Sky HD (and up/downgrade) Enquries

Another episode of Larry the Loafer's Multiple Mystery Questions...

We had Sky HD ins... sorry, Sky+ HD, installed yesterday, and I was hoping if my fellow TV Forumers could help me out with a couple of questions...

1) We had to call Sky due to problems receiving Movies, Sports and HD channels, which they sorted out today. We are, however, unable to receive the Anytime service; we are greeted, instead by a message that reads "There are no programmes currently available. Ensure you have Sky+ subscription and try again in a few hours". We do, infact, have the subscription in question. Does anybody know why we are unable to receive Anytime?

2) I understand that being a HD box, the picture will alter in aspect ratio terms. Is the picture altered on 4:3 programmes? I can see a bit of a difference in the aspect ratio, but at the same time, I can see a difference in 16:9 pictures sometimes where the picture seems a bit too slim. Is this my eyes or is the picture purposely altered like this?

3) I recorded a programme yesterday, and whilst other recordings have recorded fine, this recording greets me with a message saying "Recording Interrupted - Please wait". Should I "wait"?

Also, we are, ironically, cutting down on packages, mainly Sports and Movies. We were originally going to subscribe to Picturebox on Tiscali, but some members of our household aren't happy to see Sky Movies go, and we are therefore considering the "1" and "2" seperate packages. On Sky Active, it says under Sky Movies "From £3 per month when taken with other premium services". Can someone explain where/how the £3 comes into it?

Thanks in advance

1) That is only because it hasn't recorded any Anytime content yet, give it time and shows should start popping up.

2) 16:9/HD programmes shouldn't look any different. On HD channels, how 4:3 programmes appear depends on the channel, for example Sky One HD broadcasts shows in 14:9 pillarbox, whereas Channel 4 HD shows the full 4:3 picture pillarboxed. On SD channels, if the box is set to 720p or 1080i output, 4:3 shows will always be stretched to 16:9.

3) "Recording Interrupted - Please wait" normally happens when the satellite signal disappears mid-recording. If you wait, it should after a few moments restore playing the recording from the point it gets the signal back, which is annoying as it means it skips forward a few minutes, but it's better than failing the recording.

Thanks Orry.

1) Anytime finally started running a few days ago, thankfully.

2) I think I got the wrong message out to you in my post. What I meant was when I watched a 4:3 show, for example Gladiators on Virgin 1, it seemed to be altered a bit - you could say it was a vague emulation of a "Super Live 1" or "Smart" setting on Toshiba/Sony televisions which makes 4:3 pictures a bit more pleasent to watch.

3) Turns out none of the programme recorded then, as all of the recording was that message. Strange, as I expected "Failed" to appear on the planner.

One last question, which is about Anytime.

Sky say Anytime does not take up any hard drive space. Me, along with many people I'm sure, have not been bo**ocked by Sky, and realise that Anytime eats up half of your hard drive. If I disable Anytime, would I retain that space Anytime takes up and be able to use it for personal recordings? If not, why else would Sky give you the option to disable it?

Thanks again.

No - the hard disk is partitioned in half - opne half is for recordings and the other half is for "use by Sky" - Anytime, etc.

Just to add to that, the Sky+ PVR3 and Sky+HD boxes actually have double the started capacity, for example my Sky+ PVR3 is stated as having 80GB, but it actually has a 160GB HDD in it. As stated by Bilky, this is partitioned in half, one half for the recordings, giving the stated recording capacity, and the other half for Sky use. At the moment this is only used for Anytime, however with the introduction of the new HD EPG, which is believed to be next month, this will also be used to store the EPG data.

Thanks for the info, Billy and Orry. If that's the case with Anytime, why would they bother offering a feature to disable Anytime?