Tata Sky Vs Cas

[nosh]

I've had TSky on two televisions for over a month now, I saw CAS (Hathway) in operation at my cousin's place a week back.Here are the pros and cons according to me, would love to hear some of your opinions on this.- CAS users have access to atleast 2 channels that I'm missing already - Star Movies and CNN-IBN; Tata Sky has Zone Reality which seems to be exclusive to DTH viewers but I'm still sore at being deprived of two prime channels. The DTH players will always be more expensive than CAS - when will they realise that most people are not concerned with f**kall techie features but plain ol' CONTENT? The set top box is not a frikin PS3 that I wana fidgit with it all day long - I just want to tune in to a good program and forget about the remote! I hope Tata Sky's plans of introducing new channels go beyond adding their own ridiculously priced 'Showcase' channels. - The RAINS! The prospect of everyone else getting perfect signals while we Tata Sky users who pay more rent than everyone around us (better believe it!) get hazy/unviewable signals is a serious cause for concern. Could somebody who has actually seen TSky in operation during the monsoons please clarify how bad this problem is?- No cable operator involvement / easy rent payment - This may not be an issue for a lot of you but it certainly is for me.My cable guy actually made a shocking offer to buy off both my Tata Sky boxes if I opted to go for CAS! I told him it's too early to take a big step like that. I hate the fact that the guy was almost never there all these years when I needed him to get something rectified. To save myself that kind of frustration and to have an organized customer service department at my disposal is a big deal! So let's see - CAS users so far have more channels, will pay less rent in the long run and will not be affected during the rains. Tata Sky users have better customer support. Somebody please give me a better reason to stick with these people coz I'm beginning to feel slightly foolish.[ Edit: I just spoke to tech support regarding these concerns.. really helpful guy. He told me the High Court ban on Star Movies hasn't been lifted yet, so one assumes the CAS operators are showing it illegally.Talks are in progress for CNN-IBN and Neo Sports and they should be airing soon, I asked him about other new channels but he had no idea about that.Regarding the rains he told me that it's only during abnormally heavy showers that the signal will get hazy, there should be no problems under normal monsoon conditions even if it's completely clouded. I'm going to believe this last bit only when I see it for myself but I'm not feeling so pessimistic about Tata Sky after all ]

 

[Gokte]

DTH in metro, when you say all that may not be worth what it is to us. I live up in the mountain where we paid the cable goons more than you guys for less than half the number of channels. To us Tata Sky is really God sent.One thing that I really enjoy in DTH besides good quality picture is terrific sound. Does your cable (cas) give you similar picture and sound ??Also, I would not worry about that bad reception in monsoon. I live in a place where its cloudy and rainy almost six months in a year and I got Tatasky in August and it rained till October this year and I did not have any trouble, not a single day. I don't know if the altitude helps because I thinks I am 7000 ft closer to the sattelite than you guys in the plains.

 

[nosh]

QUOTE(Gokte @ Jan 14 2007, 08:59 AM) [snapback]75022[/snapback]
DTH in metro, when you say all that may not be worth what it is to us. I live up in the mountain where we paid the cable goons more than you guys for less than half the number of channels. To us Tata Sky is really God sent.

One thing that I really enjoy in DTH besides good quality picture is terrific sound. Does your cable (cas) give you similar picture and sound ??

Also, I would not worry about that bad reception in monsoon. I live in a place where its cloudy and rainy almost six months in a year and I got Tatasky in August and it rained till October this year and I did not have any trouble, not a single day. I don't know if the altitude helps because I thinks I am 7000 ft closer to the sattelite than you guys in the plains.[/b]


Yeah, if you stay in a relatively remote location, esp. on a mountain, going for DTH would be an obvious choice.

Sorry I didn't mention it earlier - yes, the picture quality I saw on the Hathway CAS setup was very clear. But since it's cable based I wonder if wear and tear would come into play a few years down the line like it did with the old cable system - I remember the quality was amazing when I first got it years back and it really sucked last year which is what really got me to make up my mind about going for DTH. The CAS audio was clear though I didn't consciously compare it to what I get with TSky. I have to say I have never really felt the stereo effect on TV like I do now with TSky - some channels seem to have better audio than others - I generally have FTV playing in the background when I'm working on the PC and it sounds awesome - I think it would be worth the effort to hook it up to the stereo.

