable area for dish

djmarkus

i agree. it's trying to be sky but failing miserably.

Marcopolo85

djmarkus wrote:

i agree. it's trying to be sky but failing miserably.

But an Irish company providing employment (direct and indirect) for a considerable amount of Irish.....

RicardoSmith

Marcopolo85 wrote:

But an Irish company providing employment (direct and indirect) for a considerable amount of Irish.....

Attitudes like that drag the whole country down. The product is dire. Its good money for old rope. Theres a couple of good channels, but a lot of dire ones. The equipment, settop boxes and remotes are trash.

jcoote

don't mean to be funny or anything but just get sky...its quite simply the best out there even if u only get a small package because the 6 euro a month for the full package is outrageous

LegacyUser

jcoote wrote:

don't mean to be funny or anything but just get sky...its quite simply the best out there even if u only get a small package because the 6 euro a month for the full package is outrageous

Eh excuse me! I pay 35 euros a month for NTL becuase I don't want a sky dish on my roof. I already have an Irish Broadband dish on my chimney.
I don't want sky because sky don't take responsibility for the equipment after a year and you end up forking out eachtime the wind turns the dish.

NTL advertise a service and don't provide it

Marcopolo85

RicardoSmith wrote:

Attitudes like that drag the whole country down. The product is dire. Its good money for old rope. Theres a couple of good channels, but a lot of dire ones. The equipment, settop boxes and remotes are trash.

Amazing comment that......considering most of the Sky/NTL equipment is manufactured (in one guise or another) by Pace. As for "attitudes like that bringing the whole country down" - where are you coming from on that? I. like many others, choose to support a variety of Irish companies in order to safeguard jobs and am proud of the fact that I choose to do so.

There is no doubting that the Sky platform has all the bells and whistles - but if you want a good value package, correctly priced, with a FREE backup service then there really isn't a choice - it has to be NTL. OK you don't have all the 'interactivity' (a very loose term) and a gazillion '+1' channels (most of which are complete and unadulterated tripe) that Sky offers.

And regarding the channel line-up.......most of the services are sourced from Sky......so by default you're knocking them also. What channels which Irish companies don't carry are the ones you're so fond of?

But the Irish companies do not have the finacial reserves and resources that Sky do. A simple financial fact. However, they are, in my opinion, doing a very good job under very difficult circumstances.....and in the process giving viewers a CHOICE - something which wouldn't be there but for the Irish Cablecos.

Maybe you might think on that in future before you knock your own (I'm presuming you are Irish).

cdc

Marcopolo85 wrote:

I. like many others, choose to support a variety of Irish companies in order to safeguard jobs and am proud of the fact that I choose to do so.

So do I, but seeing as NTL were a shower of west Brits (in my opinion) I don't think giving preference to Irish Anglophiles over the Brits was important

And regarding the channel line-up.......most of the services are sourced from Sky......so by default you're knocking them also. What channels which Irish companies don't carry are the ones you're so fond of?

As has been said before, the 2 non anglo-american non must-carry channels which NTL used to show, Eurosport and Tv5, were got rid of by NTL 'Ireland' and replaced with an american business channel and an anglo-american entertainment channel.

Marcopolo85

cdc wrote:

So do I, but seeing as NTL were a shower of west Brits (in my opinion) I don't think giving preference to Irish Anglophiles over the Brits was important


As has been said before, the 2 non anglo-american non must-carry channels which NTL used to show, Eurosport and Tv5, were got rid of by NTL 'Ireland' and replaced with an american business channel and an anglo-american entertainment channel.

Valid point about Eurosport.....but TV5 ffs!!! That thing must have been watched by three people. You are entitled to your own opinions about the owners, but like, let's say, Tesco, the vast majority of employees are Irish supporting Irish households. Just because someone works for a company owned by the British doesn't make THEM British.

