Will Dish Retain the Title "HD Leader"?

[rad]

gee would you rather have 10 hd channnels (d*) or over 30 (e*) ? If the decision was made today e* is the clear winner

The title of this thread is "Will Dish Retain the Title 'HD Leader'? ", not what it is today. If D* does pull this off as they're saying this year, will Charlie and the boys be able to pull a rabbit out of their a** and match D* this year and if so how will they be able to do it? D*'s got two new KA satellites going up with licences for 32 transponders at each location. Where can E* come up with that amount of bandwidth this year?

 

[navychop]

D* promised the world last year, too- see where that went? E* has a sat going up too, and is underutilizing current assets, such as Rainbow 1/E* XII.

 

[Juan]

If push came to shove ..E* could replace the voom "place holders" with real national cable network HD

 

[rad]

If push came to shove ..E* could replace the voom "place holders" with real national cable network HD

So are you saying the Voom channels are not worth the bandwidth and CNN HD would be better? Won't the folks that like Voom programming be up in arms for deleating their channels?

 

[rad]

D* promised the world last year, too- see where that went? E* has a sat going up too, and is underutilizing current assets, such as Rainbow 1/E* XII.

For HD the only thing they promised and missed on was the number of HD LIL's that they said they would have. The did add a number of HD LIL's plus some HD RSN's which they also announced. They never announced any new national HD channels for 2006.

Now if E* has all this underutilized assets laying around why didn't E* work with these content providers to launch HD versions of their channels like D* did? From
http://www.tvweek.com/news.cms?newsId=11336, the statement "The confirmations represent the largest number of networks to commit to HD upgrades all at once. DirecTV's launching of two new satellites in 2007, combined with the satellite service's push for more HD content, has been a tipping point for a host of major networks previously biding their time before taking the plunge to HD. " makes it sound like the networks were just waiting for a major DBS or cable company to commit to carry the programming.

And while E 11 is going up this year, where is it going to be going? Does E* have an unused bunch of transponder licenses that E11 will use? Just curious on what satellite resources E* has for 2007 to match what D* may have coming on line this year.

 

[GeorgeLV]

And while E 11 is going up this year, where is it going to be going? Does E* have an unused bunch of transponder licenses that E11 will use? Just curious on what satellite resources E* has for 2007 to match what D* may have coming on line this year.

IN-ORBIT SPARE.

It won't be used for anything no matter what rumors people want to stir up. The E* fleet is spread precariously thin right now. It's figuratively one stray cosmic ray away from a major extended service interruption.

 

[SarKen]

gee would you rather have 10 hd channnels (d*) or over 30 (e*) ? If the decision was made today e* is the clear winner

But only 10 of the 30 are worth watching. And D* has locals and RSN in HD. That is what most people want. Not a 24 hour kung fu and fashion channels showing the same thing over and over again. Having 30 HD channels was fun for the first few months, but after that you realize that same channels that D* has are the same ones that you are watching the most.

So 10 national channels plus local and RSN makes D* a very close runner up.

 

[Stargazer]

Weather Channel in HD.... who cares!! "Gee, that red low and the blue cold front over the Plains looks so crystal clear......."

IMO TWC is worthless except for the "Local on the 8's." Lots of gabbing about nothing and LOTS of commercials.....

I would actually love to see The Weather Channel in HD as I have an interest in weather and would make the weather maps and radars even clearer and they do have shows regarding weather on it as well.

 

[HDTVFanAtic]

If push came to shove ..E* could replace the voom "place holders" with real national cable network HD

So are you saying the Voom channels are not worth the bandwidth and CNN HD would be better? Won't the folks that like Voom programming be up in arms for deleating their channels?

Not to worry, if E* jettisoned them, D* has plenty of room to throw them on along with the other networks

 

[HDTVFanAtic]

D* promised the world last year, too- see where that went? E* has a sat going up too, and is underutilizing current assets, such as Rainbow 1/E* XII.

As GeorgeLV states, E* has assembled the equivilant of a Junk Yard in the Clark Belt and has has no long term strategic plans to compete effectively.

Of course, it starts at the top, so what does one expect.

