Moving from VM to sky

[nobblebonce]

Looking at switching providers.

Have people had any bad experience with sky, I'm happy with VM, but with BT sport securing the rights to the UFC, I'm worried ill no longer be able to watch this, I know u can buy BT sports on sky but not on VM at present.

Have people had any issues with sky BB etc.
i currently pay £70 pm with VM for XL tv, calls and BB.

Sky is coming to around £80 pm, however this does inclue multi room and movies ( I need multi room as I don have an aerial for my tv in the house so the tv in the bedroom would need to run off the sky), then an extra £15 pm for BT sports, I could skip the movies if need be.

​Any help / advise would be great.

 

[banther]

The "product" is very good but in my experience customer service is pretty atrocious for the very few issues that I have had.

Got TV, broadband & phone line through them.

 

[dk]

Sky is the ultimate tv, nothing beats it.

 

[Gareth]

If I could I'd happily leave VM to go back to Sky.

 

[Deeg]

Virgin is OK, but Tivo is absolutely dreadful.

Utterly abysmal.

Total and utter dross.

It's the worst user interface (it lags like hell) and an awful user experience (catch up is dreadful as one example).

Edit - I absolutely hate Sky too.

I used to like VM with the previous HD box, but Tivo has absolutely ruined it for me. It's a shame.

 

[Gareth]

Nail, on the head. TiVo is sh*te, Sky boxes were awesome in comparison.

 

[Deeg]

Nail, on the head. TiVo is sh*te, Sky boxes were awesome in comparison.

I know this sounds a bit much, but it's really ruined TV for me, as it's so utterly dreadful to use and watch things on.

Shame, it really is, as I'm pretty much boxed into the corner of giving SKY money and having a chavy dish on the wall.

 

[llgsimpson]

I've been with sky for over 2 years, moved house and never had any issues, upgraded and downgraded no problems.

 

[dk]

Virgin is OK, but Tivo is absolutely dreadful.

Utterly abysmal.

Total and utter dross.

It's the worst user interface (it lags like hell) and an awful user experience (catch up is dreadful as one example).

Edit - I absolutely hate Sky too.

I used to like VM with the previous HD box, but Tivo has absolutely ruined it for me. It's a shame.

When you say you hate sky, is that the actual product and experience, or the company/customer service?

the box to me now is faultless, I have a 2TB box, it's lightning fast, the GUI and epg are brilliant, it has the most channels of any service, the most hd channels of any service (I only watch hd tv these days), an endless amount of on demand and all the catchup tv channels. The box is quiet, the iPad app is brilliant, it'll even let you undelete shows you have accidentally deleted or someone else deleted it before you had watched it.

i honestly can't think of any way they could make it better, other than maybe 2 weeks of epg rather than 1 and for it to automatically remove the adverts, but that's never going to happen.

 

[Deeg]

When you say you hate sky, is that the actual product and experience, or the company/customer service?

the box to me now is faultless, I have a 2TB box, it's lightning fast, the GUI and epg are brilliant, it has the most channels of any service, the most hd channels of any service (I only watch hd tv these days), an endless amount of on demand and all the catchup tv channels. The box is quiet, the iPad app is brilliant, it'll even let you undelete shows you have accidentally deleted or someone else deleted it before you had watched it.

i honestly can't think of any way they could make it better, other than maybe 2 weeks of epg rather than 1 and for it to automatically remove the adverts, but that's never going to happen.

The company itself.

The product they offer is fantastic.

 

[Chrisgti6]

We are currently with VM for TV, phone and BB. We are just about to move house. My plan is to have VM for the BB and sky for TV, not bothering with a landline.

​Tivo is terrible, but VM BB is the best available so I'll have the best of both worlds!

 

[SC03OTT]

I thought TiVo was really good TBH. I've read of people saying its laggy but the one I had (my parents had) was lightning fast. Didn't have any issues recording anything either. Using it with the iPad app improves on it further.

I've only chosen Sky myself as VM isn't available.

 

[.LiamC.]

I had VM when I was at my parents, but when I moved into my house last October we got Sky and it so much better. I used to suffer with glitches and it freezing on VM plua the after case was awful.

The customer service with Sky has been fantastic. We have got TV (HD + Entertainment), Unlimited Broadband and free weekend calls and pay £41 P/M.