If that was the case half the population, by your reckoning, could be classed as 'Irish Anglophiles' (a contradiction in terms). Do I detect an ever-so slight anti-British sentiment which has nothing to do with this discussion? And possibly a grá for the French language (a language which, in my opinion, has a prominence at major events which it absolutely does not deserve). :rolleyes:

idj

decies wrote:

yep error 1003.basically this particular pace box is inferior to the older models this from an ntl technician!!!!!!!
I cant keep taking half days from work for these so called experts to call!!!!
NTL DIGItal is basically rubbish why do people stick with it.
Two reasons
A,Cheaper than sky
B, Not suitable area for dish

Did an ntl tech really say this? I agree with Marcopolo the boxes are made by Pace this is not the issue.
Decie I think it may be something to do with the unlinking of the first box and its relationship with the second( Mirrored box). If I am getting you right (the master box was replaced) I wondered if they had swapped the box out correctly on the their computer system?

Marcopolo is this a possible reason?

decies

the problem is with the mirrored second small pace box.
have no confidence in it sure its working since friday but it will break down again with another error message and advice on phone give it a swipe sir with a cloth to remove dust.!!!!!!

Mossy Monk

just a reminder. give up the whole irish company/british company crap as it isnt on the topic of the thread

RicardoSmith

Having used both NTL digital and sky my experience is that the NTL boxes are always breaking down, needing to be reset a lot, and the remotes stop working very frequently. Maybe there all made by Pace, I dunno but I haven't had a fraction of the problems with Sky gear as I have NTL. Maybe they only buy the cheaper stuff I dunno. As an aside, Eurosport was great for motorsport of all types and a whole range of other sports aswell. They dropped it from analog why? To drive people to their digital offerings so you can have about 20 channels of reruns. I like Wings, but that channel tends to be dead an awful lot. SOme of the Music is ok, and discovery is great. But I don't think its value for money even at the cheaper price. TV5 used to have great movies and some good music. What did they replace it with? I like Time Team, but even I get bored of the same show repeated a zillion times a day.

Where ever I've lived in Dublin we've had poor NTL analog quality and they've been unable to fix that, and lately I see that a lot of people in my current area have switched to Sky, mainly because NTL is so unreliable. I have the same problem with their broadband aswell. Its not working an awful lot and the promised repairs, fixes, seem to an awful long time. They are never fixed either the problem re-occur on a regular basis. Have a problem wth Sky and it gets fixed. That said Sky is very expensive, but at least it works.

I don't have a problem supporting Irish industry. But I have a problem for supporting a bad company, it should be lambasted for poor quality of service. They don't have to offer everthing Sky just, an I don't like a lot of Skys programming. But at least do what you can well.

As for supporting Irish workers. Well all the engineers, repairmen I've had the pleasure of meeting were all working on contract or working part time. I'd prefer to support a company I knew was putting some roots down. NTL could be gone tomorrow.

Having said all that, personally I've had better service from NTL of late. Some genuinely nice and helpful folk. I get the impression they actually thinking of customer service, instead of ignoring it completely. At the moment I don't have digital or sky, as I don't have time for it. I'd prefer an on Demand serivce so when I do get a moment to watch TV theres something on I want to see. Not big brother on 3 channels, and friends on another 3.

What I would like it a streamed on demand service over broadband. At the moment the closest thing would be a Sky+ box. However I heard something about a Sky on demand PC. I know that NTL's infrastructure can't handle this at the moment (it can't handle broadband demand) but they need to get their act together.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/06/21/sky_broadband_content/

Any problems we've had with digtial NTL boxes, is usually fixed by restarting it, or leaving it off for a while then turning it back on. Usually this forces the update to work, as the updates seem to freeze the box a lot.

cdc

Marcopolo85 wrote:

If that was the case half the population, by your reckoning, could be classed as 'Irish Anglophiles'

I'd say more than half; the vast majority to be honest.
Still doesn't stop me wanting to moan about it.

And possibly a grá for the French language

Just for an alternative view of the world, which you do not even get from the Irish channels.

