Dish Networks India

A user Gopal Krishnan posted this on the forums, I thought it would be good to post it on the main website:

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Many of you will be having this dilemma.

The barrage of advertisements wont do any good either.
You can go by your neighbour’s decision and feel safe or may be you can take your own decision.

I hope my experience will help.

Wanted to take DTH, because cable quality was pathetic and they kept wanting more money. Initially wanted to take dish TV since they have packages. But i found a lot of complaints in this forum regarding customer service. And Tata is a respected brand. Hence the dilemma.

1].But dishtv has been here for two years or so and naturally they might be having more user complaints. So i was not realy scared by that alone.

2].Visit a demo of both. That is very important.

3].The remote: I felt the the remote of tata is too bulky. This is one stuff that you are going to use continously. You dont want have a brick in your hand. Dish TV remote is very handy. [why cant they have a remote locator switch on the TV or set top box like for cordless phones? I keep misplacing the the remotes [now 5 of them!]

4] Interface: changing from one channel to another [which you will be doing every five minutes or so!] is rather clumsy in tata sky. one Big blue banner appears in which you can select and you have to push another button to let it dissappear. very annoying! [the dish blue banner dissappears on its own quickly although i still wish it was more subtle or if there was an option to hide it altogether] Also there is a disturbing bright blue screen which appears for a moment between channels, as they are changed, which is disturbing. [DishTV screen is black between channels like in many tvs and is better. Why cant they have channels that change instantly like in old tvs?] Also i like the way you can arrange favourite channels. [may be there in sky TV, i dont know]

5]picture quality is the same in both. nothing to select there.

6] you have to pay for the wire from your terrace to TV for dishTV[ Rs 10 for every meter and you have to pay around 150] relocation fee for tata is 1000. less for dish.

7] Sun TV channels are available only in dish as of now.

8] packages are available only in dish as of now. I took maxi [everything for 300 a month] Six months free in dish and three in tata.

I selected Dish TV they installed within 24 hours and i had no problems till now. [1 month now]. Havent had the oppurtunity to call in their customer service. so i cant tell you anything about that. Hope it remians that way!

i went for dish because of the remote and the way you change and select channels which were more user friendly.

Please do see both at a demo or better at a house where it is installed and try changing channels and go through the menu etc and decide for yourself which is user friendly. Costs are almost the same and hope they come down. They will, once Reliance comes in!

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Thank you Gopal for such a wonderful guide!

Mr. Channel

SaveOnDish.com launches Discussion forums at www.saveondish.com/forum/ for all its visitors, you can now go to the forums and talk about Tata Sky, Dish TV, Reliance BlueMagic, Bharti Airtel and all other DTH networks in India.

You can use the forum for:

• Registering your complaints against DTH Networks
• Voicing out your consumer opinion
• Giving your highly valued opinion on the DTH service you use
• Helping others in need
• Reading tips, tricks, get arounds etc. like catching FTA channels on your STB, downloading games on your device and more.
• Reading guides posted by members
• Get Customer support

We have initiated talks with the customer support of Tata Sky and DishTV and their customer support officials will be regularly coming to the forums to answer your questions and queries if you post them in the forum, they will also offer you online customer support!

Following are the links to the categories inside the forum:

• Tata Sky Forum
• Dish TV Forum
• Reliance Blue Magic Forum
• Bharti Airtel Forum

All you need to do to post is to register here

So if you have any complaint against your Dish Provider, have a suggestion for them, need customer support from Dish TV or Tata Sky or just want to give your consumer opinion on your DTH provider, just go the forum and do it!

I received this Rant as a comment, but I felt it deserves to be a seperate article.

This is NOT my article, it was written by Nanur of Kolkata about the poor service and signal quality he received from Tata Sky staff in Kolkata

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TATASKY AND THE DTH GO TO HELLLLL
Nanur, Kolkata

They have totally cheated us here in CAS affected Kolkata at least.I (a resident of CAS affected locality in KOLKATA) bought two tatasky digicomps(as part of my multiroom service) on the 28th DEC 2006 and was told that it would be installed the next day AND YOU KNOW WHAT ? It took them over 10 days to install it (after repeated reminders amounting to over 30 phone calls to their helpline numbers which are NOT toll-free).

