General : Changes to Virgin TV (2022)

Originally Posted by 1701-e

I just stubbed my toe and Alexa started playing Piers Morgan’s new TV show. (Gary Delaney)

[Rillington]

Originally Posted by vincerooney

especially funny because NBC News Now has launched on virgin media and if you wanted your fix of american news youve just gone over there. CNN literally moved out to make more money and their competitors have just strolled in. I also found the CBS app fairly decent which i purely went to look for after CNN decided to leave haha

Yes but CNN is an international news channel which only broadcasts its domestic service for a few hours each day whereas NBC News Now is a full rebroadcast of the domestic service.

[RichardCoulter]

I wonder which bright spark at Virgin thought it'd be a good idea to remove BBC1 AD & BBC2 AD for sight impaired people with no notice whatsoever.

Blind people will have been wondering why their channels were silent and their recordings inaccessible until this was corrected.

[garethf1927]

Originally Posted by RichardCoulter

I wonder which bright spark at Virgin thought it'd be a good idea to remove BBC1 AD & BBC2 AD for sight impaired people with no notice whatsoever.

Blind people will have been wondering why their channels were silent and their recordings inaccessible until this was corrected.

I have an audio track on my boxes telling me how to turn on AD. I'm sure VM will have written in Braille to their customers who get Braille bills to tell them of this

[cheekyangus]

Originally Posted by garethf1927

I have an audio track on my boxes telling me how to turn on AD. I'm sure VM will have written in Braille to their customers who get Braille bills to tell them of this

Same. There is an information slate/audio loop on both Ch 851 and Ch 852 that tells you about the change and how to enable Audio Description on Ch101 and Ch102.

---------- Post added at 09:16 ---------- Previous post was at 09:06 ----------

All the PSB channels that have a service in 850s have Audio Description enabled on their main instance now, so the 850 range channels are now redundant for their intended purpose.

With these closures I think it's just a matter of time now before the remaining channels in the 850s close.

[RichardCoulter]

Originally Posted by garethf1927

I have an audio track on my boxes telling me how to turn on AD. I'm sure VM will have written in Braille to their customers who get Braille bills to tell them of this

There is now (which is what I meant by iit eventually being corrected).

I wouldn't be too sure about them writing to those who receive bills in braille, they've been featured on the BBC for the shocking way they treat blind people.

Richard, if you’re going to vilify a company, it’s only polite and proper to provide links substantiating your negative comments.

[nodrogd]

BBC1 & BBC2 AD channels on 851 & 852 have now been removed from the network, as has the Metadata that supports any recordings.

Not that significant really, but will disappoint those wanting to minimise recording space by recording in SD.

[epsilon]

Originally Posted by nodrogd

BBC1 & BBC2 AD channels on 851 & 852 have now been removed from the network, as has the Metadata that supports any recordings.

Not that significant really, but will disappoint those wanting to minimise recording space by recording in SD.

Well, not quite. Older recordings may have been inaccessible for a while after the AD channels were removed from the EPG but should have become available again as the channels went into end of service placeholder status.

---------- Post added at 12:34 ---------- Previous post was at 12:28 ----------

Originally Posted by cheekyangus

Same. There is an information slate/audio loop on both Ch 851 and Ch 852 that tells you about the change and how to enable Audio Description on Ch101 and Ch102.

For Tivo and V6 boxes, yes. 360 boxes have a similar slideshow / audio loop on channel 851 advising how to use voice commands to enable audio description for BBC One although, seemingly, nothing on channel 852 to advise how to enable AD for BBC Two. Odd!

All the PSB channels that have a service in 850s have Audio Description enabled on their main instance now, so the 850 range channels are now redundant for their intended purpose.

With these closures I think it's just a matter of time now before the remaining channels in the 850s close.

What will we all do without an ITV London feed?

[1701-e]

Originally Posted by epsilon

What will we all do without an ITV London feed?

It was useful whenever we got shafted with rubbish regional stuff

[nodrogd]

Originally Posted by epsilon

Well, not quite. Older recordings may have been inaccessible for a while after the AD channels were removed from the EPG but should have become available again as the channels went into end of service placeholder status.[COLOR="Silver"]

There is a complaint on the VM Community boards today that recordings made on these channels are not working.

[ozsat]

They did stop for a while - but should be OK now.

Originally Posted by nodrogd

There is a complaint on the VM Community boards today that recordings made on these channels are not working.

[RichardCoulter]

Originally Posted by ozsat

They did stop for a while - but should be OK now.

True, but imagine how confused a person with a severe sight impairment will have been.

I tried to watch a recording from the AD channels and was met with a message saying that the recording was no longer available because Virgin no longer carried the channel and gave an option to delete it.

I was going to, but i'm glad I didn't as they then became accessible again.

Someone with no useable sight will have had no chance of understanding what was going on.

---------- Post added at 22:42 ---------- Previous post was at 22:36 ----------

Originally Posted by nodrogd

BBC1 & BBC2 AD channels on 851 & 852 have now been removed from the network, as has the Metadata that supports any recordings.

Not that significant really, but will disappoint those wanting to minimise recording space by recording in SD.

I am one of them. The AD feeds were useful to save on disc space. I've spoken to my contact today because i'm not happy at all about this and they said they would have to speak to the office manager and will ring me tomorrow, so we'll see what happens.

Due to health issues i've built up a backlog of various dramas and recording in SD allowed me to stay under the limit before it started deleting stuff. Now i'm chasing my tail and have had to delete some programmes that I did want to watch.

I don't even think they were using up any capacity, weren't they pointing to a duplicate stream??

[epsilon]

Originally Posted by RichardCoulter

I don't even think they were using up any capacity, weren't they pointing to a duplicate stream??

Originally, they shared video / audio streams with the national BBC 1 London / BBC 2 England (& Scotland) SD streams. When the national SD streams were replaced with HD versions, the AD channels were the only services using those streams.

[RichardCoulter]

Originally Posted by epsilon

Originally, they shared video / audio streams with the national BBC 1 London / BBC 2 England (& Scotland) SD streams. When the national SD streams were replaced with HD versions, the AD channels were the only services using those streams.

Thanks for explaining