Do I detect an ever-so slight anti-British sentiment which has nothing to do with this discussion?

I didn't introduce the element that has nothing to do with this discussion or comment on it before you did

Mr Monk wrote:

give up the whole irish company/british company crap as it isnt on the topic of the thread

I'll stop now. But I would say that off topic or on arguing over the Britishness of an 'Irish' service provider is not crap.

Mossy Monk

cdc wrote:

But I would say that off topic or on arguing over the Britishness of an 'Irish' service provider is not crap.

it is when it has **** all to do with the thread

LegacyUser

idj wrote:

Decie I think it may be something to do with the unlinking of the first box and its relationship with the second( Mirrored box). If I am getting you right (the master box was replaced) I wondered if they had swapped the box out correctly on the their computer system?

Marcopolo is this a possible reason?

i have the same issue as Decie with 2 independent boxes. They have no connection to each other (master/slave) etc. It is an issue with either the hardware or the software - or indeed the signal ..

Something that NTL should resolve ASAP.

Marcopolo85

RicardoSmith wrote:

Having used both NTL digital and sky my experience is that the NTL boxes are always breaking down, needing to be reset a lot, and the remotes stop working very frequently. Maybe there all made by Pace, I dunno but I haven't had a fraction of the problems with Sky gear as I have NTL. Maybe they only buy the cheaper stuff I dunno. As an aside, Eurosport was great for motorsport of all types and a whole range of other sports aswell. They dropped it from analog why? To drive people to their digital offerings so you can have about 20 channels of reruns. I like Wings, but that channel tends to be dead an awful lot. SOme of the Music is ok, and discovery is great. But I don't think its value for money even at the cheaper price. TV5 used to have great movies and some good music. What did they replace it with? I like Time Team, but even I get bored of the same show repeated a zillion times a day.

Where ever I've lived in Dublin we've had poor NTL analog quality and they've been unable to fix that, and lately I see that a lot of people in my current area have switched to Sky, mainly because NTL is so unreliable. I have the same problem with their broadband aswell. Its not working an awful lot and the promised repairs, fixes, seem to an awful long time. They are never fixed either the problem re-occur on a regular basis. Have a problem wth Sky and it gets fixed. That said Sky is very expensive, but at least it works.

I don't have a problem supporting Irish industry. But I have a problem for supporting a bad company, it should be lambasted for poor quality of service. They don't have to offer everthing Sky just, an I don't like a lot of Skys programming. But at least do what you can well.

As for supporting Irish workers. Well all the engineers, repairmen I've had the pleasure of meeting were all working on contract or working part time. I'd prefer to support a company I knew was putting some roots down. NTL could be gone tomorrow.

Having said all that, personally I've had better service from NTL of late. Some genuinely nice and helpful folk. I get the impression they actually thinking of customer service, instead of ignoring it completely. At the moment I don't have digital or sky, as I don't have time for it. I'd prefer an on Demand serivce so when I do get a moment to watch TV theres something on I want to see. Not big brother on 3 channels, and friends on another 3.

What I would like it a streamed on demand service over broadband. At the moment the closest thing would be a Sky+ box. However I heard something about a Sky on demand PC. I know that NTL's infrastructure can't handle this at the moment (it can't handle broadband demand) but they need to get their act together.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/06/21/sky_broadband_content/

Any problems we've had with digtial NTL boxes, is usually fixed by restarting it, or leaving it off for a while then turning it back on. Usually this forces the update to work, as the updates seem to freeze the box a lot.

2 Points:

1. Yes - NTL/Chorus DO use contract staff (as do ESB, Eircom, Bord Gais, etc). However these staff are usually used for installations, etc. All three aformentioned companies (NTL included) employ a large number of full-time technical and administrative personnel.

2. TV5 good music and Movies......if you talk French! (Ok - maybe you could listen to the music - never saw any on it when it was there though!).