For most of my neighbours, who ironically bought the service, have a similar harrowing story to tell. (for many of them, it took nearly 15 days to installthe dish antenna and others..) The picture quality of a number of the channels (esp. ZEE group of channels and also HBO) leaves a lot to be desired.The picture quality of ALL the ZEE channels and HBO are of poor quality VCD.

After comparing with the quality offered by our local cable operator’s set-top box I can definitely state that the quality of these channels are far better in my neighbours set-top boxes. And STEREO SOUND ???

I have fitted the logitech THX certified speakers to the digicomps and even tried the old and faithful headphones. Only ’star movies’ offers somewhat good quality stereo sound. For the rest, I can say the sound quality is no doubt stereo,but clarity is not so superior as claimed -mainly ’FM quality’.

And after it all, I found that I am not able to watch the Ind-W.Indies cricket matches- just because all on a sudden NEO-SPORTS disappeared from their network. On the 21st January 2007,the day of the ind-W.Indies first one-dayer we tried contacting the helpline at least 20 times, but nobody responded.

My local cable operator CAS based set top box delivers better picture quality of most of the channels, not to mention that all my neighbours are able to view all the cricket matches (NEO-SPORTS is available there).

Moreover there are no good english movies/music channels (Hallmark, Zee MGM, B4U etc) and no foreign language channels in the so called ’superior technology’ DTH service- all of which are available in my neighbours set-top box of the local cable operator- all at a much cheaper rate too. I have heard that Hallmark was available about 4 months back but suddenly disappeared from their network.

A large majority of the 100+ channels which TATASKY show us are the regional language channels which are mostly free to air I do not think that I require so many channels of other states.

The same applies to people in other states too-say a person in Gujrat-shall he require so many Tamil/Kannada/Oriya etc channels ? In this respect I am to state that here in Kolkata, our local cable operator offers 9 bengali channels; Tatasky offers only five.

In order to hide so many deficiencies, Tatasky is advertising so much about the so called ’active sports/active news’ and the absolutely nonsense ’showcase’.

WHAT IS THE USE OF ’ACTIVE SPORTS’ IF , DESPITE PAYING THE PREMIUM, YOU ARE NOT ABLE TO VIEW THE POPULAR SPORTING EVENTS BEING HELD IN OUR OWN COUNTRY - TAKE FOR EXAMPLE THE INDIA-WEST INDIES SERIES? Going by their service, I would not be surprised that by the time the WORLD CUP arrives, ESPN-STAR SPORTS too all on a sudden disappears from their network.

Moreover would a subscriber pay 300 bucks per month for only entertaining their children with the video games provided in the package ? And about their showcase ??!!? It is simply an advertising gimmick- how many people would, I wonder spend Rs.75/- to see a movie JUST FOR ONE DAY and that too only a few restricted hindi movies, no English?!?

In this respect I can compare Tatasky parallel to a mobile service operator who advertises a lot about the ringtones they offer, but is mum about the coverage area.

For an average customer what matters is the quantity and quality of channels which the provider should give. For quality, tatasky is satisfactory, but for quantity— too much overpriced.

I therefore feel that in CAS areas like us in kolkata, the public must stick to their faithful old cable operator, instead of jumping to the traps of DTH cheats like TATASKY ( which inspite of the ’towering advertisements- claiming to be superior to the cablewallahs’ are simply tall talks ) - who I feel, should be dragged to the consumers courts.

