Nialli's unofficial blog on Virgin Media's UK cable TV services
August 07, 2008
C4 HD rumour
According to this thread, we could be seeing C4 HD on Virgin Media "soon".
14 comments:
Anonymous
said...
Could this be the 'extra channels' which the retentions rep used to try to persuade me to retain my VIP subscription when she told me a couple of days ago that "more HD channels will be arriving late Autumn". This was rubbished by Samantha et al - but perhaps there was some truth in it after all.
My contact at VM said that he "couldn't comment" on the rumour. You can read that either way I guess. Certain folk posting on cable threads over at DS are a very negative bunch - a real shame, as a lot of people head there looking for genuine help and all they get is cynicism or false information.
I guess the Virgin apologists will now have to swallow their remarks about CH4HD not being misssed because it has virtually no HD! I'm sure the writer of this blog was one of them!
It does have virtually no hd. What is it, 1 daily show, some late night ones and about 2 films a week. I'll still take that tough, all the negative comments it's still my favourite channel and simulcasting however flawed is absolutely the way to go. Never understood the complaints about the upscaling though, a mate has it on skyHD and I thought even the news upscaled looked miles better.
I find it alarming that this blog continually references the Digital Spy forum to criticise it's content (and in this comments thread to actually personally attack some of the posters!). It's of extra concern given the blogger's propensity for self-promotion of this blog over at the actual site! Discussion forums are a place to go for discussion, not "help". Virgin has it's own site where customers needing "help" can go without fear of reading "negativity" and "cynicism". I'm pretty sure there is "false information" posted all over the web. I wonder, for example, whether CH4HD will be launching on cable as this blog suggests?
Hi Sirius. I no longer promote this blog on DS. I promoted the petition with a single URL posting (which I'd agreed with the guys at DS beforehand). Ocassionally I'll post in a thread if I feel I have something sensible to contribute (eg the petition thread, where I felt it would have been disingenuous to start things and not keep the people who'd responded informed on how things were going). I had my peurile rant about DS moderators. I was wrong. I took the offending posts down the same day. Also, I'm not saying that C4HD is coming to Virgin: I'm reporting that there's speculation on that particular thread that it may be. I think I've been clear on that.
I have switched to SKY and C4HD is not worth waiting for. Don't get excited. Discovery HD is the best HD channel at the moment the pictures are outstanding
Is Discovery HD on Sky a simulcast or a showcase channel? When I was in the US this year the hotel's Discovery HD was a pretty neat showcase. (Personally, I think that until HD-filmed content becomes the norm showcase rather than simulcast is the better option, but I know others disagree with me on that.)
Discovery HD is a showcase with no ad breaks only brief breaks to show other programs on HD. They show things like American Chopper, Jeff Corwin (Excellent) etc etc. The picture in my opinion is the best around even on the stupid Austin Stevens Snake Hunter. Nat Geo is also very good.
I saw Austin Stevens Snake Hunter a while back on discovery HD. Had seen it last year(?) on five or BBC2 and thought it good and saw it in HD and the sound and all round experience was completely different, completely insane picture even on dark jungle scenes. HD is a good picture quality but last time I checked it had around the lowest bitrate too. I've thought for some considerable time that virgin should target discovery, nat geo and history as they are the only likely ones they are going to get unless there is some rate card rejigging or aliens come down and intervene in the sky dispute. On the other hand as an ex-TWer they were always really sluggish signing contracts with discovery and history and we had to wait ages for those channels so i'm not hopeful.
FX is fantastic picture quality, it's the only channel that seems to work well on the new codecs. There's no chance of that coming though.
In anycase I agree with what neptune/horizon, sirius and mlt have said on DS and elsewhere about the bandwidth analysis. If you go on what the CEO and add it to a few rumours then these analogue channels switched off will be blown on broadband which will include voom to the 50mb customers. Perhaps if we're really lucky they'll give us 1 stream to use for a high def channel and some +1s, otherwise it's waiting till 2011.