 

[nobblebonce]

I like VM BB, I dunno if im being stupid, but I thought you needed a landline for the internet, if I could get rid of the landline and just keep the BB then that would be good.
I have to agree TiVo shocking, I set it to record new only, yet it still records old episodes, piece of s**t.

 

[Dink]

yeah you don't need a landline for VM broadband

by not using shitty wires from the cab is why they nearly always get the speed promised to the house on their "fibre" service.

there are quite a few flaws in the sky service that people seem to forget about (some have been sorted lately)

 

[dk]

yeah you don't need a landline for VM broadband

by not using s**tty wires from the cab is why they nearly always get the speed promised to the house on their "fibre" service.

there are quite a few flaws in the sky service that people seem to forget about (some have been sorted lately)

Such as?

 

[Dink]

having to connect the box to the router to get the on-demand working. (and only just recently being able to use a non-sky BB service)

having to pay for HD. i mean can you even buy a non HD television now? it's not like it's being beamed solely to your dish is it/

being limited by the technology to recording 2 items at a time? (not 100% sure on this)

affected by the weather/trees/general s**t.

can you get on-demand movies instantly streamed or is it still dowloading/playing-on-the-fly?

 

[dk]

having to connect the box to the router to get the on-demand working. (and only just recently being able to use a non-sky BB service)

having to pay for HD. i mean can you even buy a non HD television now? it's not like it's being beamed solely to your dish is it/

being limited by the technology to recording 2 items at a time? (not 100% sure on this)

affected by the weather/trees/general s**t.

can you get on-demand movies instantly streamed or is it still dowloading/playing-on-the-fly?

How is connecting the box to your router a flaw? (And it's been a good year to 18 months now since non-bt bob customers could use it)

HD channels, you just look at the overall cost, and how many Hd channels does virgin have, not nearly as many as sky. Want to watch sky sports F1, that'll be £22.50 extra please for sky sports package on virgin, I get the f1 channel included in my HD package, I don't have to subscribe to sky sports.

limited to recording 2 channels at once? Really, that's a limitation? The very few times you actually have 3 things worth recording at the same time, I just set one of the shows to record when it repeats, or an hour after it airs I download it from ondemand anyway, so it really isn't a big deal, by the time it's downloaded I wouldn't have watched the other two shows yet anyway.

affected by the weather and trees? Depends where you live and who installed it, I've never had an issue with either in 3 1/2 years. With Virgin you could have someone dig up the cable.....

ondemand is instantly streamed, you have to wait about 10 seconds before you can start watching it.

so really, are they flaws? I don't think so.

and a lot of people can't get virgin, the gadget show did a test of tv services last week and sky won again.

 

[Deeg]

The F1 channel is not included within HD package anymore, DK, AFAIK.

For new customers I mean.

 

[dk]

Oh yes, didn't know that, just read it changed in April, I was always surprised they offered it for free anyway when it must have cost them a fortune.

i got rid of sports and movies a few months back as I wasn't watching them but still have f1 through my HD subscription, so glad they kept it for existing customers.

I also read than virgin only get the f1 channel is pauper spec standard definition too, couldn't go back to watching it in sd these days.

 

[Dink]

tbh the non sky BB on demand should never of happend really should it and yes it is a pain trying to find a decent way of connecting the box to the router

i've watched sky sports f1 once and tbh i'd rather watch the bbc highlights when it's not live on bbc

so when you say wait 10 seconds you mean it's buffering on the box? so highly dependent on avaliable bandwidth?

i genuinly don't know much about sky these are just observations i've made when using at other peoples houses

 

[dk]

All ondemand services work in the same way, just like iplayer, everything is buffered and always relies on bandwidth, I've used it with a 1mb connection and it was fine.

i can't be doing with watching f1 highlights as there's too many ways to hear the result before you get to watch it, radio, Facebook, twitter, friends.

The non-sky broadband thing, I can understand why they did it, they could have charged a nominal fee for other customers to use it, but then it wasn't really worth having until they overhauled it anyway, which was when they opened it up to everyone.

The only thing I can see that virgin can trump sky on is being able to record 3 programmes at once.

Also I don't think you can get sky Atlantic on virgin can you, some of the best shows are on that channel, game of thrones?

 

[Gareth]

And tbh a fair amount of the time the ability to record more than 2 things at once on Virgin is a load of BS, as Tivo has a mind of its own and records each and every showing of programs despite telling it not to (another hate of mine with Tivo) which often means the box is already recording stuff itself.

