Liberty Global Second Quarter Results.

[oliver1948uk]

My recollection of Tivo in its early days was constant freezing with reboots taking for ever, poor picture quality, recording only on two channels at once, slow operation.

Though much improved (but still without dynamic EPG - unbelievable) I still do not hold it up as the wonderful creation that many on this forum do. Perhaps when the bugs are sorted and with 5 years of development the Horizon box will be better than Tivo.

Originally Posted by muppetman11

Sky's triple play is currently 37% , triple play has only been available since 2006 both NTL and Telewest have been bundling triple play together for many more years before coming Virgin Media so its hardly surprising they've have a greater percentage taking triple play.

Yes, I said about, actual is 37%, VM actual 66.1%, point was that it's an area for growth if Sky can find a way of driving take up. It's currently growing at 2% per annum, although this should accelerate with the free BB offers etc

[Kushan]

Originally Posted by oliver1948uk

My recollection of Tivo in its early days was constant freezing with reboots taking for ever, poor picture quality, recording only on two channels at once, slow operation.

Though much improved (but still without dynamic EPG - unbelievable) I still do not hold it up as the wonderful creation that many on this forum do. Perhaps when the bugs are sorted and with 5 years of development the Horizon box will be better than Tivo.

TiVo is much better than the old virgin STB's but it still has a long, long way to go in my book. It's very slow, menus lag, screens are incredibly inconsistent (With many dropping down to SD for some reason) and it's not very intuitive in places.

Prime example I discovered last night - wanted to watch the Great British Bakeoff (huge fan).

Went into the catchup menu, A-Z, went to G - not listed. Took about a minute to get this far.

Went into OnDemand menu, got asked which package to look at - XL, L, M, etc. - I'm on XL, picked XL (Why on earth couldn't this be more automated?), scrolled down to G, scrolled down all of the shows, eventually found it listed. Took maybe 90s as each button press takes 1-3s to respond. Noticed it mentioned that I had a series link already! Brilliant, would rather play it from the hard drive than stream it.

Back to the start, navigate to my shows, find Bake Off, says I have 10 episodes. That's fine, except Tuesday's Wednesday's episode isn't listed - this is all the last series. Odd.

Looked at the series link options - it's already set to new episodes and repeats, it even lists that the next episode to air is next tuesday's wednesday's so why didn't it record?

Turns out the program has moved from BBC2 to BBC1. Had to set up a brand new series link to catch it. That's exactly the kind of issue that could have been easily avoided (Why does the series link need to be per channel? I have software on my server that's clever enough to know when and where a new episode is showing, TiVo should be capable of doing the same - in fact, it KNOWS this already because it tells you!).

Ended up having to stream it anyway, which meant trundling back through the menus. Must have taken a good 10mins - and of course, you have to manually enable HD when streaming from iPlayer.

[RobboEdin]

Kushan, Just so you don't miss your fix of baking.

The actual weekly show is on a Wednesday on BBC1.

What is on BBC2 is 'An Extra Slice'.

So, two series links needed or, as the TiVo gurus would say, a single Wishlist.

Happy baking.

[Kushan]

Originally Posted by RobboEdin

Kushan, Just so you don't miss your fix of baking.

The actual weekly show is on a Wednesday on BBC1.

What is on BBC2 is 'An Extra Slice'.

So, two series links needed or, as the TiVo gurus would say, a single Wishlist.

Happy baking.

Ahhh you are quite correct! I knew it was on Wednesday, I don't know why I keep getting Tuesday stuck in my head (I'm sure it used to be on a Tuesday). Didn't know about the "extra slice" bit though! Cheers.

[spiderplant]

Originally Posted by denphone

And even after 2019 l cannot see that changing as why change to a dud STB.

Both TiVo and Horizon will need replacing long before that. STB chipsets only have a production life of 3 to 5 years.

[Kushan]

Possibly wishful thinking, but I'd love them to integrate Android TV into the next generation boxes. Doubt it'll happen, sadly.

[denphone]

Originally Posted by spiderplant

Both TiVo and Horizon will need replacing long before that. STB chipsets only have a production life of 3 to 5 years.

So are we talking about TiVo 2 the next generation?.

[Ignitionnet]

Originally Posted by Media Boy

With UPC Netherlands looking set to be rebranded as Ziggo in Holland I think Liberty Global may also think about rebrand UPC Ireland as Virgin Media Ireland.

