Censorship on 'Sun Direct HD Dth' Facebook page.

[sanjay0864]

Why are you repeating (copying and pasting) your posts? This is considered spam.
Also, it is strange that you have just signed up on this forum and all of your posts are either to promote or defend the actions of 'SunDirect HD Dth'?

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Dude, this is something that everyone does... Writing in fine art saying *Conditions apply... I mean once I saw that the A/C installations were free but when I bought the A/C, (don't want to dis close the company name), later during installation they said it is free but you need to pay Rs. 900 for all the other expenses, I was literally shocked, I took it to the management they said, we have written in the advertisement that there are conditions applied, then what in this hot summer I need the A/C, so paid the same, I mean sometimes they use everything for Conditions applied, but legally they can claim that, that is the problem.

Just becaue others, or most other companies also do it, does not in itself make it right. Also, just because such companies have themselves legally covered, does not make their actions any less reprehensible. As the famous dialouge in Deewar goes, "Doosron ke paap ginane se, apne paap kam nahi ho jaate". False and misleading advertising is plain simple, unethical and immoral. Unfortunately it seems our society has fallen to where it seems to even find such reprehensible acts as an acceptable way of doing business.

In the case of 'SunDirect HD Dth' my contention is that are not even legally correct. In this case, even the fine print 'Disclaimer' does not state the truth. The disclaimer states "Some programmes may be upscaled". First of all, some programmes, does not mean 'entire channels'. Secondly and even more importantly 'an upscaled signal is not a HD signal' thus their disclaimer does not justify or give them the moral, ethical and or legal right to term those cahannels as HD. It would have been a different situation, if majority or even part of the programming on the channels were in HD. But that is not the case, instead the entire channel is nothing but the regular SD channel being put through an upscaler and in turn being marketed as HD. The funny thing is that both Plasma and LCD TVs are fixed display TVs. Thus in case they are HD, which almost all are now a days, the TV will automatically upscale the signal to it's native HD resolution. Thus, by the logic being used by 'SunDirect HD Dth', all customers with Plasma and LCD TVs are watching all channels in HD already. Therefore, by logic the entire existence of 'SunDirect HD' is redundant. By the way, in your example of the A/C ad the installation, meaning labour, was free, but installation does not include the materials required in installation. Thus, the A/C company was technically and legally correct. Which is not so with 'SunDirect HD Dth'.

But dude, Facebook, I have my doubts as I had some good treatment there, initially I was furious as I called customer care so many times for installation I could not reach them, then I reported it here in the facebook, they said they will call me within 24 hours, a person called me the next day at around 11, then I got the installation within two days, well the delay was due to rain, but then again, I really think they are genuinely helping, and as they have to so many people you can see in the facebook, you can read the comments there.

I am not in any ways claiming that their 'facebook' page is not a good idea and that others may have not been able to resolve some issues by posting there. In any case, yours was an installation issue, which is in their own interests or did you not realise that. Almost all companies jump to serve you when it is time to sell you something, it is only after the sale, that post deletions start.

 

[KonfuSed]

One thing for sure is that Sun HD probably have lost a potential customer, i.e. me. If they are such snobbish on facebook itself then God only know how they'll be in real life. I would wait for other DTH's to come up with HD and then would evaluate and get one. I for a change had good experience with Tata Sky. Don't know how they are now.

Oh, that Ananya sure smells to be a troll and most probably someone from Sun HD. And in that case, another minus for Sun HD.

 

[sanjay0864]

what was in his mind..

He blatantly removed all your posts about genuine queries.. then he is asking for your smart card number, address and phone number for the problem which should be fixed at their side..

That's the exact thought that crossed my mind and why I did not send them that information. Specially, since the issue at hand cannot be resolve at my end anyhow.

 

[reju]

@ sanjay0864

You need to frame words in the right manner to get your view points across.

You will not get anywhere by openly accusing them using strong words like "blatant false advertising", "'fool' the average consumer", "'FAKE' HD channels" etc.

No company will want such statements showing up in their reviews/ discussions.

Grievances need to be addressed ethically and professionally. Its your best chance to get some positive results.

Cheers!

 

[sanjay0864]

@ sanjay0864

You need to frame words in the right manner to get your view points across.

You will not get anywhere by openly accusing them using strong words like "blatant false advertising", "'fool' the average consumer", "'FAKE' HD channels" etc.

No company will want such statements showing up in their reviews/ discussions.

Grievances need to be addressed ethically and professionally. Its your best chance to get some positive results.

Cheers!

I totally agreee with you, that a confrontational approach is not the best way to get a response. But having said that, the fact is that my very first posts on the 'facebook' page spoke of how much I enjoyed watching the 'true' HD channels and that I even found their SD channels to be better tahn those of other DTH operators. It is only after the company claimed there was absolutely nothing wrong in their adverising or their claims regarding HD and actually told me not to post on this issue and even deleted my posts that were addressing other issues, that I chose to post all this. Secondly and more importantly, the truth is, what it is. An apple is an apple, so how else would you term it? The fact is, that 'Colors HD' & 'Sun TV HD' are "FAKE' HD channels. There is no other way to describe them. Thus advertising '"FAKE" HD channels as HD channels is nothing but "blatant false advertising" with the objective to "fool' the average consumer". Bottom line is, if the company had taken a conciliatry tone and indicated a willingness to address the issues raised by me, I would not have started this thread.

