Dish TV or Triple Play ?
I read a review of Tata Sky TV which prompted me to peek at Zee’s Dish TV offering. I must admit that I have been lagging behind in using or atleast testing these two services. I was kind of lost thinking that IPTV is the way to go. But lets have a closer look. Dish TV services, both by Tata and Zee are not bad at all. Their picture quality is better than our local cable provider but not the DVD quality which they claim. Sound is as good as played on an original track CD. The choice of channels is directly proportional to the depth of your pocket 
On an average the service costs Rs300/month
I am beginning to doubt about how IPTV can be offered at a price of just Rs300/Month. Airtel-Broadband’s DSL in Karantaka costs Rs250 for downloading 400MB of data. If you want the same quality of Audio and Video as that of Dish TV, I atleast want a speed of 512KBPs(with all complex compression techniques), 1MBPS recommended. Current bandwidth costs for 1MBPs line are way too high. Also, you cannot force a customer to opt for high speed expensive broadband and then push him into the bouqet of IPTV. I had requested the results of Bharti-Airtel’s pilot project on IPTV in Delhi and the request just got passed from one to another without reciving any response. This makes me wonder if the results were awful to be published ?
Traditional and Dish TV is very popular amongst Indians while IPTV may not see the same demand. Dish TV with a DVR will also let you view movies on demand, play games, record a TV serial in background while your kid watches a cricket match and will definitely be cheaper than IPTV. Maybe this is the reason why Reliance is silent on its Dish or IPTV plans and in the next few months we will know if Mittal has his midas touch on Airtel’s Triple Play 
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GigaOM » India’s IPTV UnrealityShailaja Neelakantan @ GigaOM writes about IPTV in India. There are a few key points missing, both from the article and from the reader comments:Almost all IPTV services are within Walled Gardens i.e. within the servic…
[...] On one hand the GSM operators are lobbying hard for cheaper 3G entry. On th other hand, Reliance a CDMA operator which feels humiliated by Qualcomm’s indifferent treatment on tax issues has thrown its bid for 3G space in both GSM and CDMA. Enter, third player, the Cable TV Operators of India. They want a slice of 3G spectrum to offer Mobile TV and Broadband and hopefully not IPTV in India. However, for existing cable companies like Asianet in Kerala which also offers Internet may make sense of IPTV offerring. [...]
It took 15 days and numerous phone calls to the shopkeeper, service center, Zee head office, n number of sales people, technicians to get them to come over to my home and install the DISH TV antennae. DISH TV phone helpdesk standard response was that they don’t handle setups and I should talk to the dealer. Dealer said talk to service center. Service center said they’re sending the guy and never sent him.
This was not the end of it..now another week passed before the maxi service got activated. This too after tons of phone calls where I was always told it would be taken care of, but never happened.
Now the BIG shock….I expected good quality Video, somewhere near DVD quality since this being digital n all….No such luck…this is a majorly compressed MPEG2 video feed !! It is worse than VCD quality. Sound is near MONO unless you use headphones. I thought that signal strength maybe causing this, but I had 75-76% signal, which DISH TV tech said was the max he had seen himself. people usually get 60-65%.
Damn !! My cable looked and sounded so much better with full bandwidth, and this DTH looked like small video clip made full screen on my 29 inch TV. I guess it’s passable on smaller 21” screens but looks bad and patchy on a 29”.
My advice…don’t go for this DTH hype till they improve their service.
P.S. another thing…they recently did a software upgrade and dumbed down the set top box. now you cannot make any system changes and can’t even see the signal strength. The channel surfing has also become a pain..instead of quickly shifting between screenful of channel menu, now I have to scroll through each and every channel to reach the desired channel. Their telephone support says there is no way to go back to the old firmware. They claim this new one is very user friendly. How is it user friendly when the users don’t like it?? their active channels are just marketting hype to attract new customers comparing their service with TATA SKY. No one watches their silly active patchwork.
I don’t know about TATA SKY but DISH TV will give you that cheap “quantity and no quality” feeling that reliance CDMA phones gave. I don’t think TATA SKY would be any different.
i m using tata sky and am extremely pleasaed with the quality of their service. The video is not DVD quality but it`s good enough. Good enough for my 54″ Sony RPTV. Also the installation was done within a couple of days I ordered. So overall I pleased with TATAsky and all I wish for now is a DVR offering from Tata.
