Why are Irish channels not FTA on satellite ?

ED E

lertsnim wrote: »

And that is why IPTV isn't going to be the norm for a long time yet.

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

Even with decent broadband you would get hit with the cap/FUP that we see presently.

In any case I do not want to change to IPTV .... the Satellite is much better IMO.

What broadband would be needed for 5 people in the household watching HD TV? ...... none if you have a Satellite

Its called multicast, you can google it. For live content there's no traffic counted against caps.

GPON and Docsis3.1 will allow IPTV to dominate within 5-7. Sky? IPTV. VM? IPTV. Eir? IPTV. Vod? IPTV.

lertsnim

Every home in the whole of the UK and Ireland will have access to that?

Johnboy1951

ED E wrote: »

Its called multicast, you can google it. For live content there's no traffic counted against caps.

Yeah?
I can get FTA Satellite equivalent TV via broadband without the ISP counting it against the broadband cap?

GPON and Docsis3.1 will allow IPTV to dominate within 5-7. Sky? IPTV. VM? IPTV. Eir? IPTV. Vod? IPTV.

So what you imply is that all FTA TV will disappear and will only be available via a subscription to some provider?
I am fairly sure the likes of Sky, VM, Eir and others will not provide such a service without subscription.

STB.

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

Yeah?
So what you imply is that all FTA TV will disappear and will only be available via a subscription to some provider?
I am fairly sure the likes of Sky, VM, Eir and others will not provide such a service without subscription.

Its for this reason that those predicting the implementation of IPTV as a primary delivery method for Irish TV within 5 years is complete nonsense.

In 10 years it may be looked at closer, but as it is the legislation is written that RTE must provide the services FTA. Same with TG4/3 etc.

DVB-T will remain in the mean time.

dubrov

Bandwidth already isn't an issue in populated areas. Virgin's base package is 240Mbps with 500GB fair usage. This would be more than enough to run multiple TVs.

I think IPTV will allow TV to be more customisable.
As in, you would have a set top box and subscribe to the services you wish to use.
Multiple IPTV services could be accessed on a single set top box.
RTE's service would be free to subscribe to and would probably have some sort of geo-lock applied.
I can see broadband providers bundling IPTV as a free addon.

DVB-T will still remain for years after IPTV takes over but usage will decline rapidly.

ED E

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

So what you imply is that all FTA TV will disappear and will only be available via a subscription to some provider?
I am fairly sure the likes of Sky, VM, Eir and others will not provide such a service without subscription.

Nope, never said that. Countering "IPTV isn't going to be the norm for a long time yet."

Sats will have their place but RF spectrum is limited and becoming more and more scarce. TV broadcasts wont be allocated double or triple the current band plan to account for increased bitrates and res's. The growth will be over the fixed line networks while FTA slowly goes the way of Analogue bcasts.

Update:
The real reason why IPTV matters is ads. An FTA box can, but doesnt have to, be online. All IPTV boxes are online in their nature. That means the networks can report exact watch times. Watch times = money.

The Cush

Traditional broadcast TV will be around for many years to come, terrestrial TV has been guaranteed its remaining spectrum until at least the end of 2030 under new legislation.

But, I believe we are at the beginning of a transition to a IP delivered future. We see OTT services like Saorview Connect, Freeview Play arriving for non-linear TV/services from linear TV providers.

Sky recently announcing its SkyQ service will be available without a dish from next year but way too early for a complete transition

“The debate over whether satellite will be replaced by TV over broadband (both IPTV and OTT) is being put too crudely. We have explained that, for the foreseeable future, satellite will remain the most cost efficient & practical means to deliver mass reach channels of over 2 million simultaneous viewers. Major pay-TV platforms will not be turning off satellite to move to DSL in the near, or even mid-term. But, the barriers to DSL delivery: sufficient bandwith in local access and congestion in core networks, are falling. Falling costs and rising bandwith is making it more viable for smaller channels to shift to IP, with the customer benefits of interactivity which satellite cannot deliver. This move is a landmark – the first time Sky has offered a full service, equivalent to the cable/sat offer, over terrestrial.”