 

[dgtl887]

One thing for sure is that Sun HD probably have lost a potential customer, i.e. me. If they are such snobbish on facebook itself then God only know how they'll be in real life. I would wait for other DTH's to come up with HD and then would evaluate and get one. I for a change had good experience with Tata Sky. Don't know how they are now.

Same here. I mean, I was pretty much on the edge after hearing about their crappy customer service. That got reinforced after I sent them an email to which I didn't get a reply. This pretty much puts the final nail in the coffin.

I think I'll just wait it out until other companies start HD broadcasting. Hopefully, we'll have some more HD channels by then too.

 

[reju]

I totally agreee with you, that a confrontational approach is not the best way to get a response. But having said that, the fact is that my very first posts on the 'facebook' page spoke of how much I enjoyed watching the 'true' HD channels and that I even found their SD channels to be better tahn those of other DTH operators. It is only after the company claimed there was absolutely nothing wrong in their adverising or their claims regarding HD and actually told me not to post on this issue and even deleted my posts that were addressing other issues, that I chose to post all this. Secondly and more importantly, the truth is, what it is. An apple is an apple, so how else would you term it? The fact is, that 'Colors HD' & 'Sun TV HD' are "FAKE' HD channels. There is no other way to describe them. Thus advertising '"FAKE" HD channels as HD channels is nothing but "blatant false advertising" with the objective to "fool' the average consumer". Bottom line is, if the company had taken a conciliatry tone and indicated a willingness to address the issues raised by me, I would not have started this thread.

"Fraud, Fake, false, fool etc., are very offensive and insulting words which should have been avoided.

How can you expect them to take a conciliatory tone even if they wanted to?

 

[sanjay0864]

Tell me this Sanjay, how are the other channels on Sun HD, are they at least un-compressed and capable of being upscaled decently? Just for that I would be happy to pay a premium.

In all honesty, the fact is that I have found the SD channels on 'SunDirect HD' to be slightly better than the other DTH services I have seen. That is a different matter altogether that 'SunDirect HD' has the most expensive and rather stupid combination of channel packages on offer. First of all you do not get all the channels you want, specially no sports channels at all. NOw to get the channels you do want, you have to subscribe to them seperately. Which would be alright, except that the only way to get them is by subscribing to a group of channels and in case you want several channels, the same channels appear in different groups. Thus you end up having to pay for the same channel a multiple number of times. Since, they don't have any package which will give you all channels, like 'Airtel IPTV' and 'DISH TV' do, I tried to have them calculate for me what it would cost me to get the same channels that I get from 'Dish TV' for which I pay Rs 325/ pm. The total for the same channels on 'SunTV HD' ended up being close to Rs 900/- pm.
Of course the 'real' HD channels such as 'Discovery HD', 'National Geographic HD', 'Tamil Music/Movie' and 'IPL HD' are a pleasure to watch. I totally disregard the 'Colors' and 'SunTV' channels, due to them being shown in a squeezed and incorrect aspect ratio. Personally I don't mind having spent my Rs 10,000 on this, for I find that 'Discovery HD', 'National Geographic HD' and 'Tamil Music/Movie' themselves make it worth it for me. Of course the 'IPL HD' will be gone in two days, thus for all practical purposes, there are only 'THREE' HD channels.

 

[psychotropic]

how is IPL HD? and 900 bucks a month sounds damn steep!

In all honesty, the fact is that I have found the SD channels on 'SunDirect HD' to be slightly better than the other DTH services I have seen. That is a different matter altogether that 'SunDirect HD' has the most expensive and rather stupid combination of channel packages on offer. First of all you do not get all the channels you want, specially no sports channels at all. NOw to get the channels you do want, you have to subscribe to them seperately. Which would be alright, except that the only way to get them is by subscribing to a group of channels and in case you want several channels, the same channels appear in different groups. Thus you end up having to pay for the same channel a multiple number of times. Since, they don't have any package which will give you all channels, like 'Airtel IPTV' and 'DISH TV' do, I tried to have them calculate for me what it would cost me to get the same channels that I get from 'Dish TV' for which I pay Rs 325/ pm. The total for the same channels on 'SunTV HD' ended up being close to Rs 900/- pm.
Of course the 'real' HD channels such as 'Discovery HD', 'National Geographic HD', 'Tamil Music/Movie' and 'IPL HD' are a pleasure to watch. I totally disregard the 'Colors' and 'SunTV' channels, due to them being shown in a squeezed and incorrect aspect ratio. Personally I don't mind having spent my Rs 10,000 on this, for I find that 'Discovery HD', 'National Geographic HD' and 'Tamil Music/Movie' themselves make it worth it for me. Of course the 'IPL HD' will be gone in two days, thus for all practical purposes, there are only 'THREE' HD channels.

