Not as good as Sky, but I love you all the same. (ITV Digital)

Member Name: hugon

Product:	ITV Digital
Date:	24/10/01 (1578 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: More channels than analouge, Cheaper than Sky, Set up in minutes

Disadvantages: Less Channels than sky, Occasional blocky picture, Ages to wait speaking to customer services

I finally dragged myself kicking and screaming into the digital age with the purchase of an ITV digital set top box. A lot of my favourite shows like WWF (sad I know), Buffy, Dawson's Creek, West Wing, 3rd Rock From the Sun, etc, are shown a lot more on digital channels like Sky One, E4 and the Paramount Comedy channel, so I knew it was time I brought myself up to date.

I'd heard a few stories about poor pictures, breaking up every time a car drove past, unresponsive and poor software in the set top boxes and poor customer services, but I took a deep breath and ordered the box, and I can honestly say I've encountered no problems so far, and I've had it for over three months now. A few minor break-ups of picture when there is extreme bad weather, but nothing worse than that.

I chose ITV Digital over Sky for a couple of reasons. My ex girlfriend had Sky, and though there was plenty of choice, a lot of it was poor, the main channels I watched where Sky One, E4, Paramount and MTV2. I decided to lump for ITV because I wanted it for my room, and also because the £9.99 a month was cheaper than Sky's family package. OK, so I was missing out on MTV2, but I still had the radio.

I couldn't afford to splash out on a prepaid set top box, so I went directly to the ITV Digital (http://www.itv-digital.co.uk) and ordered from there. It's a simple method, you enter your details and the site checks your postcode to check ITV Digital is available in your area, then you select your channels and payment method (either credit card or direct debit), a delivery date and Robert's you mother's brother. I have a bone to pick with the ITV Digital site - it looks nice, but the graphics slow it down rather a lot, and there isn't a lot of information, let alone schedule information, which I found to be a bit of a let down.

CHANNELS AND PRICING

First of all there are the free to air channels - BBC1, BBC2, ITV, ITV2
(or regional variations), Channel 4, Channel 5, BBC Choice, BBC Knowledge, BBC Parliament, BBC News 24, Shop and the information channels and text channels.

Next we have the 'Primary Channels' - Sky one, E4, PlayUK, UK horizons, UK Style, Carlton Cinema, Carlton Food Network, Wellbeing, MTV, Play UK, UK Gold, Discovery, Eurosport, Granada Breeze, Granada Men and Motors, Paramount Comedy, Nickelodeon and The Cartoon Network.

The subscription channels are Sky Sports 1-3, Sky Premier, Sky Moviemax, ITV Sport, Film Four and some adult channels.

There are also five channels set aside for pay per view film broadcasting.

You can either pay £9.99 per month for six of the primary channels or £13 for all of them. If you subscribe to six, you can phone up and change the channels as you wish.

For a £5 fee per month, you can access the Internet via your set top box, they will supply a keyboard and the necessary leads, but this is done via a local rate call and I have a computer for the Internet, so didn?t take this option up.

ITV Sport costs £6.99 per month, Film Four costs £5.99 per month and I'm not sure how much the adult channels cost. The Sky Sports and Movies channels cost £12 for the first one, £16 for 2. £19 for three and £21 for all five (Sky Sports 3 is free when you take either Sky Sports 1 or Sky Sports 2).

Unfortunately ITV digital doesn't offer a free sports channel now, as it did last year (screening Champion's League football and Tennis), as this is now part of the ITV Sport package, which you must pay for. I have to say I was disappointed when I found out this had happened as I hadn't read about it anywhere and was looking forward to a more than healthy dose of football this season. To cap it all off, ITV Sport is in dispute with UTV about carrying the channel in Northern Ireland, and because of this, there is no schedule for when the channel is due to start broadcasting in
the province.

The pay per view services are £2.99 per movie, a variable charge if it's on the adult request channel, or £6.99 for a pay per view football match, although a 'season ticket' is available for £40 to view all 40 PPV football matches.

The minimum subscription term is 12 months, and you must be over 18, and the license is for broadcast in the home, if you want a box for a pub or other public venue, you will need an alternative subscription.

INSTALLING THE DIGIBOX

One of ITV Digital's main selling points is its ease of use straight out of the box, and it certainly is true. All you simply need to do is plug the aerial into the back of the box, and attach the box to your TV or video with the SCART or RF lead (which are supplied) and follow the simple instructions, the box will then scan for your available channels and store them. Then you need to phone the customer services number for them to activate your Smart Card, which means you have to tune to a primary channel and leave it there for a few minutes while the card updates itself with the information necessary to decrypt the picture. I had a few problems, which I will come to later.

The box also keeps itself up to date, by installing new software it receives via the aerial. Currently all the boxes are changing themselves over from On digital software to ITV digital software, when this becomes available depends on your box and transmitter, but it's gradually happening for all customers.

THE PICTURE

Put the ITV Digital picture beside a Sky Digital picture and there's no comparison - the Sky Picture is sharper and clearer. The ITV digital picture can become quite blocky at times, I don't notice it too much on a 14" TV, but on the 28" TV downstairs, it is much clearer. This happens when the picture moves a lot, for instance in an action movie when the camera is moving quickly, the picture becomes quite pixelly
, but only for a second or two then it sorts itself out again. The ITV digital picture is much superior to an analogue picture, but not as much as I was hoping for.