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4 Responses to “ A Tata Sky Rant (Kolkata) ”

Comments:

1. Dimu says:
   January 28th, 2007 at 3:53 pm Well my experience in email support is great. They normally reply within 24 hours.
   Also Neo Sports is back on air now.
   ESPN or Star Sports won’t dissapear from Tata Sky as they belong to Star network & they are the Co- Partners of Tata Sky
2. Mr. Channel says:
   January 28th, 2007 at 3:59 pm Hmm I wonder why Star Movies is missing from Tata Sky? When the Star Network is a partner, they should provide all the channels, right?
3. Atul Kumar Rohatgi says:
   February 1st, 2007 at 10:50 pm My experience with TATASKY was not so great. After installation on 10 Jan, the digicom became defective on 25th.(1-238860649 comp no.)
   This could not be repaired till 30Jan evening, inspite of several reminders and telephone calls when i decided to to go back to cable TV.
   Now i am waiting for refunds.
   Not what i may call exciting
4. Mr. Channel says:
   February 4th, 2007 at 8:36 am Thats sad to know Atul, really…

   There is a huge contrast in the customer service offered by Tata… all over the country.

   Where are you from? and if you could elaborate further that’d help more.

Many people ask me as of late that what are the good things about Tata Sky? So I decided to compile a guide to the features of Tata Sky that actually stand out from the rest of the Dish Networks in India. This list of Tata Sky’s special features and… of course features which Tata Sky does offer normally.

• 120 Channels (November 2006): Tata Sky boosts 120 channels under its kitty but its still missing a lot of channels which DishTV offers, although it is very much clear that DishTV offers those channels already because it is the senior player in this game as compared to Tata Sky. Although Tata Sky has been EXTREMELY quick to pick up considering the fact that Tata Sky was launched quite later and DishTV was very slow to add new channels.

• No Channel Alteration: This is one thing I like about Tata Sky, the fact that Tata Sky seldom changes the CHANNEL NUMBERS of the channels they offer, DishTV does it for all the time except for Zee Channels (Primarily because DishTV’s parent company, the Essel Group, CEO Subhash Chandra, owns Zee Network as well) and I am seriously fed up of the way I have to search for the channel I want on DishTV after an update, but this is not a cause of concern with Tata Sky absolutely. Tata Sky gets full marks over here.

• SEVEN DAY Program Schedules: Another big plus point with Tata Sky is the fact that you can go browse the Schedules of the programs on different channels (all of them actually) even SEVEN days in advance or less. DishTV as far as I know never offered anything like this, I mean to say a period like SEVEN days here, DishTV can go up to maximum of 24 hours forward and back, but this feature with Tata Sky is just incredible.

• EPG standalone usage: This may sound like a technical term, although it isn’t. EPG means Episode Guide or Everyday Program Guide I believe, anyways, so there is this feature on Tata Sky that allows you to check out what is on a particular channel without changing the channel you are watching, now no more missouts! What a great thing this is which the Tata Sky team sorted out, I am lead to believe that this is one of the most user friendly things ever! Not to mention, DishTV doesn’t offer this at all.

• Multiple Screen Feature: I don’t get the fact that why isn’t DishTV offering this thing? and why haven’t DishTV ever offered this as well? This is such a basic thing, and to tell you readers, I must say that why should we spend a few extra thousand rupees just to have a multiple screen feature on our Television set? (I bet you people remember those advertisements where the TV companies show in their advertisements that they have this new and cool multiple screen feature so their television is now going to cost you a few thousand rupees extra JUST FOR THIS ONE FEATURE. All it has to do is with software, hardware is the same. Now when we have DishTV, which is all in all software based and remotely upgradable as well! So why can’t DishTV offer this facility? But Tata Sky has an answer for this and therefore they are offering us a Multiple Screen Feature service, you can watch up to four channels simultaneously and choose whatever audio you want to! All this at no extra cost as well.

• Active Wizkids Interactive channel: DishTV may be offering a lot of Interactive channels and so is Tata Sky, but the channel Tata Sky stands out at here is the Active Wizkids Interactive learning channel for kids, where kids can go play some games which will also help them in learning something new through the method of games! Things couldn’t get better for kids when its Tata Sky! It was actually good to see that the Tata Sky people do have some creativity to stand out, even if it was just one little channel and that too for little people, but Tata Sky has SUCCESSFULLY stood out from the crowd over here.