 

[vktyagi]

I am using Sun HD for last 2-3 days.

Video quality is excellent of Discovery-HD, NGC-HD, IPL-HD. :clapping:

I have given audio from Sun STB to my Onkyo AVR through optical cable.

It skips the signal for a fraction of second which is very less noticeable if you listen the audio in the TV through HDMI. But in the Onkyo it is very disturbing as the AVR switches from Dolby to Stereo in absence of no signal even if it is for a fraction of second. The break on Onkyo is of 1 second. It makes listening audio in 5.1 in Onkyo almost impossible.

I also faced the similar problem, i.e. breaking of sound signals from Tatasky+ while connected through Digital Coaxial cable provide by Tatasky. Signals broke for a second or so when a light switch in the house was operated. Then I tried another cable which I received along-with a Philips DVD player. To my surprise, I am not detect the problem any more. It is apparent, the problem was due to poor quality of cable provided by Tatasky.
Try to solve the problem by replacing the cable.

 

[sanjay0864]

how is IPL HD? and 900 bucks a month sounds damn steep!

'IPL HD' is awesome, specially when compared to the regular, ad filled, crappy, over compressed, SD channel that we usually get. Although, I should point out that it is not 'truelly' ad free, since the IPL raw signal itself, includes three/four advertisements during the actual over. I don't fault 'SunDirect HD' for this, since it is not in their control, but it does make their "AD FREE' claim not entirely true. I must point out here, that even this excellent HD viewing experience, is spoilt to some extent by the 'huge' 'SunDirect HD' logo watermark that is superimposed on all the HD and 'FAKE', or shall I say 'PSEUDO' HD channels Strangely enough, as a major plus in my book, the SD channels on 'SunDirect HD' do not have any 'logo' watermark on them. In their infinte wisdom, it is only the 'premium' HD channels they have chosen to mar with their 'logo' watermark.

As for the 900 bucks per month. My solution to this is to keep just the package already included with the HD set-top box and subscribe to Airtel IPTV at Rs 200 pm for all the other channels. With IPTV I also get the option of watching programmes on 'time shift tv'. 'Time shift TV' is what Airtel calls their feature of having all programs for the last 7 days, of almost all major channels, on their server, which can be viewed at the customers convenience. This way I can watch programs without the Airtel logo watermark and also be able to fast forward all the ads.

 

[sanjay0864]

I also faced the similar problem, i.e. breaking of sound signals from Tatasky+ while connected through Digital Coaxial cable provide by Tatasky. Signals broke for a second or so when a light switch in the house was operated. Then I tried another cable which I received along-with a Philips DVD player. To my surprise, I am not detect the problem any more. It is apparent, the problem was due to poor quality of cable provided by Tatasky.
Try to solve the problem by replacing the cable.

Are you sure you mean 'Digital Coaxial' cable and not 'Optical' cable. This is not a problem that is generally associated with a coaxial cable, which is basically a standard composite cable with a RCA connector.

 

[sanjay0864]

very interesting. It's sad to see them do this, but I did watch the upscaled Sun TV through Sun HD in a store, and it looked excellent, of course this is in comparison to the horribly compressed images that we get from all the other DTH operators.

I agree with your assesment. The upscaled picture on both the pseudo HD channels, 'Sun TV' and 'Colors', although not of HD quality, definately looks much better than the same on the regular SD versions of those channels. But, unfortunately the technically incorrect decision by 'SunDirect HD Dth' to stretch the 4:3 aspect ratio to fill a 16:9 screen, makes the channels unviewable due to the totally distorted picture, atleast to me. This decision by 'SunDirect HD' is even more stupid, considering that anyone who wishes to fill their 16:9 screen, can simply do so by using the aspect ratio feature of their HD tv. Since the picture is already distoprted, there is nothing that viewers, who wish to watch an undistorted picture, can do to fix this. 'SunDirect HD' should simply upscale these channels but should maintain the original aspect ratio of the picture in their broadcast. This will allow the consumer to choose whether they wish to watch the picture in original aspect ratio or fill their 16:9 screens by stretching the picture.

 

[akj]

Sanjay,
I have a hard-copy of the SunDirect HD brochure, and in last page, bottom, it says: "** Certain channels are up scaled to HD"

I am not a troll or Sun Direct rep, but thought of pointing this out on reading your posts.

Btw, can you explain how you got the figure of Rs 900/pm. Tried to decode the packages from website, and am confused - Are the Jumbo/Metro addons or complete packages.

 

[akrish01]

Even more censorship.

Instead of responding, all above posts deleted by 'Sun Direct HD Dth'.

Good thing that you did not give them your smart card number etc. If you had given the details, they could have stopped signals being sent to your set top box. All the money that you invested in the set top box & the subscription would have gone down the drain & those fellows would have had you on your knees. This is a good lesson for everyone to learn from. Never divulge your details to the company if you feel that they're acting fishy.

regards

Arvind