[...] MTNL’s IPTV is available in Mumbai and Delhi so far I haven’t heard back from any of my readers or friends using the same. In Delhi they have mere 75 subscribers till date and expect to have a subscriber base of 500,000 in three years [Interesting ?]. Aksh OptiFibre has tied up with Star TV for content and will power MTNL’s IPTV users. Content providers may go soft to encourage this new distributin channel but later everything will be under TRAI’s CAS policy. IPTV service providers are trying to price it aggressively inline with Cable and DishTV but not many living rooms want to go the IPTV way just because of the Hype and are moving towards DishTV. [...]
As I can say Zee DTH service is nothing but fruad they do not respond at all they do not start your service I am one of the suferer of this I had paid the amout for the two sets and still my DTH serivice is not started
dear sir
we are instrted in get a distrutsship of yours dish tv line
As I can say that Dish TV service id pathetic. There Customer care is full of uneducated people who do not know how to converse properly. Only thing they keep saying is sorry, which I doubt, they ever feel for the customer. Dish TV seems like a big fraud, with loads of uneducated people as their “Channel Partner”, who do not know anything about service industry. I was much happy with the local cable connection. After follwoing up with them for last one month to get my connection rectified, I am going back to my old cable connection. My sincere suggestion is not go for Dish TV. I can not comment on other DTH connection.
i have been using dish t v since 3 years becuase of high charge . i am not able make reneval . but un fortunatly we cant do any thing with it once we trapped we cannnot get free from it so dont do any thing wrong
Hi, I request the users of ‘triple play’ services to kindly reply. I want to hear from the useres with first hand experience of the Triple Play. I believe customers are the best judges of a service.
Thankin You
hi! we have been using dish tv since last seven months uder the package MAXI . what we were told ab the subscription tha it is free for next 6 month at the cost of initialy paid package amount. and after six month we need to pay 300/m to see all the channles, otherwise your subscription will be valid for all the free chhanels. but now what we are not getting acess to lot of free chhanls. it’s like a fraud , isn’t there any rules policy is provide with package in written / hardcopy ? so that we can claim . i too agree upon the complains made by oter user !
Hi
I have been using DishTV since last one and half year and Customet care of Dish TV has left very bad taste in my mouth. Whenever you try to call there customer care number you have to dial at least 100 times then you will be connected. You horror doesn’t end here rather it’s beginning. Their customer care staff even doesn’t have basic etiquette to talk to a customer. The moment you will say anything about any technical issue they will tell you to contact to your Dealer. Talk to dealer and they will at first ask Rs 150 as visiting charge then they will listen. Does your cable wala charge if your cable is not coming. Have you every tried to make renewal through Dealer or easy bill. Money will never reach to DishTv. I will advise all of you, Please do not subscribe for Dish TV.
I shifted my house on 1st January 2008 and called on customer care for re-installation. They gave me on complain no and said that problem will be fixed with in 4 to 24 hours. I called them after 48 hours then executive told me “I AM SORRY FOR INCONVENIENCE”. for next 3 days (till 5th Morning) I called around 20 times. Sometimes they say sorry, sometimes sorry+ installation will be done till evening.
Now on 5th jan I got another complain no with same words that problem will be fixed with in 4 to 24 hours.
after 24 days I called them again they forwarded call to super wiser he gave one local service center number and told it will be fixed and u can talk on this number also. I called on that number executive told ” Sir your place is not under our area (phone got disconnected from her side)”. Now today is 7th Jan.
Can some one please suggest me how to resolve this problem.
I am very irritated now with their add “Don’t be SANTUSHT” as I am doing the same since 1st Jan.
Hi Guys and Galz,
We cannot see any Adult channel in India through DTH Services till 2025…..
as no matured person is there in the govt to take the bold step…. its a fact..
I have been given such a lot of trouble by this DISHTV MY SUBSCRIPTION ENDED IN JAN 2008 hereafter I subscriped it again by ITZ card of Rs.600/- on 4th of Feb.2008 and transmission given to me on 11th of Feb, today is March 12 and they have again locked me out of transmission I really don’t know what is going on in this company.
They are so incompetent and careless they don’t have a system it seems they lock out anyone they like and the person concern who wants to enjoy after a hard day work has to run around writing them emails or talking to them and all they do(Customerscare) is take you round the bush.
Can someone help me !!!
ISMAIL NOOR MOHD
i deals in free to air dish and distributors of su-kam invertor. i am intersted
in reliance paid dish. please send me your me yours terms & conditions
quit nice and decent blog going on as have to read all and i found that these are in very manner
good one.. i want to share the comparision between IPTV vs DTH.. do check it out myway.in/comparison_sheet.html