Whose Sky is it anyway ?
My uncle didn’t like the local cable operator. So, he switched to TATA Sky. We both analyzed Dish TV and TATA Sky before we made the deal, and found there wasnt much difference between the two, and hence decided to go by the most “Catchy- Name” and “Neat-logo”.
TATA Sky operates from Hyderabad for South-Indian services. But they dont buy time for that. Installation was in a matter of two days. It costed Rs. 3999 for the initial installation and registration. The engineers (very professional guys) come in and install it in a giffy ! There’s a cute little Dish sitting on the top of your house watching the sky.
This brings TATA Sky into your living room. I know STBs and Dish TV offer quality clarity, but I feel TATA Sky beats them all. Semma clarity. With that clarity you’d love to watch any program.
Currently they are offering 100+ channels. But the sad part is Sun TV isnt one of them. Chennai wouldnt care to buy a Television package if it doesnt have Sun TV in it. In Tamil Nadu we dont call it Satellite TV connection.. we call it “Sun TV Connection”. Thats the popularity of Sun TV and a package without that is never going to get successful in the market. But my uncle says TATA Sky is soon going to add sun TV as well. Paarpom !
With Chennai’s affordability increasing exponentially, we would hear voices in the air.. “Why should I entertain rowdy cable operators, when a branded service provider offers me professional service and quality transmission ? Even if it costs me some extra money, i think it is worth it”.
Yet, there are very few number of people who wouldnt go in for it. Because, they are already watching the free channels for Rs. 100. They wouldnt want to pay a huge installation fee and Rs. 200 per month for more channels.
There’s a lot of features that may attract. You get the schedules of programs. You get to categorize the channels, and browse through them in that order. Auto program On and Timer for programs. And there’s this multiple cameras for Cricket. On demand score card and other things that fascinate the cricket viewers.
What do you think ? Whats the future of televsion service providers like these ? Let us know !
Did you know that Sun TV is going pay from Dec 2nd?
Keerthi, most cable operators are rogues no doubt. I had a big fight with them last month and they are so so apathetic when their business runs because of us.
Though the idea of having a dish is good, the fee seems too high. And if the channels are “free-to-air”, then there should be no reason why they should charge so high. And its also very unreasonable that many channels, inspite of having considerable ad patronage resort to making it a pay channel and that too exhorbitant rates!
Am not sure what Ravi means by high. I have the local cable guy and TATA SKY — for obvious reasons. It still works alright cost wise.
An important point to note on TATA Sky — when the Monsoon gets really furious, the S/N ratio goes too low and you don’t get to see anything. So, apart from the fact that we need SUN TV, another reason to have the local cable is for uninterrupted TV during heavy rains.
The reason why Sun TV is not available on TATA Sky is because of the impending launch of Sun’s DTH service – “Sun Direct TV”.
Sun TV is trying hard not to be available on TATA platform until its own DTH rollout begins, which has been delayed as the recent INSAT-4C launch failed.
A large part of Chennai does not get any sports channels; only when SCV feels generous during major events such as the FIFA World Cup or ICC Champions Trophy, do we get to see some sports. Tata Sky should free people from all this.
I think this is one of the best things to happen for the Chennai-vaasis w.r.t TV. The devil-may-care attitude of the cable operators is just growing by leaps and bounds. As you rightly pointed out, with increasing affordability, DTH is here to stay. SunTV as a channel isn’t going away anytime soon,’pay’ or ‘no pay’. My only concern is whether SCV will show its clout with high switching costs and make it unappealing to the consumer to try DTH.
I’m also considering the Tata Sky option. I’ll have SCV too. But what about hardware compatibility? Will Tata Sky work on old TVs?
Hey guys, forget about sun tv. The younger generation is not for entertainment tv like Sun TV. I feel they are more into sci fiction tv’s of US , speciality sports like dedicated cricket,soccer and theme tv channels. That is the way it should be like in Western countries rather than the stupid film based programmes and daily boring serials.
Ganesh
I am a tad concerned about how these dishes will fare in the face of heavy rains/storms? I remember someone saying that the sig./noise ratio gets really bad; have others experienced this?
Keerthivasan – Good post. I dont know how many of you noticed this.. I went ahead reading the post only after seeing the image – I could see Venu Arvind in Selvi in one of the pics and thinking that Sun has finally been netted by Tata Sky ,went ahead to read the post .. hahaha