Johnboy1951

“The debate over whether satellite will be replaced by TV over broadband (both IPTV and OTT) is being put too crudely. We have explained that, for the foreseeable future, satellite will remain the most cost efficient & practical means to deliver mass reach channels of over 2 million simultaneous viewers. Major pay-TV platforms will not be turning off satellite to move to DSL in the near, or even mid-term. But, the barriers to DSL delivery: sufficient bandwith in local access and congestion in core networks, are falling. Falling costs and rising bandwith is making it more viable for smaller channels to shift to IP, with the customer benefits of interactivity which satellite cannot deliver. This move is a landmark – the first time Sky has offered a full service, equivalent to the cable/sat offer, over terrestrial.”

Well I for one don't care about any pay-TV platform or whether they move off Satellite or not.
I have no doubt there will be a migration to IPTV, but I do not expect much of an impact for 10 or 20 years.

I wonder what the situation will be for the likes of Sky where they presently 'appear' to provide many more channels than they actually do? Will they still have permission to provide those channels on IPTV? Are those agreements in place now for their IPTV launch?

Will Freesat disappear in the next 5 years or even 10 years?

joeysoap

Gerry Wicklow wrote: »

Many UK ex-pats lost their home channels in France and Spain when the new birds flew. Other needed a serious dish upgrade to continue watching.

In Portugal and southern Spain they just point the dish to Gibraltar. When the code changes they bring back the decoder box to the TVs dealers and for €10 the new code is applied ( by USB stick ) the code last changed in December 2015.

joeysoap

I live in a border area and have freesat through a dish. I also have freeview through an old fashioned aerial. There is no comparison on picture quality. Freeview is vastly superior. The number of free channels is roughly the same, with the exception of the Irish channels available on freeview (Saorstat)

Thurston?

joeysoap wrote: »

I live in a border area and have freesat through a dish. I also have freeview through an old fashioned aerial. There is no comparison on picture quality. Freeview is vastly superior.

That simply isn't true. What kind of satellite receiver are you using?

FRIENDO

joeysoap wrote:

I live in a border area and have freesat through a dish. I also have freeview through an old fashioned aerial. There is no comparison on picture quality. Freeview is vastly superior. The number of free channels is roughly the same, with the exception of the Irish channels available on freeview (Saorstat)

I have Freesat, Saorsat and Freeview.
I've not noticed much difference in picture quality between Freesat or Freeview.
Possibly the standard digital version of CBS Action is better on Freeview alright.

Freesat carries more channels than Freeview.

However Freeview may carry a number of channels not on Freesat and not fta on satellite.


Saorsat is a good service,
Excellent picture quality
Good radio service
RTE Aertel
Mheg 5
7 day programme guide.

However we have downfalls also on Saorsat:
Issue with rights for UEFA Champions league.
TV3 family of channels are not on Saorsat.
NO approved Saorsat set top box on the market at the moment.

Thurston?

FRIENDO wrote: »

Saorsat is a good service ...

joeysoap isn't actually referring to Saorsat, but either Saorview or the NI mux that carries RTE & TG4.

FRIENDO

Thurston? wrote:

That simply isn't true. What kind of satellite receiver are you using?

I aggree, I've not noticed much difference between standard digital channels, I can't comment on HD as I don't have a T2 receiver.

In the past I did notice CBS Action on Freeview less grainy than Freesat.

But I think the sat version has since improved, possibly due to a frequency change.

FRIENDO

Thurston? wrote:

joeysoap isn't actually referring to Saorsat, but either Saorview or the NI mux that carries RTE & TG4.

I guessed that also

Harry Palmr

Worth a read, while it's unlikely the big boys will deliberately reduce PQ on their primary platform freeview it just shows how things can be allowed to become shoddy.
http://www.a516digital.com/2016/04/rules-governing-freeview-picture.html

With no complaints received in the last three years about the quality of pictures on Freeview, Ofcom now proposes to drop the requirement that forces the main commercial channels including ITV and Channel 4 to broadcast their standard definition channels with a minimum resolution of 720x576 or 704x576 pixels. Other commercial channels on Freeview are already not bound by these rules, neither are services on satellite and cable platforms.

FRIENDO

Harry Palmr wrote:

Worth a read, while it's unlikely the big boys will deliberately reduce PQ on their primary platform freeview it just shows how things can be allowed to become shoddy.