THE SERVICE

Changing channels is easy - simply press the select button on your remote and cycle through the channels. It lacks the on screen info about what it on and what is coming on that Sky Displays, but once on the channel you can press the info button on the remote to receive the same information. The change can sometimes take a few seconds to decode the picture, it's not quite as fast as Sky, but everything goes quite smoothly.

The digital teletext is amusing for a minute or two, it looks nicer than ordinary text, but it is so SLOW as to be almost unusable. Its pretty, colourful, but ultimately a bit disappointing.

Once you make your first payment to ITV digital, you get a welcome back with your guide magazine, which you receive monthly, like the sky guide. It's very basic with not a lot by way of features, only highlights of the months features on the ITV digital channels. You can recieve a weekly issue for 39p per issue, if you choose not to subscribe, you'll recieve four free issues about two months after you start using the service. It's a fairly decent guide, all the channels packed onto five pages means its quite crowded, but not the worst I've seen.

PROBLEMS

Lets start at the start. First of all, my delivery was late. Probably more the courier's fault than ITV Digital's fault, especially since I live in Northern Ireland and am used to waiting for these things. The delivery window was between 8am and 5.30pm, and my box didn't arrive until 6pm, when I'd more or less given up hope.

Next up, they neglected to put any leads in my box, just the digibox and the mains lead. Luckily I had a spare scart lead and managed to get my digibox set up and tuned in using the controls on the front of the box.
Then came the problem of not being able to change the channels, as they controls on the front of the box seemed to have locked themselves. I phoned up the customer services, and they tried to help me, but the poor girl on the end of the line was new and didn't really know what to do, so she referred me to the technical support. After waiting in another queue, he was able to talk me through what I needed to do in order to use the front of my box to control the channel selection - it involved yanking the aerial out of the back when I wanted to change channel, but hey! - It worked, and he ordered me a remote and leads, which took about 5 days to arrive.

CUSTOMER SERVICES

In my short time with ITV Digital I've had a fair few dealings with the customer services people trying to get my box and remote sorted out. They are a friendly bunch of people, although they are understaffed, and you have to put up with a fair amount of waiting around listening to orchestral music through your phone line. On the whole, they seem to know what they're talking about and aren't afraid to refer you to someone else who knows more rather than fudging you with an excuse. The main gripe I would have is that the line seems prone to crashing at times rather than placing you in a queue, you end up listening to a dead tone, but phoning back ten minutes later things seem to ease a bit. I did find an alternative number on the net to use - 0870 600 8686 instead of the one they give you - apparently this is a more direct line and it isn't publicised anywhere, so it is far less busy, and you can usually get straight through to an operator.

PAY PER VIEW

The pay per view films are quite up to date, usually the same kind of stuff as Sky, stuff that has recently come out to buy on video or DVD. At £2.99 a throw, it's as cheap as renting the video, and ordering can either be done over the phone or from your remote, so long as the box is connected t
o the phoneline. With both methods your fee is added to your monthly cost. It's then a case of tuning in to the correct channel when the movie starts and pressing select on your remote to start viewing. It's not as easy as sky, as there are only five channels showing films, meaning the start times are far less flexible, but the channels do broadcast more or less all the time. They have an offer at the moment where you can watch a movie before 6pm for the reduced rate of £1.99.

ADVICE TO PROSPECTIVE SUBSCRIBERS

Do try and test it out first. I found out that I can't receive Mux C, which carries UK Gold, MTV and Sky Sports 2 and Moviemax. As I really wanted UK Gold this is a bit of a disappointment, but not too bad. If you have a look at http://www.jaura.freeserve.co.uk/, that should be able to tell you what Muxes are available in your area, and from that you can work out what channels are available to you. I'll warn it isn't always accurate; you might need an aerial upgrade in order to receive all the channels. The best way is either to borrow a friend's box to see what the signal is like in your house, or to purchase a prepaid box which can be returned if the signal is unacceptable and you don't want to have to fork out £40 for the aerial upgrade. Hills and large buildings affect reception, and there's no real way of testing the signal unless you try it out yourself or have a neighbour who has one. I live 10 miles from the Divis transmitter on top of a hill, and I'm missing some channels, so the moral is try before you buy!

I?m really pleased with my box. It's easy to use and set up; it's added another 25 or so channels to my range of viewing. I'd prefer Sky, but this is just for my room, and I'm not often in, so it isn?t really worth the effort of Sky. I'm awarding four stars because I reckon the pricing is very reasonable. I'm deducting points because of the lack of channels comp
ared to sky, and the quality of some of the primary channels (especially the Food Network and Wellbeing) is very poor. Also points off for the break up of the picture at times, but on the whole, it's been a very positive experience for me, and I don?t regret buying it. 56-oddchannels doesn?t seem like a lot, but they do carry some great channels like Sky One and E4, and I've been spoilt for choice ever since I got my box. For my increasingly needed Buffy fix, and wrestling obsession, it's more than adequate, and if you're looking for an easy step into the digital world, you would do well to look at this option.

Useful sites:

http://www.itv-digtal.co.uk
http://www.jaura.freeserve.co.uk/
http://forum.digitalspy.co.uk/board/index.php

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