 

[mike123abc]

The only way I see Dish adding a bunch more HD is for them to get E11 up soon. Perhaps it can move a lot of the HD LiL from 61.5 and 129 to spot and then they would have room on those satellites for more national HD. Right now they are pretty near capacity for HD unless they cut back on bitrates even more.

 

[GaryPen]

gee would you rather have 10 hd channnels (d*) or over 30 (e*) ? If the decision was made today e* is the clear winner

I'd rather have ones I watched, with content that had value to me. For many, that means RSN's in HD or other local HD content. For others, it may mean the same handful of Kung Fu movies in HD played over and over again. So, the "clear winner" depends on who is doing the watching.

 

[FlyingJ]

Apparently, it didn't, except in the D* marketing department.

Quote from jeremyL---Last time I heard anything, Sci Fi had no plans to go HD. When did this change?- - -

Navy once again opens mouth and inserts foot. I think that you and Superman need to start understanding that you don't know everything that is going on. And by the way that Sat you mentioned that E* is putting up, it has been posted over and over that it is not being used for more bandwith, it is in fact a backup. Anything else?

 

[DAVEGTESTR]

RSN's in HD, on ConUS, and I will join DISH

RSN's in HD, on ConUS, and I will join DISH as in Platinum. :

Forever the DISH lurker a C* Platinum :up

Don't worry, be happy... MHD is about 15 shows repeating all month and half of those are from last month. Hardly any reason to use a DVR. :tux: :

 

[vurbano]

I dont consider either of them the HD leader until their mpeg2 HD is 1920x1080i at high bitrates. Why are we interested in which Macdonalds makes the most big Macs when as HD subs we should be interested in who has the best Fillet Mignon? D* last time I checked isnt serving up anything HD that can be verified and E* is all over the place. IMO Verizon FIOS TV and the cable companies that arent downrezzing are the HD leaders.

 

[navychop]

"...But only 10 of the 30 are worth watching. ..."

Maybe. But people don't agree which 10.

And FlyingJ- SciFi was denying HD plans, D* announced anyway. My post was then. AFTER my post, the USA Today article and other word from SciFi came out that they were planning (or "evaluating" by one account) an HD version. Yes, E* XI is marked for backup. That doesn't mean it won't be put to use. As others have noted, conus and spot beam assignments can be juggled.

No need for personal attacks because someone posts things you don't like to hear or disagree with.

Remember, E* has a track record of actually turning a profit, something D* is not so good at. E* must be doing something right.

 

[FlyingJ]

Nothing personal navy, just think that the "in D*s own mind" comment was a bit sticky and negative. Couldn't understand why so many stated that same type of comment unless it was just to try to stick it to D*, which it probably was, funny though I didn't see one of those posters backtrack and say ooops, maybe they did know what they were talking about.

 

[navychop]

"Navy once again opens mouth and inserts foot." is personal.

Perhaps D* should have coordinated with SciFi and maybe others about their announcement. It just sounded, in the face of SciFi NOT confirming, like they were promising things they weren't going to deliver. They never really delivered on the HD they talked about at the 2006 CES, so this could have been (or still could be) more of the same. But D* is hardly alone in not meeting "projections." We have yet to see if they knew what they were talking about.

And FWIW, if you look back at some of my posts, when I have been corrected in something objective that I got wrong, I do admit I was wrong. See my posts regarding DVB-S2. I try to post accurately when discussing facts, especially when we see so much misinformation posted. When it comes to opinions, mine are just as valid as anyone else's, and I am entitled to post them even if others disagree.

 

[HDTVFanAtic]

Don't worry, be happy... MHD is about 15 shows repeating all month and half of those are from last month. Hardly any reason to use a DVR. :tux: :

Just like Voom!!!!

 

[mike123abc]

If Dish were to put E11 at 119 and turn the spots off on E7, they would probably pick up a lot more spot capacity. I would like to see the specs for E11 to be filed at the FCC so we can examine them. E7 uses 5TPs over 15 spots with reuse it provides about 25 TPs worth of transmission. If E11 with steerable spots had much smaller footprints, it could probably reuse the same 5 transponders more than 5 times each. E10 gets almost 10x reuse. If they were to get 10x they would have 25 more cities worth of capacity for HD LiL. This would free up a bunch of TPs on 61.5/129.