• Superior Hardware and Customer Support: Now this is one thing that people are rooting at Tata sky for, the great quality for Hardware which they are selling to their customers as well as their awesome customer support, the good thing about their hardware is that it doesn’t fade out when there are weather problems, it doesn’t have sun outages, it doesn’t have any kind of a blurred picture when the the winds blow, neither does the signal fade out at Tata Sky when there are rains, it seldom happens and if it does, it has something to do with you and not the Dish which Tata Sky has provided. Also if some issue comes up and you need support, Tata Sky Customer support is always more than willing to come help you out as soon as possible. Something I have always seemed to have missed at dishTV, no real customer support, they come to your house days after your request. But Tata Sky has a 24 hours thing which doesn’t let them go late no matter what. Signal quality has also always been great at Tata Sky, with signal strength reaching to the extremes of 90-95%, nothing ever achieved in DishTV as far as I know.

So yeah Tata Sky has many good points to cheer about, and they are also better than DishTV in a lot of ways, I have only tried to specify some points here, but there are many more as well. Although one shouldn’t be unjust which is why I will be putting in the features glossary of DD DTH as well as DishTV pretty soon as well complete with reasons as to why you should choose them over the other alternatives around in the market.
Be optimistic though! There might come a day when all of these services become the same and then we do get to see some sort of a real competition between all these people, errm I mean these companies, the STB and DTH providers. We might be up for Hardware replacements, software overhaulings and don’t know what else! So yeah once again got to say! Be optimistic people! Thanks for reading

Mr. Channel

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15 Responses to “ Tata Sky Features ”

Comments:

1. Rahul says:
   December 11th, 2006 at 5:39 am Our adapter conked out in 3 days after the system got installed. The TataSky Field Service and Customer Support is so disconnected that it took them 2 days to even get their engg to check out what the problem is. Its been 5 days since we have had TV…and I thought TataSky would be better than Dish !!!
2. bipin says:
   December 11th, 2006 at 7:40 am tata is much costly , they should anounce a small package which suitable for top to bottom public
3. anupam says:
   January 2nd, 2007 at 3:51 am Multiple screen feature in Tata Sky!! Who told you that - it’s there only for some fixed channels.
   Seven day program schedule!! My tata sky connection (Bangalore) does not show me more than one day of schedule. And unlike Hathway, if I were to opt for a full screen program guide, there’s no window showing the current channel.
   Outages!! Actually, rare. It;s just that right now I was getting a “No Signal” error and decided to search for it in google - and landed up on this site.
   Picture quality is excellent - and some channels even have digital sound - though these channels have “Tata Sky” logo watermarked in them for some reason. I really look forward to better outputs in the setup box than composite/analog audio though, and support for digital video recorder - which I hear dish tv has…
4. Junjunb Khan says:
   January 2nd, 2007 at 3:56 am on 2nd jan 2007 today, suddenly the signals to tatasky stopped, all their call center numbers are busy, and no information on the status is available on their website.

   we as costomers can audjest with any techenical problem but atleast they should keep us informed.

   Tatasky sadly has got very slow, uninformed, and unmotivated team of people working for it.

5. jadoo says:
   January 6th, 2007 at 12:23 am TATA SKY - Big Mistake.
   1. They do not have a toll free number and one only if u use MTNL/BSNL - do not take tata sky if u do not want govt monopoly.
   2. Got the box on the 31st Dec and now 6th still no sign of the dish etc.
   3. TATA has very poor after sales record [historically] i don’t understand what went wrong in my head i bot tata sky.
   4. If they do not show up today i will return the set top box to the dealer - good thing i used my credit card.