Have a look at this thread:
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=3035209#post3035209

MarVeL

Just to point out that TV5 is pretty cool for sport as well. Handy when so many matches went to sky

RicardoSmith

Marcopolo85 wrote:

2 Points:

1. Yes - NTL/Chorus DO use contract staff (as do ESB, Eircom, Bord Gais, etc). However these staff are usually used for installations, etc. All three aformentioned companies (NTL included) employ a large number of full-time technical and administrative personnel.

2. TV5 good music and Movies......if you talk French! (Ok - maybe you could listen to the music - never saw any on it when it was there though!).

Have a look at this thread:
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=3035209#post3035209

1) Obviously, but all of repair people I've met are on contract.
2) Subtitles.

Marcopolo85

RicardoSmith wrote:

1) Obviously, but all of repair people I've met are on contract.
2) Subtitles.

1. How many have you met?

2. Subtitles are for the hard of hearing.

3. Why show a French language channel in Ireland if this is not reciprocated in France (i.e. TG4)?

4. French is spoken by a miniscule amount of people in Ireland, so what's the point in allocation a whole analogue frequency to it? Surely other language enthusiasts (German, Italian, Spanish, etc) would also be entitled to argue that case. There is also a great deal of sports/movies on these.

5. Finally, as I've already said, in my opinion the French language enjoys a prominence at all major events which it does not deserve. :rolleyes:

RicardoSmith

Marcopolo85 wrote:

1. How many have you met?

I dunno 5 or 6 at this stage, why?

Marcopolo85 wrote:

2. Subtitles are for the hard of hearing.

Obviously thats simply wrong.

Personally I prefer watching other language films like DAS Boot or Nikita, La Balance in their own language with subtitles. All films are dire when dubbed.

Marcopolo85 wrote:

3. Why show a French language channel in Ireland if this is not reciprocated in France (i.e. TG4)?

One thing has nothing to do with the other. Its not a community service. TG4 is great for movies, especially westerns.

Marcopolo85 wrote:

4. French is spoken by a miniscule amount of people in Ireland, so what's the point in allocation a whole analogue frequency to it? Surely other language enthusiasts (German, Italian, Spanish, etc) would also be entitled to argue that case. There is also a great deal of sports/movies on these.

I'll take your word that these other channels are good. With NTL we'll never know.

Marcopolo85 wrote:

5. Finally, as I've already said, in my opinion the French language enjoys a prominence at all major events which it does not deserve. :rolleyes:

French is a widely spoken language throughout all parts of the word. Thats a fact. Despite your opinion. Lots of people have french as their second language. Which is why you see it used a lot.

Why is that sarcastic?

Marcopolo85

RicardoSmith wrote:

I dunno 5 or 6 at this stage, why?



Obviously thats simply wrong.

Personally I prefer watching other language films like DAS Boot or Nikita, La Balance in their own language with subtitles. All films are dire when dubbed.



One thing has nothing to do with the other. Its not a community service. TG4 is great for movies, especially westerns.



I'll take your word that these other channels are good. With NTL we'll never know.



French is a widely spoken language throughout all parts of the word. Thats a fact. Despite your opinion. Lots of people have french as their second language. Which is why you see it used a lot.

Why is that sarcastic?

Right - here we go!

1. You would have met two at the original install, and possibly a further two if you have digital. This does not mean that their entire technical staff are contractors.

2. Everyone to their own. I can understand deaf people needing subtitles, but if you choose to watch a niche foreign language channel with subtitles that doesn't mean the rest of us have to.

3. One thing has everything to do with the other. I strongly object to having an obscure foreign language foisted upon me.

4. You're missing the point. What I said was that if you give preference to a French language channel these channels should also get the same treatment. The bandwidth is not there on analogue to support this scenario.

5. French is a widely spoken language??!! Maybe in wannabee France, Quebec, and some remote former French colonies. If you look at the attached link (http://www2.ignatius.edu/faculty/turner/worldlang.htm) youwill see that French comes in TENTH (yes, tenth) in a list of the most spoken languages in the World. Ahead of it are Portugese, German, Spanish, and even Bengali. Do these languages receive the same preferential treatment as French - NO! OK - some have it as a secondary language, which still only brings it up to sixth, but again that doesn't warrant it being rammed down TV viewers throats.

