Unscrambled advice
With so many DTH varying for you to choose, how do you choose?
Recently in some areas in Mumbai, customers have a choice when it comes to basic utility service providers. Even when it come to their electric supply, which has long been public sector controlled been public sector controlled, consumer can choose between two providers, and how many are exercising that new found freedom. So when it comes to cable TV entertainment, naturally we will tend to be pickier. With several new entrants in the market, the already crowded direct to Home (DTH) space none has more than enough contenders: namely, Dish TV, Tata sky, Big TV, Airtel digital, sun Direct and Videocon d2h. The battle is getting fierce, while the consumer is spoilt for choice, who’s complaining?
More choice means more confusion. So many plans- how does one choose?
It is so overwhelming sometimes that we wouldn’t mind hiring a consultant to spew out a solution suited for needs. There are various factors one needs to consider when making a choice about DTH providers. First, there is a question of whether a cable set-top-box is sufficient for you. Next, when you have decided to go in for DTH, there are various factors one needs to consider like picture quality, transmission during rough weather, how suitable are the package bouquets, pricing and of course, value added services.
Since the services are dependent on signal strength, geographically variances have to be considered. If a particular provider has excellent representation in one area it may not necessary be the same elsewhere.
When it comes to choosing DTH providers, some go strictly by price – the cheapest being the default winner. But most people go by what their friends and relatives have to say. The various communities felt about the various players out there. An online survey was conducted where it was asked to rate their DTH service on each of the parameters mentioned.
The DTH story
DTH can be defined simply by the transmission mode by satellite TV programming can be received at home. It began in India, a few years ago, with Dish TV who was awarded the country’s first DTH license in 2003 and began in operation in 2004. DTH is the primary alternative if you don’t want to depend on local cable operators, who, let’s face it, have a lots of problem when it comes o service delivery. Tier 2 and 3 towns frequently face cable TV outages and breakdowns and service is not dependable. Since DTH signals come directly from broadcast satellite to the consumer’s dish, it can reach remote places. With the wide spread implementation of CAS (conditional access system) throughout the country. DTH is a good alternative. As of now, there are primarily six main players in this space with Videocon being the youngest entrant. Each player has more popularity in certain zones. For instance, sun with its bouquet of south Indian channels is strong in the south Indian channels is strong in south. As of late 2008, DISH TV had about 59 % market share followed by Tatasky. But within three months of its launch, Reliance BIG TV gained 15 percent of share.
Key parameters
In the current scenario, DTH players are offering a host of services to attract consumer attention. Here are the some of the features you should consider before you decide which service provider you would opt for, from the ever growing list.
Picture quality - A DTH service is only as good as the picture quality you get. Some players offer MPEG4 picture quality. While other offer DVD quality digital transmission. A newer standard is the MPEG3 with DVB-S2 which stands for Digital Video Broadcasting – second generation. This standard was developed at about the same time as the H.264 video codec for HD quality, but it has to be implemented. It also allows for enhanced interactive services with access to the internet. Only the outgoing data needs to be sent by other transmission methods. Currently, going by information on their websites, only Airtel and Videocon offer MPEG4 with DVB-2.
Packages - Each DTH provider has packages with channels bundled together. This seems unfair since you should be able to pay only those channels that you want. But it’s a small price to pay for digital quality and value added services.
The base pack of almost every provider contains free-to-air channels and a few other channels thrown in. The first level of categorization in packages happens in to two large geographies – south-specific packages and rest of India packages. Some providers like Tatasky schemes are structured in a way that you can add other add-on packages to the base pack to make it more comprehensive. Other has fixed plans according to different prices of the packages. Dish TV. For examples has plans such as silver, Gold, Platinum. In addition to these, providers allow you to add channels a la carte (order on an itemized basis). For instance there may be a movies a la carte add-on that will activate few foreign movie channels. Almost each DTH provider has special packs for the southern region that has packs specially designed to include regional language channels. Another option is the all encompassing package. In such a package, DTH providers will give you all channels available for a lump sum amount. These packs are given grandiose names such as mega pack or titanium packages. On an average, the monthly charges for such a mega packs come to about Rs. 350. Depending on the providers they will even throw in a couple of free movies on demand and perhaps access to active services. The mega packs gives the most value for money when it comes to a price per channel. However, if you don’t want to go for jumbo schemes, you need to prioritize, which channel are most important. The simplest way to do this is to make a list of the channels you want, and go ahead with the service or package that gives you most of them for that least amount. While looking at a purchase decision, the number channels offered is not as important as the relevance of those channels and whether you are getting the desired combination in a pack. There are even interesting entry offer by the DTH which include the cost of installation and the hardware. In the entry offers, these providers bundle a particular package for free in the initial months. To make sure you are getting your desired channels, its best to look through listings on the provider’s web site and brochure carefully.
