Tata Sky to launch HDTV This Year

[dgtl887]

Tata Sky to launch HDTV, more interactive channels this year- Electronics-Cons. Products-News By Industry-News-The Economic Times

Looking at having a bigger share in the seven-player DTH market in the country, Tata Sky said it will undertake various initiatives
this year that include rolling out high definition (HD) services and launching more interactive channels.

The company will launch its HD service this year, ahead of Commonwealth Games to be held in October 2010. It will also introduce interactive channels in the gaming and education space.

Besides, it plans to push personal video recorder (PVR) set-top boxes which is witnessing an increasing demand by families trying to keep up with their favourite, but overlapping, shows.

Tata Sky is placed third in the seven-player market with competitors like Dish TV, Sun Direct, Airtel Digital, Reliance Big, DD Direct and now Videocon D2H.

"Every DTH operator today is offering almost the same channels at competitive pricing. It will be the interactive services and the additional features that would help differentiate between the operators," Tata Sky Chief Marketing Officer Vikram Mehra told PTI.

Mehra added that the country is ready for new technologies in TV viewing and that the company would launch its HD service this year.

The HD market is expected to be big with many consumer durable companies like Samsung, LG and Sony launching full HD televisions.

This is really great news. Hopefully enough HD channels will be included and it wont be ridiculously priced.

 

[sam9s]

....and they have some benifits for the existing subscribers......

 

[danccc]

And wishing they come up with a larger capacity PVR bundled.

 

[anm]

actually, it is the reverse practice I have witnessed. If you are an existing customer, no one gives a f*** about you. Everyone wants new customers. Ensure that the old customer is screwed when he decides to make a switch.

Bank home loan rate is another glaring example.

....and they have some benifits for the existing subscribers......

 

[teky]

actually, it is the reverse practice I have witnessed. If you are an existing customer, no one gives a f*** about you. Everyone wants new customers. Ensure that the old customer is screwed when he decides to make a switch.

Bank home loan rate is another glaring example.

Completely agree with you there anm. Sky HD in the UK has similar story, so can expect the same from TS. Early adopters will always need to pay the premium, But I'm atleast happy that there are companies seriously thinking about HD.

 

[sanjay0864]

How many times will these companies 'cry wolf'? Tata-Sky has been claiming that they will be launching HD services soon, since 2007.

 

[deba]

Good News and this time it seems somthing is going to happen before the Commonwealth games this year.
Still remember how color television set was introduced before the 1982 Asian Games.
)

 

[deba]

This is really great news. Hopefully enough HD channels will be included and it wont be ridiculously priced.

Price is the only enemy of HD - be it Blu Ray or DTH.......:sad:

 

[corElement]

Price isnt the enemy, greedy people who get away charging international prices to the indian people who blindly pay more than the international level for a much inferior product are.

They're all a bunch of swindlers, look at the internet. Every year the mbps almost doubles in other countries, in india the definition of broadband is still 256kbps and they market 2mbps saying free 100mb download.

I spit on the people who do all this and curb progress of the country. Pathetic.

 

[saikatroy]

now, how will they provide hd support with the existing STB for Tatasky (I do not know whether HDMI is available in even Tatasky plus)

 

[psychotropic]

it's not.....but component is....good for 720p/1080i which is what most HD broadcasts are i understand.

(I do not know whether HDMI is available in even Tatasky plus)

 

[deba]

Price isnt the enemy, greedy people who get away charging international prices to the indian people who blindly pay more than the international level for a much inferior product are.

They're all a bunch of swindlers, look at the internet. Every year the mbps almost doubles in other countries, in india the definition of broadband is still 256kbps and they market 2mbps saying free 100mb download.

I spit on the people who do all this and curb progress of the country. Pathetic.

Correct , In our Country the dealer and manufacturer earns the highest margin in selling a product....and because of total collapse of consumer law in our country we consumers end up paying more........

Just compare the prices of blu ray decks in India and USA......God !! we pay almost three times more.....

 

[dgtl887]

Price isnt the enemy, greedy people who get away charging international prices to the indian people who blindly pay more than the international level for a much inferior product are.

They're all a bunch of swindlers, look at the internet.

That's true. The first time I saw BIG TV, I was really surprised to find that they had their logo along with the channel's logo on the screen. Apparently, it's the same with Sun HD. Is this normal practice ?

Regardless, I'm happy the ball's rolling (and I don't count Sun HD). As long as their prices are reasonable and there are a decent number of channels included, I'm in.

 

[sqvare]

Price isnt the enemy, greedy people who get away charging international prices to the indian people who blindly pay more than the international level for a much inferior product are.

They're all a bunch of swindlers, look at the internet. Every year the mbps almost doubles in other countries, in india the definition of broadband is still 256kbps and they market 2mbps saying free 100mb download.

I spit on the people who do all this and curb progress of the country. Pathetic.

And one of the biggest cons is forcing us idiots to buy 200-channel packages when all we want is 25-30 selected channels. Daylight robbery

I think TRAI made some proud pronouncement a couple of years ago of regulations that would protect the consumer from this extortionist bouquet-pushing, but it quietly died, ignored by all. I guess it needs someone with clout to push the issue!

Hathway, on the other hand, makes you choose a basic bouquet, but then allows you to subscribe per channel, or to group channels that you select, provided you subscribe annually. Works out significantly cheaper, specially for >1 TV, but has other issues Hathway single-channel audio

 

[dgtl887]

Ericsson wins TataSky HD biz | News - Rapid TV News

Tata Sky, the Indian DTH operator, has signed with Ericsson (formerly Tandberg Television) to equip its head-end for HD transmission.

Ericsson says the new service will serve 5m homes. The Ericsson solution achieves dramatic bandwidth savings. With bandwidth being such a vital commodity when launching HD services, the savings that are achieved through Ericssons EN8190 MPEG-4 encoder are extremely valuable to operators. Tata Sky has also deployed Ericssons EN8100 MPEG-2 SD encoder, which has enabled it to increase its SD channel capacity without the need for swap-out of legacy MPEG-2 consumer set-top boxes (STBs).

With Ericssons head-end, we have an advanced solution that dramatically increases the number of channels our subscribers can receive, as well as enabling us to now offer high definition programming to enhance the viewing experience, said Yigs Riza, CTO at Tata Sky.

 

[senthilsss]

Ericsson wins TataSky HD biz | News - Rapid TV News

Great news! :clapping:

However, I believe we need to change the current TS+ STB as it does not have Ericssons EN8190 MPEG-4 encoder which is required for HD transmission.

 

[vin_eme]

Well the encoder is at the HEAD-END part [At the transmission end]. All our STBs are MPEG-4 enabled. So we need not do anything at our end. We will be able to recv the HD signals.

~Vince

 

[teky]

Well the encoder is at the HEAD-END part [At the transmission end]. All our STBs are MPEG-4 enabled. So we need not do anything at our end. We will be able to recv the HD signals.

~Vince

I thought the STB boxes don't come with a HDMI port and even if existing Box is compatible don't expect TS to allow you use that. They want to extract every single paisa out of us the first adapters.

 

[senthilsss]

Well the encoder is at the HEAD-END part [At the transmission end]. All our STBs are MPEG-4 enabled. So we need not do anything at our end. We will be able to recv the HD signals.

~Vince

Pardon my ignorance. Thanks for the clarification!

 

[senthilsss]

I thought the STB boxes don't come with a HDMI port and even if existing Box is compatible don't expect TS to allow you use that. They want to extract every single paisa out of us the first adapters.

TS+ comes with Component Video output which is capable of transmitting HD signals. Somebody can correct me if I am wrong.