14 comments:
Could this be the 'extra channels' which the retentions rep used to try to persuade me to retain my VIP subscription when she told me a couple of days ago that "more HD channels will be arriving late Autumn". This was rubbished by Samantha et al - but perhaps there was some truth in it after all.
My contact at VM said that he "couldn't comment" on the rumour. You can read that either way I guess.
Certain folk posting on cable threads over at DS are a very negative bunch - a real shame, as a lot of people head there looking for genuine help and all they get is cynicism or false information.
I guess the Virgin apologists will now have to swallow their remarks about CH4HD not being misssed because it has virtually no HD!
I'm sure the writer of this blog was one of them!
No confirmation of course that the channel will actually launch on cable. Those retention staff have some gaul
It does have virtually no hd. What is it, 1 daily show, some late night ones and about 2 films a week. I'll still take that tough, all the negative comments it's still my favourite channel and simulcasting however flawed is absolutely the way to go. Never understood the complaints about the upscaling though, a mate has it on skyHD and I thought even the news upscaled looked miles better.
It's just a rumour - I did think twice before posting it up as there's nothing really of any substance to go on. Let's wait and see what happens ;o)
I find it alarming that this blog continually references the Digital Spy forum to criticise it's content (and in this comments thread to actually personally attack some of the posters!). It's of extra concern given the blogger's propensity for self-promotion of this blog over at the actual site!
Discussion forums are a place to go for discussion, not "help". Virgin has it's own site where customers needing "help" can go without fear of reading "negativity" and "cynicism".
I'm pretty sure there is "false information" posted all over the web. I wonder, for example, whether CH4HD will be launching on cable as this blog suggests?
Hi Sirius. I no longer promote this blog on DS. I promoted the petition with a single URL posting (which I'd agreed with the guys at DS beforehand). Ocassionally I'll post in a thread if I feel I have something sensible to contribute (eg the petition thread, where I felt it would have been disingenuous to start things and not keep the people who'd responded informed on how things were going). I had my peurile rant about DS moderators. I was wrong. I took the offending posts down the same day.
Also, I'm not saying that C4HD is coming to Virgin: I'm reporting that there's speculation on that particular thread that it may be. I think I've been clear on that.
I have switched to SKY and C4HD is not worth waiting for. Don't get excited. Discovery HD is the best HD channel at the moment the pictures are outstanding
Is Discovery HD on Sky a simulcast or a showcase channel? When I was in the US this year the hotel's Discovery HD was a pretty neat showcase.
(Personally, I think that until HD-filmed content becomes the norm showcase rather than simulcast is the better option, but I know others disagree with me on that.)
Discovery HD is a showcase with no ad breaks only brief breaks to show other programs on HD. They show things like American Chopper, Jeff Corwin (Excellent) etc etc.
The picture in my opinion is the best around even on the stupid Austin Stevens Snake Hunter. Nat Geo is also very good.
I saw Austin Stevens Snake Hunter a while back on discovery HD. Had seen it last year(?) on five or BBC2 and thought it good and saw it in HD and the sound and all round experience was completely different, completely insane picture even on dark jungle scenes. HD is a good picture quality but last time I checked it had around the lowest bitrate too. I've thought for some considerable time that virgin should target discovery, nat geo and history as they are the only likely ones they are going to get unless there is some rate card rejigging or aliens come down and intervene in the sky dispute. On the other hand as an ex-TWer they were always really sluggish signing contracts with discovery and history and we had to wait ages for those channels so i'm not hopeful.
FX is fantastic picture quality, it's the only channel that seems to work well on the new codecs. There's no chance of that coming though.
In anycase I agree with what neptune/horizon, sirius and mlt have said on DS and elsewhere about the bandwidth analysis. If you go on what the CEO and add it to a few rumours then these analogue channels switched off will be blown on broadband which will include voom to the 50mb customers. Perhaps if we're really lucky they'll give us 1 stream to use for a high def channel and some +1s, otherwise it's waiting till 2011.
I doubt they worry, you must be the only one who has ever read those blogs! p:
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