User interface - User interface is important. You will be using it to interact with your service. The electronic programming guide (EPG) help you navigate through all programs you can watch. Some EPGs allows you to narrow down channels as per genre. Big TV’s guide, for example allows you to reorder channels alphabetically or as per numbers. Videocon offers the interface in multiple languages and allows you to customize the on-screen display to a certain extent. The more user-friendly the interface the better, the interface should let you access a lot of information in a comprehensive manner.
There are several things that go in to this – brief write up available about upcoming programs how far ahead does it guide show updates, does the guide show what is currently playing preview, and soon.
Movies on demand - With DTH comes the added advantages of playing movies on demand. There are specific channels where movies play at scheduled start times.
These schedules can be accessed through the service interface or some DTH operators even put it up on their websites. It’s important to note here that the number of channels showing movies on demand is not as important as kind of movies. Some players source latest content. While other show movies that are not as recent.
Interactive services - Many providers with exception of Sun Direct offer interactive services. These services let you interact with the TV. For example, while watching a cooking show, there may be a pop up which says press the red button to see other such recipes.
Widget based data - Some DTH providers such as Dish source content from online sources like matrimonial or job services. Others like Airtel allow you to set up widgets that give information and news snippets, weather, stock updates breaking news in the press of a button without moving away from the main screen.
Survey findings
The survey asked to rate their DTH service on a scale of 1 to 5 on a few parameters, Such as picture quality, overall reception quality, package composition and structuring. Pricing and value Added services. They were even asked to comment on specifics that appeal to them as users and their thoughts while choosing a particular DTH provider. BIG Dish and Airtel received the highest number of votes for being chosen based on pricing.
It also got clear that which services are more popular. As expected, TataSky was the most popular and formed the largest part of the respondents. It receives good rating on picture quality, but scored lowest on pricing and package structure. The highest average rating for picture quality went to BIG TV, followed closely by Airtel received the highest user rating for packet pricing. Since Videocon is the newest entrant in this space, it received very few votes to be considered on the comparison of specific parameters.
The survey also revealed some secondary findings as well. About 60 percent of the respondents who took the survey were DTH, while 20 percent were on regular cable. Cable set-top boxes were preferred by 17 per cent of the respondents. About 73 per cent of the respondents still own regular CRT TV’s while 15 percent have HD ready and 11 percent have HD ready and 11 per cent have full HD LCD’s.
TataSky - Tatasky has been around for quite some time. Among other things, Tatasky provides customers with 24*7 supports in 11 languages. Their channel packages seem to be tad on the more expensive side. However, they have the maximum number of interactive services – many of which very promising and are directly are kids. Tatasky seems to be most trusted of the lot. It has good service and the “Tata quality”. But since it is the most popular it got a lot of criticism as well. A few complained the interface is slow. TataSky even after many software updates seems to be slow and hangs couple of time. However on the positive side, their customer service is good, its customer support is also very responsive and supportive.
Airtel Digital - With its Saif and Kareena campaigns, Airtel seems to be going places. The DTH providers have armed itself with a lot of innovative interactive services and some exclusive features such as a Universal remote. Choose Airtel for universal remote and customer service. On the interactive front, Airtel has some interesting innovations. With their iNet features, customers can get updates on the latest news, stocks from the portfolio, Bollywood gossips and the latest news, stocks from their portfolio, and the latest weather with widgets. Airtel have partnered with NDTV for news widgets and CNBC for stocks. As the plan, the structure is decent. If say you are a music buff, you could go in for base pack of 110 channels for Rs.127 and go in for music top up for Rs.25, which has a few channels and World space radio thrown in.
Dish TV - Dish is the oldest DTH provider around. You can access content from shaadi.com and search for potential partners through the Shaadi Active service. The content is not live but updated every week. Similarly you can access content from monster.com and ICICI bank.
As for packages, they have got three packages that cover an assortment of everything. While a la carte channels can be ordered as per preference. The packages are good however he adds bur poor reception during rainy days.
Big TV - Big has been quite big on user-based score charts. It scores high in picture quality, thanks to MPEG4. It also has good start-up plans, with three months subscription clubbed with the hardware cost. BIG is focusing heavily on pay-per-view movies, but couldn’t find any interesting titles playing. “Big TV has its issues but it does provide with many options. There are more channels, in more languages (and in the original languages) and the picture quality is definitely better. And it is reasonably priced.
Sun Direct - Sun has a strong presence in south. It also has packs for other regions and languages. This way, you can opt for the Marathi pack (depending on your language) if you are from Maharashtra.
Videocon d2h - Videocon combined its electronics and consumer goods background to bundle LCD TV’s and DVD players within built DTH receivers. They have ever come up with DVD players that have in built DTH. It also has some interesting features on interface. For example - A 12 picture in picture mosaic to browse channels rather than using the EPG. It also has tickers for stock, cricket and news updates that form an overlay over the programming being viewed. Their packages are decent but as per the website information even their Diamond pack which is their highest end offering needs an English movies add on priced at Rs.25 to make it complete. Like sun direct, Videocon d2h also has packs for every region.
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