[TelstraClear] HomeMedia PVR- Demonstrations available now.

Forums › One NZ (including Farmside) › [TelstraClear] HomeMedia PVR- Demonstrations available now.

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#328675 10-May-2010 19:24

lchiu7: I have 6 phones in the house. If I want to move to VoIP then I need to find a way to get the PAP2T or whatever connected at the demarc so all phones are coming off it. Then of course I need to get Internet to the PAP2T. I guess I will be sticking to POTS for a while.

Let me know if you ever want to move. That's not particularly difficult to do!

StarBlazer

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#328687 10-May-2010 20:03

amanzi:
amanzi: Sky will charge you $99 for installation but there is no minimum contract term. You can also sign up for MySky HDi through Harvey Norman and get free installation but then you're tied into a 12 month contact. Both options are better than TCL's 24 month contract!

I rang Sky today to enquire about signing up and was told that there is a 12 month minimum contract, despite the fact I had been told by another sales person that there was no minimum contract term. The lady I spoke to today said there were no special deals available or coming up soon.

I'm on hold to TCL now to enquire about cancelling my TV and phone service with them.

Okay - I've decided to go with Sky - rang them up (got through straight away) and it is being installed on Saturday. Okay I'm going over to the dark side - but just fed up with the whole thing.

Deal: $49 install MySkyHDi - minimum 12 month contract. Half price Sport and Movies for 6 months $43.50/month, free MySkyHDi box for 6 months and free HD ticket for 6 months. At the end of the 6 months, you select whatever package you want - I think the current minimum is $48/month + $15 for the HDi box and if you want to keep it $10 for HD.

EDIT: At the end of the 6 months you can give the HDi box back for $39 and go back to SD (as if!) and if you want to cancel completely $150. Straight forward and clear pricing!!

Now for the maths based on 1 year cost -
1. Do nothing keep paying for SD family package $405 + 2 months sport upgrade $33 = $492
2. Wait and upgrade to HDPVR $99 install + HD box $180 + above = $771
3. Get MySkyHDi $49 install + 6 months sport/movies/HDi box/HD Ticket $310 + 6 months family ($48) with HDi box $378 = $737

The equivalent to option 3 from TCL prices (best guess) is $950. TCL would have to practically give their boxes away to match that.

If you are interested, PM me and I will give you the name and phone number of Sky telesales - He's not sure how long he can keep the deal open (yeah, right!).

Procrastination eventually pays off.

amanzi

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#328966 11-May-2010 15:40

I just signed up for MySky too - getting it installed on Saturday with the same deal as StarBlazer.

I went into the TCL shop today to look at the box and I must admit that the picture looked beautiful on the big screen, and the EPG menus look really nice too. While we were watching the Sky Sports in HD the picture kept freezing every 15 seconds or so for about a second - the guy in the shop apologised and said it was still a bit buggy.

The interesting thing about the HD ticket pricing is that with TCL if you don't get the HD ticket you don't get any channels in HD. But with MySky HDi, if you don't get the HD ticket, you still get TV1, TV2, TV3 in HD. So with MySky HDi you only need the HD ticket if you want Sports or Movies in HD.

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#328987 11-May-2010 16:05

amanzi:
The interesting thing about the HD ticket pricing is that with TCL if you don't get the HD ticket you don't get any channels in HD. But with MySky HDi, if you don't get the HD ticket, you still get TV1, TV2, TV3 in HD. So with MySky HDi you only need the HD ticket if you want Sports or Movies in HD.

I didnt like that either. These are free to air HD channels, and they shouldnt be charging extra to get them in HD.

ZollyMonsta

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#328993 11-May-2010 16:16

The interesting thing about the HD ticket pricing is that with TCL if you don't get the HD ticket you don't get any channels in HD. But with MySky HDi, if you don't get the HD ticket, you still get TV1, TV2, TV3 in HD. So with MySky HDi you only need the HD ticket if you want Sports or Movies in HD.

Completely wrong.

TV1, TV2 and TV3 in HD comes standard on TCL. HD Ticket is required if you want Sky Movies and Sports in HD

Check out my LPFM Radio Station at www.thecheese.co.nz - Now on iHeart Radio, TuneIn and Radio Garden

As per the usual std disclaimer.. "All thoughts typed here are my own."

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#328997 11-May-2010 16:22

ZollyMonsta:

The interesting thing about the HD ticket pricing is that with TCL if you don't get the HD ticket you don't get any channels in HD. But with MySky HDi, if you don't get the HD ticket, you still get TV1, TV2, TV3 in HD. So with MySky HDi you only need the HD ticket if you want Sports or Movies in HD.

Completely wrong.

TV1, TV2 and TV3 in HD comes standard on TCL. HD Ticket is required if you want Sky Movies and Sports in HD

Ah good. You might want to make it clear to the staff in store doing the demos. I explicitly asked about this and they said the HD ticket would be required for TV1/2/3 in HD.

Samsung

Shop now on Samsung phones, tablets, TVs and more (affiliate link).

amanzi

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#329005 11-May-2010 16:47

ZollyMonsta: Completely wrong.