TV5's rightful spot is on any digital platform - not a prime spot on analogue. :mad:

Charles Slane

NTL are to be avoided if at all possible !!

Anyone I know who has had dealings with them regarding installations, repairs, billing issues etc, has found them to be unprofessional in the extreme.

It's a rare thing to hear of a time when they've actually turned up when they said they would.

A few years ago I ordered an additional point for an upstairs bedroom. Of course they didn't turn up on the first day that I took off work. The next time they turned up hours late and the guy couldn't do the job because he "didn't have the ladder" !! It took literally hours of phone calls and barely controlled fury before the job eventually got done.

As recently as yesterday my sister's service was cut off when two of NTL's people were working on other people's connections in the same apartment block. No signal being received at all (not even analogue). She told them about it and they said it was nothing to do with them. She rang NTL, talked to one of their phone monkeys who said he'd call her back in a few minutes. Two hours went by with no call returned and she finally managed to get through to him again. When she asked why he hadn't called her back he replied "I had to take my break" !!! She asked to speak to a superviser and was put on hold for fifteen minutes (during this time the two NTL guys who were working in the building drove away). Eventually she was told that the superviser was busy. By this stage her patience ran out and she told the guy that she wanted to cancel her subscription to NTL and that she would take her business to Sky. The guy's response ? "Fine".

Is it really any surprise that Sky Digital has been so successful in Ireland (despite the lack of Channel 4 and ITV) ?

Harry2001

Charles Slane wrote:

As recently as yesterday my sister's service was cut off when two of NTL's people were working on other people's connections in the same apartment block. No signal being received at all (not even analogue). She told them about it and they said it was nothing to do with them. She rang NTL, talked to one of their phone monkeys who said he'd call her back in a few minutes. Two hours went by with no call returned and she finally managed to get through to him again. When she asked why he hadn't called her back he replied "I had to take my break" !!! She asked to speak to a superviser and was put on hold for fifteen minutes (during this time the two NTL guys who were working in the building drove away). Eventually she was told that the superviser was busy. By this stage her patience ran out and she told the guy that she wanted to cancel her subscription to NTL and that she would take her business to Sky. The guy's response ? "Fine".

Is it really any surprise that Sky Digital has been so successful in Ireland (despite the lack of Channel4 and ITV) ?

I have steam coming out of my ears just reading your sisters experience as it all sounds so familar of my experiences with various companies in Ireland :mad:

paulm17781

NTL have always shown up for me when expected (3 times).

If you ring any Irish telecoms company and say you want to cancel they will always say fine, it comes down to the person earning just above minimum wage really doesn't care. Something that really needs to be sorted out IMHO.

Gadgie

While I don't doubt the truth of other posters' experiences with ntl, I fell I must share my positive experience of dealing with them.

I received an offer in the post for free broadband for the first three months, free connection and free basic tv for 12 months. I decided to get the digital service too, with free connection.

I ordered on a Monday. Was told I'd be called back later that day with an installation date. I was. The date given was for Friday that same week, sometime between 9am and 1pm.

Received a text message on Thursday to remind me of the appointment.

They turned up on Friday at about 11.30 (within the appointment window). Everything was installed and up and running by 12.15. The did the job neatly and professionally.

No problems yet.

I'm not the world's biggest ntl fan - I used to be an MMDS customer and the service was woeful - but they have definitely improved bucketloads since I last dealt with them.

Guy:Incognito

RicardoSmith wrote:

Attitudes like that drag the whole country down. The product is dire. Its good money for old rope. Theres a couple of good channels, but a lot of dire ones. The equipment, settop boxes and remotes are trash.

Well if no one had jobs here no one would be able to buy anything and the country would collapse.