   DO NOT BUY TATA SKY - IF U WANT PEACE OF MIND

   cheers

6. abhishek says:
   January 11th, 2007 at 1:21 am TATA SKY is the best… it rules…
7. Dimu says:
   January 14th, 2007 at 10:56 am Although I saw on many sites that Neo Sports is available on Tata Sky,as at today (14/01/2007) it’s not appear on my channel list.

   Does anyone getting it?

8. sanjay says:
   January 16th, 2007 at 2:16 am hi,

   tata sky is sick … it is like dumping your money in shit.

   booked on 7th and they ayet to install on 16th .

   confirmed me 9th installation . will come back with more problems if any once the unit is installed.

   wachout guys.

9. James says:
   February 4th, 2007 at 10:34 pm one thing strikes me about TataSky and that is they are not giving sufficient amount of information about their product.There aren’t any booklets available at the dealers(they by themself don’t know about the product) and even their website sucks!!.Another thing i got a coupen in Reader digest of last month for a copy of booklet informing about their product guide, the free copy will delivered to only thoes who has the coupen else u gotta purchase fuck!!.i mean who gonna purchase that garbage for nothing.
10. prakash chandra panda says:
    February 9th, 2007 at 12:37 pm I think Tatasky is best cable TV Networks in India. There is Nothing after TataSky. But one draw back is that it has no internet facility. I think Tatasky should deeply consider about this matter.
    from
    Prakash Panda
11. sunil says:
    February 21st, 2007 at 4:37 am I dont understand how companies like this survive. Are the people in India so lazy to raise their voice for their own self. We just take anything that comes out to the market. And that’s the reason why companies sails shits at the cost of gold.

    Tata Sky sucks. The website is the biggest bull-shit. No relevant information is available. People are more intrested in the quality of service than dump of some pig.

12. Jaishankar says:
    February 28th, 2007 at 3:03 am Hi,

    It was sad to say that tata sky don’t have a helpline number of tamilnadu. Although they have a tataindicom phone. If anyone wants to make a call to customer care they should use only bsnl/mtnl what happend to TATAINDICOM especially people in tamilnadu have to make a STD to other state number. TATAINDICOM don’t have a chennai helpline number.

    One important thing i would like to discuss is we all from South India especially from Tamilnadu. We would like to watch tamil music and filims but we don’t have that option. we are watching only jaya and vijaya. what happend to sun tv even if it is cases why not raj and other tamil channels.

    What happend to packages in Tamilnadu. We got only super saver pack. Is it possible for middle class people to invest 300 rupees on montyly basis. We request the tata group to comeup with some economical plan.

    I hope they do so.

    tanks
    Jaishankar

13. viral says:
    March 29th, 2007 at 12:17 pm tata sky is not shoing the charges after instollaion, if after 2 days their is the problem in hadware or dish thy will chared for reparing .you want to change the space they charged up to 1000.rs. can any one bilev it. then after in the form they given a point that if the party does not renual they will take the hardwear.it is very bad.
14. Ravi says:
    April 7th, 2007 at 4:03 pm Dishtv is a sick, they don’t reply ur message. very poor service.
    ravi
15. vasanth says:
    May 15th, 2007 at 2:33 pm SUN NETWORK is not avaiable in tatsky tdsat has already fixed 11 may as for final hearing .but still the case is pending in court tdsat are careless they should order sun to give signals to tatasky at al a carte bases at 50% of that of cable rates

    for further update in this case visit

    http://www.tdsat.nic.in/orders.htm

Movies on Demand are a regular feature of Tata Sky as well as DishTV, they update their movies section every week, its like, they make a movie available for you, then… you order it through your mobile phone or through giving their special landline number a call.

However these movies cost you Rs. 40 on DishTV and Rs. 80 on Tata Sky, expensive? Yes of course they are expensive, but after all their reasoning for this is that you can have as many people view the movie as you want, and you get about 48 hours viewing the movie. But Rs. 40-80 for a movie viewing on Television just doesn’t sound great. Reasons?

• The General mentality: Movie will come free to air after a while anyways
• Lack of the Theatre effect: Now you know what I am talking about
• Last but not the least, NO POPCORN!

