Sky Q without the dish

The 2018 launch of Sky Q without a dish was first announced last year, but it doesn't look like it will arrive in the UK quite as soon as some hoped.
The 2018 Q1 Sky Financial Update says it will launch first in Italy, then Austria, followed by other "key markets".
Sky says the new move will allow "millions of homes" currently unable to install a dish to access the full Sky TV experience. Of course, you can get all the Sky channels in HD without a dish through Virgin Media (with one notable exception, Sky Atlantic) and the NowTV experience has all the channels at a lower cost too, but when Sky does finally launch Q without the dish there's no doubt it's a serious challenge to Virgin. I'd expect it to be a Sky broadband exclusive at launch and priced around the same as the satellite service (which VM often match or better if you call them), but Sky will launch aggressively and we should see some attractive offers from all pay-tv providers to compete. Interesting times.

Now TV ups its game

Launching at the end of February for just £15 is the Now TV Smart Stick. It will be the first Now TV box with voice search and can also control your TV. Oh, and you can pause live TV for up to 30 minutes.
If you already have Now packages you can buy the stick on its own for £15. If not, £20 will get you a stick and either one month of movies, a two-month entertainment pass or three months of kids' TV. If you want a month of sports thrown in instead, there's a £30 bundle for that.
Now TV still only streams at a maximum resolution of 720p but the Smart Stick itself is capable of outputting at full HD. Sky is finally upping the quality of Now TV to 1080p later this year, but it won't come as standard and will most likely cost more. I think the service has improved considerably from the early days of outages and buffering and have found the 720p on demand picture quality absolutely fine.
Now TV is a low cost and viable alternative to the year-long contracts offered by Virgin Media, Sky or BT if you don't need to record programmes and are happy with catch-up and On Demand services to compliment Freeview or Freesat. I use it solely for Sky Atlantic shows, dipping in and out when there's something I want to watch. I've just renewed my Virgin contract for another twelve months (got a very good reduction in my monthly bill from Retentions) but will consider Now TV seriously next year.
Or Sky Q without the dish. And more on that little temptation soon...

A more efficient standard for HD channels

Virgin Media TV is in the process of switching its HD channels to the more efficient H.264(MPEG4) video standard.
According to this thread on Cable Forum a number of customers have noticed that this can be a mixed blessing. Recordings take less space, which means you will be able to get almost twice as many recordings on your TiVo or V6 box*, but FF is now a more delicate beast and you have to be quicker with the remote as it flies through a recording much faster than before.
It appears that HD channel is being carried twice - once in MPEG2 and once in MPEG4 - which VM has confirmed is standard practice when switching to a new standard until all tests are completed.

*Obviously this only applies to recordings made since the switch to the new standard

Free V6 upgrades?

According to TrustedReviews:

Virgin Media is offering its customers a free top-of-the-line TV box upgrade, but you’ll need to check your contract to get the best out of the offer.
The company said it’ll offer its V6 TV box to some 2.8 million existing customers without hiking up their contract costs.
It’s an attractive offer for customers familiar with Virgin’s TV services. However, given the V6 TV box has been out more than a year, it’s likely being offered to customers who are nearing the end of their contract or are already out of contract.

MoneySavingExpert offers the following advice

If your original contract with Virgin Media has ended and you've moved onto a rolling contract, without negotiating a new deal, you could be paying hundreds of pounds a year more than the promotional rate you originally signed up to. This won't always be the case though, so here's how to check:

• Check your account or call Virgin Media to see if you have passed the minimum contract term. 
• If you're still in contract, diarise to check for new deals at least a month before the expiry date.
• If you are out of contract, this means you can leave Virgin Media penalty free.

It's going to be a competitive year for Virgin's TV product. Sky is likely to be under new ownership, Sky Q over broadband is promised and Now TV upgrading its service to 1080p. There have been a number of interesting news items this week and I'll be posting more before the end of the month. Stay tuned.