Thought of buying Satellite TV but got this instead

[desiibond]

First, went to local dealer that gives all satellite TV connections. The channels that I regularly watch are:

Channel V
9X Music
VH1

HBO
STAR Movies
SAB Pix
ZEE Cafe
UTV World Movies

ESPN
STAR Sports
NEO Sports
TEN Sports

NDTV channels
CNN IBN

Gemini
etv
maa tv
Teja

I already have local cable connection and I do feel that their support is lot more better than that of Airtel
And to get all these channels, I have to pay 400 bucks per month for any satellite TV provider.
Yes, some all the satellite TV brands are giving one year subscription free but after that, you need to pay premium to get all the channels that I had mentioned.
So, I called my local cablewallah and asked if he can provide a set top box. After 15 minutes, there is serivce engineer waiting outside my house with STB pack. (not satellite TV but the usual STB that these guys give).
Cost: 699/- (100% refundable)
Company: Digitelly
Monthly rental for my cablewalla: Rs.250/-
PC Tuner I am using : Tech-Com SSD-TV-670.
The STB has two connectivity options:
1) Red-White-Yellow RCA
2) analogue passthrough which sends the cable signal without procesing to good old analogue in of TV Tuner. (no use for this one as STB will be a non-functional box in this case)
Tech-Com SSD-TV-670
Price: Rs.750
Ports:
1) Remote cable port
2) Audio: Line Out and Line In
3) S-Video
4) Composite Video in
5) CATV (to connect cable)
Connected Video directly to card's Composite Video in. Installed the bundled application.
Result:
Video: Am getting video in 16:10 aspect ratio without any setup. As I said earlier, the video quality is just amazing. Even Doordarshan channels are coming without any noise in the picture.
Audio: Lot better. Instead of connecting the audio to TV Tuner’s audio in, I connected the same to Creative Live 24-bit soundcard’s Line in. The audio clarity too increased a lot.

Moreover, I can set favourites, view guide, do scheduled recording (using tv card), browse channels using TV Guide, play games that are built into TB, no channel sapping by cable walla.

List of channels I get now:

STAR Plus
STAR One
STAR World
STAR Gold
STAR Movies
STAR News
STAR Cricket
STAR Sports
ESPN
Colors
Zee TV
Zee Sports
Zee Business
Zee News
Zee Smile
Zee Café
Zee Trendz
Zee Studio
Zee Cinema
SET Pix
SET Max
Filmy
Bindas Movies
UTV Movies
Hallmark
World Movies
Sony TV
SAB TV
Sahara One
9X
NDTV Imagine
Bindaas
Zoom
ETV Rajashan
DD National
DD India
DD Bharathi
Discovery Travel & Living
AXN
NDTV Good Times
Fashion TV
IBN 7
NDTV India
Aaj Tak
Sahara NCR
Live India
New24
DD News
CNN IBN
Times Now
NDTV 24x7
9X News
Headlines Today
CNBC
NDTV Profit
UTV News
BBC World
CNN
ABC
Nick
Hungama
Toon Disney
Disney
Cartoon Network
Pogo
Animax
Cbeebies
Neo Sports
Neo Cricket
DD Sports
National Geographic
History
Discovery
Animal Planet
Home Shop 18
Voyages
MTV
Channel V
Etc
9X Music
B4U Music
SS Music
Yo Music
VH1
Aastha
Sadhana
Sanskar
Satsang
STAR Vijay
Sun TV
KTV
Sun News
Sun Music
Chutti TV
Jaya TV
Raj TV
Makkal TV
WinTV India
Kalingar TV
Raj News
Jaya Max
Vasanth TV
Raj Music
Imayam TV
Isal Aruvi
DD Podhigai
Gemini
Teja
Etv
Etv2
Maa TV
Zee Telugu
TV9 Telugu
MAA Music
SVBC
DD Sapthagiri
ETC Punjabi
DD Punjabi
Udaya TV
Udaya Movies
Udaya Varthegalu
Udaya 2
Etv Kannada
Zee Kannada
Asianet Suvarna
TV9 Kannada
Kasturi TV
Suvarna News
Ice6 news
Ice6
DD Chandana
Etv Bangla
Zee Bangla
Akaash Bangla
Surya TV
Kiran TV
Asianet
Asianet Plus
Kairali TV
God TV
Manorama News
Asianet News
Kairali People
Amrutha TV
India Vision
Jeevan TV
DD Malayalam
Etv Gujarati
Zee Gujarati
DD Gujarati
STAR Majha
Etv Marathi
Zee Marathi
DD Sahyadri
Etv Oriya
Angel TV
Etv Urdu
Nepal 1
TV5
Qtv

**Channels I am getting after setting up STB are in Bold
Total number of channels: 165
I would say that this is total VFM. In reality I haven’t paid anything as I can get full money back after returning the STB. Now I am determined that I will not suggest satellite to TV to anyone.

[Charan]

Yes Digital Signals over local cable is VFM, Our local cable wallas have become smart, realising that DTH will kill their business, they are comming up with schemes which are on par with the quality of DTH. Even I use STB from Hathway and I am very happy with their service.

[acewin]

+1 for STB from Hathway, the only con of the cable connection is they are analog but with STB its better result.

I have tried Umax TV Tuner with local cable(no STB) the result was good except for low resolution. I think it was 800x640 max or less maybe

Currently do not have any cable connection.
So I will ask what res are you guys getting

[desiibond]

I think 720x576 expanded to 1440x900

[iChaitanya]

Originally Posted by acewin

+1 for STB from Hathway

That Hathway Digital thing is nice and moreover, it's VFM.

But instead of getting that, I bought DishTV as cablewallah has lot of downtimes.

[gopi_vbboy]

ya STB Hathway was great but thing was little costly..........180rs per month

now have sun direct...rs2000 for installation+ 1 year subscription.......after one year rs75 per month.....but has less news channels

[desiibond]

^^ SUN Direct has less news, sports and movie channels.

[IronManForever]

WTF? No channel for pr0n?

[saqib_khan]

@desibond
In the poll it's written as "Local Cable with TB". Correct it with STB.

And yup, local cable with stb seems vfm.

[Charan]

Originally Posted by IronManForever

WTF? No channel for pr0n?

Indian Government doesnot allow p0rn to be telecasted

[Ethan_Hunt]

The only real problem with me making a shift to Digital cable is the purchase of 2 set top box being mandated for 2 TV's. I currently have 2 TV's in my house shared/split from one main RF cable wire. So I end up paying 350 bucks for 2 connections.

In case of STB's, not only would I need to pay for 2 STB's but pay for both connections as well. This is a major drawback for me. Else I would have had no issues shifting to it.

[IronManForever]

@charan.
Curse me if i didnt kno.

[skippednote]

9xm
biegi billi

[IronManForever]

9xm
biegi billi