I'm back in the broadband only TV world of my Welsh home for a long weekend (and to sort out builders, so emotions are running high...).
The bad news is that my Slingbox is useless to me since all the output ports on my Virgin Media V+ box seem to have disabled themselves apart from HDMI - and you can't plug HDMI into a Slingbox. So, it'll be a call to the technical people at Virgin when I get back to London, who are usually quite speedy to rectify issues. Maybe it's because they know I can go and blag to their bosses, whoever they are this week...
But, here in TV-less land (no analogue or digital TV and no digital radio where I am in the mountains, even though I pay a full BBC licence), this time round it's been frustrating trying to get my TV shot sorted out.
BBC News 24 is decent enough and the quality of talking heads is acceptable, although I tend to use it like radio whilst working on my desktop. The only simulcaster in the UK, that wonderful public service broadcaster, Channel 4 had programmes about dirty houses, embarassing illnesses and then the total trash TV that is Big Brother. So much for PBS... And I've watched the local news on ITV Local, but really want to watch some drama or a movie...
The BBC have nothing else to offer at the moment apart from short form web video content - well, until the 27th July when iPlayer comes out, so I'll hold further judgement.
The internet contention here seems very bad at the moment - unusually, I'm barely getting 200Kbps, so the download services are painful.
First of all I tried Channel 4, which does not work on Vista, and the Channel 5, which also does not work on Vista. So, I switched from my laptop to my desktop which still runs XP. The Channel 4 download service is so complex and difficult to use I have never been able to download anything from it, despite trying multiple times - despite being pretty patient and technical. I think the Kontiki element seems to be a real weakness since this is what always throws up an error. Anyhow, nul point for Channel 4's 4OD service.
Five use Entriq, who are a pretty sorted company with lots of download experience, but encoding downloads at 9Mbps seems excessive, so, on my challenged Tiscali connection, I started downloading at around 6.30pm, having paid £1.49 for the season finale of CSI that my V+ box failed to record for some unfathomable reason (another reason for calling the techies), and I still only have half of it downloaded as I post this at 11pm. So, one point there.
The pieces are not stacking up and it's going to have to be DVD for me for the rest of the evening. Actually, sod that. A good book is what I need, with ten out of ten for service delivery for Ian McEwan's Chesil Beach... So much for internet TV..
The bad news is that my Slingbox is useless to me since all the output ports on my Virgin Media V+ box seem to have disabled themselves apart from HDMI - and you can't plug HDMI into a Slingbox. So, it'll be a call to the technical people at Virgin when I get back to London, who are usually quite speedy to rectify issues. Maybe it's because they know I can go and blag to their bosses, whoever they are this week...
But, here in TV-less land (no analogue or digital TV and no digital radio where I am in the mountains, even though I pay a full BBC licence), this time round it's been frustrating trying to get my TV shot sorted out.
BBC News 24 is decent enough and the quality of talking heads is acceptable, although I tend to use it like radio whilst working on my desktop. The only simulcaster in the UK, that wonderful public service broadcaster, Channel 4 had programmes about dirty houses, embarassing illnesses and then the total trash TV that is Big Brother. So much for PBS... And I've watched the local news on ITV Local, but really want to watch some drama or a movie...
The BBC have nothing else to offer at the moment apart from short form web video content - well, until the 27th July when iPlayer comes out, so I'll hold further judgement.
The internet contention here seems very bad at the moment - unusually, I'm barely getting 200Kbps, so the download services are painful.
First of all I tried Channel 4, which does not work on Vista, and the Channel 5, which also does not work on Vista. So, I switched from my laptop to my desktop which still runs XP. The Channel 4 download service is so complex and difficult to use I have never been able to download anything from it, despite trying multiple times - despite being pretty patient and technical. I think the Kontiki element seems to be a real weakness since this is what always throws up an error. Anyhow, nul point for Channel 4's 4OD service.
Five use Entriq, who are a pretty sorted company with lots of download experience, but encoding downloads at 9Mbps seems excessive, so, on my challenged Tiscali connection, I started downloading at around 6.30pm, having paid £1.49 for the season finale of CSI that my V+ box failed to record for some unfathomable reason (another reason for calling the techies), and I still only have half of it downloaded as I post this at 11pm. So, one point there.
The pieces are not stacking up and it's going to have to be DVD for me for the rest of the evening. Actually, sod that. A good book is what I need, with ten out of ten for service delivery for Ian McEwan's Chesil Beach... So much for internet TV..
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