One thing I didn't mention is that the CAS people already have radio channels - I haven't tried them out but I'm aware they're there - that's another thing TSky has promised but not delivered just yet. I guess we'll have a fairly good idea in a few months time when the market settles down. Then Reliance will step into the game and more chaos will surely ensue.

Thanks for the info about the rain - I suppose the elevation would make a difference but it shouldn't be that big a difference either, so I'm hoping us flat-landers should be more or less OK too.

 

[kkaarthik]

Guys we cannot believe in cas as its a very new product. they jus dont want to loose their customers to DTH. Till last year it was only Dish Tv minus STAR On DTH. so there was no much of compititon. as Tata Sky launched with a better tech & best in South Asia they were in trouble. To woo the customers the so called Cablewallahs are playing dirty gqames as they loose the customers they will not recieve comission.

 

[WiZaRd]

Does cas have stereo sound ? i don't think so...Anneways, i do star movies nosh..... it's axn that's been barred

 

[hitman]

I want to ask guys u have Tata Sky installed tht is there any voice quality difference when u connect STB to ur Tv using RF out and when u connect to ur tv using audio- video cable.... Cos I have an old tv set and I have to connect using RF out.... The picture quality is superb but the sound quality is not tht gr8.... it keeps on generating a faint hush sound in the background...Not tht anyone can notice but u can hear it when there is no noice around....

 

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[vebk]

I think it would be too simple to say that CAS is cheaper than Tata Sky in every situation. I have 3 TVs, and the monthly rent of each TV would be around Rs. 342 per TV per month!!! (i.e. for the channels that I am used to, which does not include regional channels). So I would end up paying about Rs. 1,000 every month - compare that to Rs. 500 for TataSky. The only hitch is that initially I would have to shell out Rs. 11,000 for the STBs, installation, Activation etc. for TataSky and only Rs. 1,000 for Cable (but this is also because I already have the cable lines laid.... the cost would be at least Rs. 1,000 more if I wanted to lay down the lines). But anyway, this difference would be made up for in 23-24 months. That is to say that (at current prices) TataSky would become cheaper than CAS in 2 years. So in the long run TataSky is cheaper for anyone with multiple TVs which is a pretty big chunk of households in Delhi.

DishTV is the cheapest option, but it sucks. Oh I wish I had taken TataSky when they had the 6 months free option!!!

But on the other hand one thing really irritates me about TataSky is that it AFAIK it displays it damn logo on every channel which is obnoxious.

 

[hitman]

Tata Sky logo is not on all channels.... its just on all the star channels...

 

[vebk]

I stand corrected.. but still it's obnoxious.

 

[waterloo_sunset]

It's more of a watermark to catch cable operators if they try to use Tata Sky as a source feed on their networks which is illegal. Even i was pissed at first but it's translucent and after about 5 minutes it kinda blends with the background and u stop noticing it. But the nagging scrolls on ESPN-Star Sports during live broadcasts are somethin we could do without.

 

[WiZaRd]

Isn't Dishtv showing a watermark on zee turner channels ?I'm cool with the watermark, makes it look classy....but i do hate the stupid scrolls that appear every other minute as mentioned before....and the irritating flashing of a set of numbers

 

[Crazysah]

Yeah. The iffitating flashing set of numbers is the worst TBH!

 

[nosh]

QUOTE(hitman @ Jan 19 2007, 02:07 PM) [snapback]75996[/snapback]
I want to ask guys u have Tata Sky installed tht is there any voice quality difference when u connect STB to ur Tv using RF out and when u connect to ur tv using audio- video cable.... Cos I have an old tv set and I have to connect using RF out.... The picture quality is superb but the sound quality is not tht gr8.... it keeps on generating a faint hush sound in the background...Not tht anyone can notice but u can hear it when there is no noice around....[/b]


Yes, it makes a difference. Read pg. 27 of the manual - you get enhanced audio and video by using an AV cable.
You may want to consider plugging in the audio output straight into your amp/stereo. That way you won't have to upgrade your telly and will get stereo sound when your amp is on. I haven't tried this coz I don't use RF out, the only small doubt I have is if you will be able to use both the AV and RF outputs of your STB concurrently... I'm guessing it shouldn't be a problem!

 

[WiZaRd]

I was thinking of using the RF connection for my pc tv tuner, any ideas which channel will it be tuned in ?Coz channel 68 as mentioned in the manual just ain't cutting it I'm using InterVideo WinDVR 3

 

[hitman]

Yup its on 68.... I too am using it on my tv tuner card...I am using TVR software from kworld...