Sky or Virgin?
 

I am incensed that the BBC has sold off yet another top program, namely Madmen, to Sky. If there is one program I have considered worth watching over the past four years, then this has been it. The question now arises as to whether we should upgrade from Freeview (which is dominated by adverts and an increasing amount of subscipted blue rubbish) to Sky or Virgin, both of which offer reasonably priced packages. I enjoy my cricket and motor sports, but am not particularly into football and my better half loves to watch tennis, so we would therefore appreciate advice from both camps.

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

You would need to check if Virgin is available in your area first, cabled areas only, Sky is available to everyone.

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

I've had Sky for twenty years Stumped, but I've always had the full monty, mind you TV is my only entertainment apart from Accy Web

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

Yes, we are cabled, hence my indecision as to which would be the better option.

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

VIRGIN defoooooo & they wil more than likely be in your area....

free installation...

tv 'on demand' (pause record tv etc)

and top factor - EXCELLENT CUSTOMER SERVICES :)

(and they do sky sports packages for the boys)

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

ps i have found sky are absolutley shocking when it comes to customer services

i once spent 25 mins on hold on a 0870.....

wasnt happy

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

We have been with NTL and then Virgin after the takeover for 9 years now and never had a problem with them.
There response if you do have a problem is very good too,we had the house fronts done up by the council under the regeneration scheme the firm that was doing it cut through my broadband and tv cable i got in touch with virgin and they where there within a few hours and did a good job.
also if you do go with virgin get a friend who has virgin to recommend you to them after its been installed your friend will get £30 off his bill:D
I have done this 3 times upto now.

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

I've been with Sky for 20 years and never had any trouble at all, I also have Sky Protect and their services is second to none

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

What is Sky protect? Sounds like one of those dodgy insurance schemes.


Sky is a good second best for people who cant get Virgin.

You get better services with Virgin like on demand that works and you can watch what you want not what sky want you to watch

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

If you have HD you now get Anytime+ where you can choose other programming that is downloaded over your Internet connection to the box for watching later...

I've been with SKY for years and like Jaysay never had any issues. I dont have teh option of cable where I live and terrestrial TV is pretty much impossible to get.

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

Like I said Sky is a good second best.

We like to sit down together and just watch what we want to and forgot to record. We dont want to have to ask them to download it for later, we want to watch it straight away which you can with Virgin.

The download and watch later will be painful on a slow internet connection I would have thought.

With Virgin they have access to fast broadband so can stream it live.

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

Sky protect is their own insurance system against breakdown Neil, Its virtually the next day service, I used them twice late on last year, the first time they replaced the dish because my multi room was playing up, the second time my HD box wasn't recording properly they turned out next day checked it out and replaced it with the latest model, with twice the hard drive of my old one, I can now record about 200 hours of programs

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

It downloads instantly Niel, I use Sky Anytime on a regulare basis especially for films usually watch one every saturfday night, if you record of mormal programs its easy too, I regually record two programs at once at night when I'm watching TV in my bedroom

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

I assume you pay for that service. With Virgin you don't own the equipment so they fix/replace if faulty for no extra charge.

I do think that the Sky EPG is the best in the world, I used to be into satellite so have seen a few.

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

Kept me happy for 20 years, and when my father was alive he have Cable and they treated him really shoddily, he changed to Sky and was quite happy from then on

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

Stumped mate, the big problem is this. Mad Men will be shown on Sky's new channel, Sky Atlantic HD. Will this be available on Virgin? Sky's website does not say it will or won't.
Tread carefully.

That said have had both Cable (NTL) and Sky I do prefer SKY and never had any problems.

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

If you read this you will find out that the BBC have sold nothing, it was never a BBC made program but a US import that they can not afford anymore

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

Had Sky installed today. Although the engineer tried to explain it to me, it will probably take me an age to work out how to use the zapper!

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

You'll pick it up in no time Stumped, If I can use one anybody can:D

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

Thanks, Jaysay. My geek grandson came round to show me the ropes so, up to press, everything seems shipshape and Bristol Fashion.

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

Sky+ functionality is an absolute god send and you will wonder how you managed before it....

just remember you can fast forward teh adverts to catch up if you are a little bit "behind" teh real time

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

I watch recorded programs every afternoon entwisi, it tales 45 minutes or less to play back a 1hr recording, 15 minutes of ads every hour, gone in seconds:D

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

It wont be long before sky stop you forwarding past the adverts. Its not in there interests to allow you to.

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

problem is how do they differentiate between you forwarding the content or the ads.

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

come on I dont need to explain that to you, they just add something in the datastream only while the ads are on so they can prevent fast forwarding.

When it happens remember I told you first :D

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

Defeats the object, why would you want to fast forward if not to get rid of adverts, I think if they were going to attempt to do anything they'd have done it before now, Sky plus has only been in operation 10 years:rolleyes:

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

Its easy to do and I think the advertiser will demand it eventually.

I remember back in the days of video tapes, around the time they introduced bar codes and number codes for selecting programs, they could 'skip' the ads in the programming didn't last long before the advertisers stopped it.
So if the codes were there then, I'm sure they are there now.

Re: Sky or Virgin?
 

be a bitch, but i can get by, always used to use the mute button before we got it.:D