Movie on Demand, just doesn’t fit in the normal guy’s criteria, although I have an Idea for you DTH people, if you can provide people with a library of movies for anytime viewing and slash the rates to Rs. 20/-, and cut down the viewing time to 24 hours. You can really start earning from this.

Maybe the DTH people will read this entry of mine afterall and make changes for all of us, who knows, Be optimistic!

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One Response to “ Movies on Demand, toooooooo costly? ”

Comments:

1. Mr.Payer says:
   January 19th, 2007 at 7:47 am The DTH Broadcasters are exploiting the rural as well as urban people.

   In complete in a sense that the rental is also very high. For Dish welcome package Dish TV charges i.e “Rs.240+Taxes=262″ which is quite impossible for the rural viewers. They are also pushing for the Dish Maxi package which will cost a bomb i.e. more than Rs. 300/-. But the Customer care says that “If u will pay a little more than dish welcome package then u r getting 160 channels.”

   u see nobody will watch all the channels at a time in a single TV, secondly, such channels include so many regional channels which should not be in count.

   u can’t watch more than one TV (if u want than u have to add Rs.100/- per TV) which is just ridiculous. One can get more facility from the local cable operator. But what to do with the local area people.

   They must have to pay for those regional & international language channels , even though they don’t understand.

   It should be in a manner that one should pay only for the required channels but not for all channels (Like Conditional Access System). Otherwise the packages should be revised, like in the current package selection no one can choose all the English Channels / Kids Channels / Movie Channels. Also most of the channels have been wiped out like: SaharaOne, Sahara Filmy, Boomerang, CCTV, Australia Network (ABC Asia Pacific), AXN (Banned by the regularity Authority) etc.

   I hope the management will cut down the monthly rentals & may consider the above factors.

Internet on your very own STB, how cool would that be, instead of getting bored watching TV, you can just decide to surf your favorite websites, this is not just a possibility, but is something that is very possible in the future.

If your mobile phone can have internet with a little Data Card inserted into it, why can’t your Television, with DSL access to the Satellite through the STB, provide you High Speed internet? It is very possible, and has been done numerous times in other countries.

So you can just expect that Internet is on its way! After DishTV is done with its new updates and Playjam, and after Tata Sky is done adding all its channels, we will be entitled for THE Internet on our STBs, of course typing etc. wouldn’t be this easy, but who knows? Maybe people will become better typists on their remotes!

Be optimistic

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3 Responses to “ Internet… is possible! ”

Comments:

1. Vijay says:
   January 4th, 2007 at 10:47 am Well dont know…Internet is heavily two-way trafic.. Where as TV is totally one way …Quality of internet on mobile AFA what I have seen is not too good…
2. ravinder singh says:
   February 20th, 2007 at 6:15 pm dear sir,
   i want buy tata sky dish.i want know
   that internet on tata sky dish. plz send fully detail
3. Md.Muqthadeer Parwaiz says:
   May 5th, 2007 at 4:28 pm Dear Sir/MadamIs it possible that we will have high speed internet and wirless digital television through one instalation on a PC if so will it be affordable for comman people of INDIA.

   Thanks

   Parwaiz

With the launch of Tata Sky, it has quickly become the most rivalled competitor to DishTV, judging from the reviews by different people about it, it can be quickly assumed that Tata Sky is far ahead of DishTV in terms of customer friendliness, cost effectiveness and Service Quality.

I don’t know the current rates, but getting DishTV cost me almost Rs. 10k, however the Tata Sky can be got for a mere Rs. 4k, therefore I believe it is cost effective. Also its monthly package is less in costs compared to DishTV, but I believe DishTV will cut down the prices seeing that the monopoly time is over.

People have also told me that the Tata Sky Dish is actually very small in size compared to the DishTV dish, can’t vouch for the fact’s accuracy, but if it is true, then Tata goes many steps ahead of Dish here.

Will blog much more about it in the coming times!