I don't think it's up to Liberty what is branded as Virgin Media. The agreements cover ex-ntl/Telewest. Liberty can't just take the name and do as they please with it.

Liberty spent a long time slowly migrating UPC Ireland from ntl to UPC, too.

---------- Post added at 12:57 ---------- Previous post was at 12:52 ----------

Originally Posted by Top banana

Yes, I said about, actual is 37%, VM actual 66.1%, point was that it's an area for growth if Sky can find a way of driving take up. It's currently growing at 2% per annum, although this should accelerate with the free BB offers etc

Obvious way for Sky to drive take up is to invest in their own access network, which they are looking at through various trials, rather than using the same network as every other xDSL ISP. Comparing Sky's 38Mb for £20/month, requires phone line at £15.40/month, and 76Mb for £30/month, requires phone line at £15.40/month, with VM. It's not flattering - VM deliver 152Mb + phone line for less than Sky sell half that speed, and 100Mb for a quid a month more than Sky sell 38Mb.

---------- Post added at 13:00 ---------- Previous post was at 12:57 ----------

Originally Posted by nn012

Sky do the same now when reporting RGUs. It helps them report increasing numbers while their TV business has saturated. I'm aware they have been increasing TV additions but this includes Now TV subscribers which they don't provide actual numbers for.

Cable companies and, in turn, Sky once they started offering telco and DSL, have all done this. An RGU is any product a customer has purchased that, well, generates revenue. A single household can happily be a 4 RGU property if taking mobile as well as fixed-line.

[spiderplant]

Originally Posted by denphone

So are we talking about TiVo 2 the next generation?.

Don't know at the moment. It's being looked at.

[GrimUpNorth]

Originally Posted by Ignitionnet

Cable companies and, in turn, Sky once they started offering telco and DSL, have all done this. An RGU is any product a customer has purchased that, well, generates revenue. A single household can happily be a 4 RGU property if taking mobile as well as fixed-line.

I'm sure they would happily describe our household as a 5 RGU property - TV, internet, fixed-line and 2 No. mobiles - all 5 services are in my name, in years gone by when I paid for our daughters mobile it would have been 6! I'm also pretty certain there are plenty of people out there who are counted even more times than I am!

Cheers

Grim

[denphone]

Originally Posted by spiderplant

Don't know at the moment. It's being looked at.

Thy lips are sealed one suspects.

[muppetman11]

Originally Posted by Ignitionnet

Obvious way for Sky to drive take up is to invest in their own access network, which they are looking at through various trials, rather than using the same network as every other xDSL ISP. Comparing Sky's 38Mb for £20/month, requires phone line at £15.40/month, and 76Mb for £30/month, requires phone line at £15.40/month, with VM. It's not flattering - VM deliver 152Mb + phone line for less than Sky sell half that speed, and 100Mb for a quid a month more than Sky sell 38Mb.

Couldn't have put it any better , its far easier for a Sky telephone/BB customer to migrate their service away to the likes of BT , Plusnet , Talk Talk etc.

If Sky could start to build its own fibre network and become less reliant on Openreach I'm sure it would pay dividends long term.

[Kushan]

I think the problem with that is how long that "long term" aspect is. There's probably no point in rolling out anything other than pure fibre at this point for a totally new network and that's not cheap to do.

[Ignitionnet]

Originally Posted by Kushan

I think the problem with that is how long that "long term" aspect is. There's probably no point in rolling out anything other than pure fibre at this point for a totally new network and that's not cheap to do.

It costs no more than anything else for a completely new network. Rolling out anything besides FTTP would be a bizarre decision.

I can understand VM deploying deep fibre HFC in areas which are getting tacked onto existing network or even just extending the existing coax but where they are doing new new build I would expect them to be deploying FTTP. It costs less than HFC to deploy and less to run, no need for any active hardware or cabinets in the field, everything can go underground in chambers. Only thing that's more expensive is installs to properties due to the kit needed within the property.

---------- Post added at 14:25 ---------- Previous post was at 14:25 ----------

Originally Posted by muppetman11

Couldn't have put it any better , its far easier for a Sky telephone/BB customer to migrate their service away to the likes of BT , Plusnet , Talk Talk etc.

If Sky could start to build its own fibre network and become less reliant on Openreach I'm sure it would pay dividends long term.

Possibly but it's a case of how long term you'd look. £1,000 per property, whether connected or not, is ouchy.