TV1, TV2 and TV3 in HD comes standard on TCL. HD Ticket is required if you want Sky Movies and Sports in HD

Well either you're wrong or the guy in the shop is wrong, I don't know. The way he showed it to me seemed to make sense though - all the HD channels were grouped together starting at channel 901 (901 = TV1 HD, 902 = TV2 HD, etc) and he said that to get the HD channels you needed to pay for the HD ticket. I double-checked with him on that point and he definitely said that TV1, TV2, TV3 would be in standard definition if you didn't have the HD ticket. That was the tipping point for me and now I'm a MySky HDi subscriber.

kiwipawl

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#329006 11-May-2010 16:50

How about some one from TCL for whom this forum was setup for, commenting on this to clear it up?

amanzi

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#329009 11-May-2010 16:57

The other question for TCL to clear up is whether or not you have to sign up for a 24 month contract. I asked the guy in the shop but either he wouldn't comment or he didn't know for sure.

StarBlazer

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#329011 11-May-2010 17:05

amanzi: The other question for TCL to clear up is whether or not you have to sign up for a 24 month contract. I asked the guy in the shop but either he wouldn't comment or he didn't know for sure.

I had a look on the TCL website last night (before signing up for Sky) and found the following link. It looks like as standard their contracts are 24 months. The important question is what is the early termination fee.

I would also ask what they consider to be a reasonable reason for terminating a contract without charge - such as buggy box/software, power failures, lockouts and unreasonable length of time to replace/repair.

This is not trolling - these are the real problems that the box is suffering in its alpha phase - as reported both by TCL and Stuff/Dom Post!

Procrastination eventually pays off.

mulac

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#329496 12-May-2010 19:04

So now we just sit and wait for an answer/update from TelstraClear... Still...

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kiwidoc

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#330581 16-May-2010 10:26

All this talk of the STB. Given that a lot of people on this fourm will have HTPC's, shouldn't we be getting pressure on for cablecard? Here's a link to a 4 channel HD cablecard. The resoonse I hhad from TCL alo below. I really don't want another box, and I'm very happy with one rempte and one interface to rule them all. (ie various iterations of windows mediacentre, now up to W7 and its really good!).

From TCL:
'Thank you for your email. At this stage the only way for TelstraClear to bring you HD TV is through our T Box Decoders. I have passed on your link to the appropriate team.'

http://www.cetoncorp.com/products.php

Anyone know what the tech specs are for the TCL service?
Would it work with the cetons specs as below:

The Ceton InfiniTV 4 includes the following technical capabilities:

Four, dual ATSC/QAM 64/256 tuners

CableCARD M-Card DRM Processor

Open Cable Unidirectional Receiver Specification - OC-SP-OCUR-I08-081114

Digital Receiver Interface Specification - OC-SP-DRI-I03-090206

CableCARD Copy Protection 2.0 Specification - OC-SP-CCCP2.0-I10-090904

CableCARD Interface 2.0 Specification - OC-SP-CCIF2.0-I20-091211

Digital Cable Network Interface Standard - ANSI/SCTE 40 2004

(top of page)

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#330588 16-May-2010 11:09

kiwidoc: All this talk of the STB. Given that a lot of people on this fourm will have HTPC's, shouldn't we be getting pressure on for cablecard? Here's a link to a 4 channel HD cablecard. The resoonse I hhad from TCL alo below. I really don't want another box, and I'm very happy with one rempte and one interface to rule them all. (ie various iterations of windows mediacentre, now up to W7 and its really good!).

From TCL:
'Thank you for your email. At this stage the only way for TelstraClear to bring you HD TV is through our T Box Decoders. I have passed on your link to the appropriate team.'

http://www.cetoncorp.com/products.php

Anyone know what the tech specs are for the TCL service?
Would it work with the cetons specs as below:

The Ceton InfiniTV 4 includes the following technical capabilities:

Actually, the US is far behind the rest of the world for this stuff. They're only just starting to make progress on PC capture cards with cablecard support. The equivalent of cablecard already exists for the DVB part of the world, and works fine with the TelstraClears cable systems.

You can get any DVB-C capture device, with CI slot, and Irdeto CAM, and it'll work fine with your TelstraClear smartcard.

For example, a card like this: http://cdn1.afterdawn.fi/hardware/standard/259.jpg

and Irdeto CAM like this: http://www.ultrapower.co.nz/images/NIPC904505_fr_1.jpg

The CAMs dont typically decode 4 channels, but other than that, its the same sort of technology. TCL wont rent you a smartcard, but the smartcard from the STB works fine.

That said, that'll get you all the channels available today, but it wont give you the handful of new HD channels, which use a different encryption system (a CAM may exist though).

sbiddle

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#330590 16-May-2010 11:25

As sub pointed out Cablecard is nothing new. There are plenty plenty of ways of using 3rd party hardware to watch TCL cable & Sky TV and to build a HTPC that allows access to the DVB-C and DVB-S streams. There are also plenty of people doing this right now with Sky & TCL cable. All you need is a DVB-C/DVB-S card and a card reader.

You will however only be able to access TCL's existing irdeto channels. All new HD channels don't use a card and the subscription is tied back to the box. Cards are very much on their way out for Pay TV providers since they have been totally compromised by people using card sharing and very few effective ways to totally prevent this.

KiwiRover

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#331087 17-May-2010 21:39

StarBlazer:

If you are interested, PM me and I will give you the name and phone number of Sky telesales - He's not sure how long he can keep the deal open (yeah, right!).

Thanks StarBlazer just got off the phone with your guy and he has set me up to be installed on Thursday. With a deal I couldn't find anywhere else, not even when I asked a Sky supervisor for it.

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