Sky HD Service

I just got this from registering on the Sky HD website some weeks ago, but I still feel it's a little 'lite' on information. No idea of a subscription price yet.

Is the plan to have a multi-purpose channel with a bit of sport, entertainment and movies? It's not exactly clear from the attached bumph.

I think we should be told.


http://www.gorillaenterprises.co.uk/upload/uploadFiles/SKYHD.jpg
http://www.gorillaenterprises.co.uk/upload/uploadFiles/SKYHD4.jpg
http://www.gorillaenterprises.co.uk/upload/uploadFiles/SKYHD3.jpghttp://www.gorillaenterprises.co.uk/upload/uploadFiles/SKYHD2.jpg
http://www.gorillaenterprises.co.uk/upload/uploadFiles/SKYHD5.jpg

I had an e-mail today, from Sky media, about skyhd.. intresting, but very little details as of yet...

How exactly would 5.1 surround football work then? Crowds actually in your room... ooer.

Here is part of the e-mail I got
http://www.walknetworks.co.uk/junk/skymedia.jpg
Looks like its got built in Sky+ too

I'll be interested to see how much extra they charge.

I pre-registered yesterday for a Sky Gnome though... www.sky.com/skygnome

Seeing as it's not avaliable till next year I wouldn't expect any detailed information until much nearer the time

AIUI there is no plan for a merged service - they will be separate chanels.

I believe the plan is for Sky One to be simulcast in HD - as most of the US imports it shows are already shot in HD.

Not sure if there will be a Sky Sports HD channel - in addition to SS1/2/3/X or wthether one of the existing SS channels will be simulcast in HD, and HD coverage scheduled on that. Sky have commissioned the facilities for the Premiership this year to be HD.

Artsworld is likely to be a simulcast of the SD channel - again because a lot of their source programming is already available in HD.

Sky Movies is likely to be an extra stream of HD specific movies - though it could conceivably be an HD simulcast of Sky Movies 1?

Sky Box Office will be HD movie screens to supplement the existing SBO service.

I guess the issue will be whether Sky want to run the HD channels separately, or replace the SD presentation with an HD presentation, and downconvert the HD channel to SD for SD viewers, rather than running two presentation chains.

It is also expected that Discovery will launch an HD service and that HD-1 are also negotiating for carriage. However these aren't Sky channels (i.e. they aren't run by Sky) - so presumably that is why they aren't mentioned yet? They may not have finalised plans.

Also the BBC are expected to launch an HD version of BBC One - though when isn't clear.

They have bought more transponder space on the Astra slot (though on a wide beam bird) - but they have also announced a large-scale local TV pilot in the Midlands, which will require some satellite space.

I can't see what all the fuss is with HD, I think my digital picture is quite good anyway - compared to what I used to get on terrestrial analogue.

Are the main electrical chains (such as Dixons, Comet etc) now showing demonstrations, because I wouldn't mind going to see one - then I might have a bit more enthusiasm for this "great TV revolution"

All questions answered here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HDTV

Well the current digital pictures are good, but compared to good quality analogue picture is poor, apparantly when you watch HD, the picture is very clear with no pixelation.

The quality is amazing. I watched a short HD promotional film on a large (LCD?) TV in Bracknell a few weeks ago and compared to SDTV it's much sharper, more vivid and less grainy.

On smaller sets - below 28" - then at a normal viewing distance HD doesn't offer a HUGE advantage (though the pictures look excellent on small displays)

However once you start going for screens larger than 28" and up to 50", the 720 line progressive HD system (compared to the 400ish lines of resolution our 576 line interlaced system delivers) is a noticable improvement. Once you get over 50" displays then a 1080 line progressive system (not currently available) would be even better.

In the UK our standard definition broadcasts on Freeview and Satellite are not actually that high quality... There is very noticable compression quality loss - ITV on satellite is nearly unwatchable on some shows in quality terms as a result of their lower resolution and over compression.

Good quality analogue pictures are in some ways better - but fewer people got decent analogue than get decent digital so I guess this is a moot point - and digital does deliver proper widescreen and component quality.

Once you've seen HD on a large screen - especially movies and sport - SD suddenly feels a bit poor...