Page 1 of Itv Digital - any good...?

Not dvd related, I know, but....

I`m contemplating getting an ITV digital box ( £99 off the shelf at Dixons) and was wondering if anyone could tell me more about it. Does it really suck? How bad does the picture get when there bad weather? What`s customer service like? Is the service any good?

Enlighten me, O knowledgeable ones....

Generally the service is okay, and they`ve just opened a new customer service centre, so that part of the operation (whcih has always been excellent) is now even better.

Picture quality is noticeably better than analogue, as is sound. However, you`re in the lap of the gods with regards to which box you get, and how strong the signal is.

I actually had to pay the £40 aerial upgrade fee, as there was no roof aerial at my house when I moved in. The thing points to the Waltham transmitter (about 5 miles away - apparently you can actually see it from the top of my house).

As the signal was so strong certain digitalboxes (noticeably Phillips ones) really struggled (yes I had two !), whilst the Pace first generation ones (yes, two again) seemed to cope better.

I`ve heard good things about the new Pace (second generation) boxes and also the Pioneer boxes.

The line-up is pretty unspectacular (no Bravo for a start, which I do miss from my Sky days), but they are still adding stuff regularly. Most of the primary channels are pretty rubbish, so if you can make do with six, go for that.

The premier channels are pretty expensive (Sky Sports 1-3, Sky Moviemax and Sky Premier, Film Four) plus there is the ITV Select (previously onrequest) order on demand film service which is okay.

Thoroughly recommend hooking up via RGB SCART if you can, as the standard composite connection can be a bit flakey at times, especially with games under floodlights, such as cricket or football, where there can be very visible pixiellation.

I`ve been with them 2 years now, and have watched them grow over the years. There are industry rumours abound that ITV want to get shot of it, and ntl are supposed to be very interested in gaining a controlling interest.

Don`t bother with Onnet (ITVActive) by the way - it`s total cack !

Hope this helps - please feel free to ask any more questions.

I don`t suppose you would like to sell me one of your old ondigital boxes, clayts?? ;-)

LJ

Soz, LJ, if I had one I`d send it to you, but I had to do swapsies as I`m on a contract, as opposed to prepay.

I`ve got an old Pace analogue satellite decoder you can have, but I`m thinking of sending it to the Science Museum ! You can have it for free, honest !

Many thanks for the kind offer, clayts, but I really wouldn`t be able to sleep at night if I thought I had deprived the Science Museum of such an historic relic!! ;-)


LJ

Is that something you can do under the contract Clayts - change boxes??
I`ve had three boxes in my house for about a year now, one in my room, one in my housemates, and one in the lounge and I`m thinking seriously about getting an aerial upgrade cos theres no roof aerial on my house either.
The result of this is that each of the bedrooms has a roof aerial in the loft, and the one in the lounge has a dodgy old tv-top aerial. The annoying thing is, my aerial is on top of the water tank so the signal remains okay for a bit, but goes dodgy on certain channels when someone flushes the toilet! And it`s only my tv that goes dodgy, the one with the poxy little aerial is fine!!
Can swapping the box over make any difference at all to signal strength??
The other problem I have (My box is a phillips DTX 6371) is that sometimes it locks out on a channel when I`m surfing and won`t come back until it`s unplugged for a period of time - resulting in having to involuntarily watch the Wellbeing channel for a while.
Which is hell.

The only reason you`ll get a swapsie is if you`ve got a serious fault on your digibox. For example :

Philips DTX6371 - massive picture break up due to strong signal
Philips DTX6371 - er, ditto : warehouse sent me the wrong digibox
Pace DTR730IM - audio problems (probably wouldn`t have noticed if I didn`t have a decent amplifier !)
Pace DTR730IM - unable to hold on to a signal for more than 2 minutes, and then blanked out
Pace DTR730IM - so far so good, but has the least responsive remote control ever.

The channel lock you mention is a known fault on the 6371, but it may well be worth ringing the Technical Support section on 0870 2410393 and seeing if they`ll swap you one. However, they generally will only do it if your picture or audio quality is totally naffsville, Arizona.

I`m seriously thinking of terminating my contract and going pre-pay so I can get the new Pioneer box, which has had rave reviews, but I reckon I`m gonna hang on until one has a decent audio out, such as optical or coaxial digital cable. Or, I go bankrupt from paying the extra £10 a month for ITV Sport....

many thanx for the advice clayts - i`m gonna brave it and get a box this weekend - anything`s got to be better than the shoddy service i currently get from cable london/telewest. did you know that they`ve put up prices so that for a basic package (tv only) i`m paying approx £22 a month. With ITV digital i get the same channels, but pay £100 for the year (£40 aerial upgrade excluding). I don`t need to tell you how much that option saves me....

thanx again, and down with cable !

cool - but where do i get a chipped card ?

Have you guys never been to a market or car boot????? ;-)


LJ