I would guess that it would be some time before the pbs channels would ever drop picture quality.
I would imagine that the SD versions are probably still the most watched and they still hold the prime epg allocation positions.

soporific

I don't know if it was a mistake but after blank screens for the champions league last week on saorsat, there was also a blank screen for Apres Match. The commercials still played fine during breaks (which I find hilarious). Why would RTE not broadcast Apres Match, a home-grown program with no rights issues, on saorsat??

FRIENDO

soporific wrote:

I don't know if it was a mistake but after blank screens for the champions league last week on saorsat, there was also a blank screen for Apres Match. The commercials still played fine during breaks (which I find hilarious). Why would RTE not broadcast Apres Match, a home-grown program with no rights issues, on saorsat??

Sounds like a mistake, I don't think any rights issues exist for Apres Match.

I would send an email to RTE about it

joeysoap

Thurston? wrote: »

joeysoap isn't actually referring to Saorsat, but either Saorview or the NI mux that carries RTE & TG4.

Yep, sorry, my mistake, Saorview.

Actually I think I have two receivers with different ways of displaying channels.

Both of the TVs Saorview and have the Irish channels from 1 to 11 - UTV HD is on ch 83, BBC 1 HD is on ch 86.( (etc etc)

And a HD recorder which sorts the channels differently i.e. BBC 1 is channel 1 BBC 2 is Channel 2 - and BBC 1 HD is Channel 101, BBC 2 HD is ch 102 etc etc

On this HD recorder RTÉ 1 is 820, RTÉ 2 is 802 and the other Irish channels are all up in the 800's

I don't think the HD recorder (Panasonic) is Saorview, I bought it in NI.

Either way both are superior to my freesat reception, maybe the dish is clapped out.

Thurston?

joeysoap wrote: »

... Either way both are superior to my freesat reception, maybe the dish is clapped out.

Depends what you mean by 'reception'. If you mean the picture & sound are breaking up due to poor signal, then that's a fault with your equipment, not a reflection on the relative merits of Freeview v. free satellite.

You still didn't say if your satellite receiver is HD or not.

STB.

joeysoap wrote: »

Yep, sorry, my mistake, Saorview.

Actually I think I have two receivers with different ways of displaying channels.

The reason they display the channels differently is because when you set the Country settings to Ireland the NI Channels will be in the 800s.

Likewise the Panasonic Recorder is set to UK in Country Settings and the Irish Channels would then be in the 800s.

Its called logical channel numbering and which are placed in the 800s depends on what you set as your home country.

Having said all that, all of this can normally overcome with Free Channel Editor software like Chansort, which allows you re-number the channels as you like, ie the 800 channels can be renumbered channel 7 etc.

joeysoap

Thurston? wrote: »

Depends what you mean by 'reception'. If you mean the picture & sound are breaking up due to poor signal, then that's a fault with your equipment, not a reflection on the relative merits of Freeview v. free satellite.

You still didn't say if your satellite receiver is HD or not.

Satellite receiver is ancient, no not HD. Picture just looks grainy in comparison to freeview. So yes, it's probably due to my equipment and not the fault of Freesat.

joeysoap

STB. wrote: »

The reason they display the channels differently is because when you set the Country settings to Ireland the NI Channels will be in the 800s.

Likewise the Panasonic Recorder is set to UK in Country Settings and the Irish Channels would then be in the 800s.

Its called logical channel numbering and which are placed in the 800s depends on what you set as your home country.

Having said all that, all of this can normally overcome with Free Channel Editor software like Chansort, which allows you re-number the channels as you like, ie the 800 channels can be renumbered channel 7 etc.

Thanks STB, had thought there might be a way to re number the channels on the HD box but every second week I keep getting a message 'new channels found, press ok to scan or exit to ignore' ( or words to that effect) if you ignore every time you go to record/watch a recording this message keeps popping up, so it's easier just to accept the re scan and at the end select 'best quality'. So even if I renumbered RTE and TV 3 etc I would be back to square 1 in a week or so. At this stage I know the channel numbers by heart 802, 803, 804, 805, 806, 820, 822 and lastly RTE Junior is 825. Picture quality is superb though.
The Irish radio channels are around the same place 810 to 819 roughly.

Thanks again

STB.

There should be a facility to turn off notifications. These are notifications of the channels found that do not have logical channel number assigned.

Display-New Service Message set to OFF.


Chansort