 

[Dink]

oh yeah i'm not defending VM (the tivo box does have ALOT to be desired)

i couldn't watch sky sports f1 live it's just so dull imho

well iplayer just starts instantly no waiting at all as does the rest of on-demand even when my internet connection is at 100% bandwidth

i watch very few american programmes tbh and the ones i do are "factual" so i wouldn't even know

 

[dk]

It's instant, but they are all buffering in the background.......

 

[Deeg]

And tbh a fair amount of the time the ability to record more than 2 things at once on Virgin is a load of BS, as Tivo has a mind of its own and records each and every showing of programs despite telling it not to (another hate of mine with Tivo) which often means the box is already recording stuff itself.

Argh!

I f**king hate TiVo.

It does just do whatever the f**k it wants. I've missed loads of the Americans because it cuts off before the end of shows and what mots. Handily though, it records every f**king episode of master chef, because I once asked it to record one.

TiVo has basically single handedly ensured I won't use VM for TV in the future.

I was trying to watch some if the Glastonbury coverage, and between not being able to navigate out if menus, the box being about 3 clicks behind the remote and stuff being unavailable, it was pretty s**t.

 

[nobblebonce]

ok thanks for the all the advise, would it be best to keep vm for the broadband, and get sky for the tv.
would I be able to use the on demand service from sky with the vm broadband, is this built into the sky box or is the on demand based on a separate box (if that makes sense)

 

[dajones]

Sky on demand is absolutely awful.

 

[Gareth]

I personally (as soon as possible) will be going back to Sky for everything with their highest speed broadband.

 

[DB.]

VM have said it's BT sport deal will be merged/completed by the end of July on their website. I'd hold your horses until then!

(I've also been following the issue closely as an avid Rugby fan, and the fact BT Sport have exclusivity to all televised Premiership Rugby this season)
​

 

[dk]

Sky on demand is absolutely awful.

And why is that?
​it has a lot of content, and works perfectly well for me.

 

[dk]

VM have said it's BT sport deal will be merged/completed by the end of July on their website. I'd hold your horses until then!

(I've also been following the issue closely as an avid Rugby fan, and the fact BT Sport have exclusivity to all televised Premiership Rugby this season)
​

Sky already have bt sport though as an option, I already have the channels listed in my epg, it's just a little but more than just espn used to cost.

Why hold your horses?

 

[DB.]

The Rugby season doesn't start until the 6th of September and I've always been happy with Virgin. No rush just yet although if deals start to stall, I'd have a month to jump ship.

 

[dajones]

Nowhere near as much content as virgin media and most of the time you need to wait for the programme to download before hand. Maybe there's not much on there because I dont have sports or movies but what's on there is ancient!

 

[dk]

hmmm, i find theres loads of content but you need to use the search really, and while you need to download, you start the download and then go to your planner and you can start watching it straight away, unless you still have 56k modems in wales
do you have the new EPG or are you still on the old one?

i think the new on demand stuff is only available with the new EPG and some boxes aren't upgraded yet or aren't even compatible.

 

[Keyser Soze]

Sky are the worst company Ive ever dealt with. I dont recommend them to anyone.

 

[DB.]

I used them in my final year of Uni for broadband and they were great, cancelled a few months early and the charge was only £23, when I had about £80 worth left to pay on the contract. Still prefer VM though!

 

[dk]

i don't think theres a single utility provider that I've ever heard of nobody having a problem with, they all have terrible customer service (Sky, BT, Virgin, NTL, all the power and water companies, oh and don't forget insurance providers).

They are all as bad as each other and your experience really depends on whether you get an intelligent human being answering your call or some bottom of the gene pool lowlife who just doesn't give a s**t.

 

[DB.]

Agree with that, there have been times I've called VM and ended up with 'Steve' aka Surpindingaish from Delhi, India which has been frustrating, and fairly sure the last Sky person I ended up with was from Newcastle or Scotland, something very northern anyway which was better than having someone from the far east!

 

[nobblebonce]

im still undecided, ufc is due to end at the end of this month with espn, and with vm you have to give 30 days notice.
Looking at ufc163 it seems a decent card, and knowing my luck if I don't have bt sports by then, it will be the greatest card in history with ko's and subs galore.
The vm TiVo box is also starting to piss me off.