oldchuckles

I went to the Voom website a few minutes ago. There was the following message posted: "Voom will cease to provide service to existing customers on April 30, 2005." Did Voom go bankrupt? What satellite or cable service provides the best HD if Voom is no longer an option? Thanx for any suggestions!

Corleone

http://www.detnews.com/2005/technolo...ech-144787.htm

Maxflier

I thought Echostar had bought them out or something.

Gooch

Nope, they're done. I had JUST ordered friday morning, all fine and dandy.

By the time I came back from lunch, they called me back and said they were not coming out to do the install, and there are no contract penalties, etc. etc.

I was sooo looking forward to it too

Maxflier

Yeah,just saw this:


http://www.newsday.com/business/ny-b...ness-headlines

oldchuckles

So, where do we go from here? What is the next best HD programming source? Any suggestions would be appreciated!

Lastdaysofrain

That's a shame, I hope another satellite system picks up some of the great VOOM channels like the Monsters HD channel

clappj

There really isn't another satellite provider who's even in the same ballpark in terms of the number of HD channels Voom had!

On a positive note I heard that DirectTV is supposed to be launching some new satellites soon, which will expand their HD offerings.

Spiky

If you notice from the links others provided, E* bought the birds. Not the content/channels or the business.
They are launching new birds that can handle LOTS of HD channels. This is mostly for local HD channels, though. There are 12 markets that are supposed to be up and running by end of 2005. Time will tell. All things TV revolve around sports. Something will be done in time for Superbowl, as usual.

Maxflier

Sorry,the only time i even saw Echostar even mentioned was in the link i posted later.There was nothing in the link before i posted about Echostar that i saw.

Spiky

Sorry, didn't pay attention to all the names, silly me.

This deal has been rumored for many weeks, so you were correct. First it was done, then the chairman of Cablevision was going to personally keep Voom alive, now it's back to E* buying the birds. Sounds definite this time.

shelland

Sadly, yes, Voom will be shutting down at the end of the month. As already stated, there aren't really any providers that compare to their HD content in sheer numbers of channels. A lot of Voomers report they are going to cable for HD - just depends on your local providers. Our particular cable company doesn't offer HD at all, so satellite is our only option. Still haven't decided which way to go - I'm leaning towards Dish because you can get set up with HD equipment for virtually nothing out of pocket, but DirectTV is $300+.

If you have a few hours to spare, go to the Voom forum here, and read the last couple months' posts about the soap opera that's taken place: http://www.satelliteguys.us/

Spiky

Scott,
Which company do you have out there in the sticks? All of them offer HD closer to Mpls, maybe you moved too far. For sat: you get what you pay for. I got tired of Dish, have been much happier with D* for the last few years.

shelland

We're about 10 miles West of Chaska and 5 miles South of Waconia, and our only cable option is North American Communications. We have their basic service along with Voom just to get Fox Sports for the local sports teams.

I guess the one positive thing with going to D* or E* is that we can drop the cable bill...

When we were in Plymouth, we had Comcast.

buckee1

This is seriously bad news. I was contemplating moving over to voom as Comcast HD in my area has only 11 channels with five of those being pay services (HBOHD,ShowtimeHD etc...) Hopefully, someone else will step up.

Alan Smithee

I knew this was going to fail when I first heard its name- it immediately reminded me of the Monty Python Dead Parrot sketch: "This thing wouldn't VOOM if you put 5,000 volts through it! It's bleeding demised! It has ceased to be!"
Of course 10 years ago I was sure DirecTV would fail also, as only an idiot would pay money to get channels with onscreen logos and commercial interruptions, but that shows how much I know.

sdcrym

birds?

Alan Smithee

The satellites are called "birds". Unfortunately, most of them tend to drop the same stuff that real birds do.

Osiris

This sucks.

shelland

I've said that to myself many times...

oldchuckles

So what to do? Which HD service is the best...Comcast cable, DirectTV, or Dish? Or maybe I should rephrase the question and ask, which HD service should I avoid? Thanx for any suggestions!

Chew

With Voom being gone, I think the one to look to now will be DirecTV. Once the new satellites are in place, they have a lot of HD plans. It might be close to the end of the year before we really get a good sense of what all those plans are though.

Spiky

Those channels will go somewhere, I'm sure. It's just that no one else has the technology to handle it. D* launches the first one of their new sats this month. E* hasn't yet acquired the Voom sats, but that should help them out. I've been wondering what they were going to do as it has been pointing to D* jumping ahead with the 4 new sats.

This summer will probably be a bit empty in HD land. Might be a good year to go outside.

Adam Tyner

Since Rainbow Media (the company behind the likes of AMC, Fuse, IFC, and We) still owns the 21 original channels, it'd be interesting to see if they're able to repackage and redistribute that content.

I'd pay up to $15 extra a month without blinking twice to subscribe to another tier, if offered. Much more than that and I'd probably start poring over the listings to see if I'd watch much of anything other than Monsters-HD, but something like $20 wouldn't be out of the question.

With so many of the channels repeating themselves throughout the course of the day, I think they could be condensed at least somewhat. Maybe combine Animania with the Family Room, Film Fest and The Majestic with World Cinema, Vice and GuyTV, Gallery and Lab... I think you could drop that 21 down to 15 without really losing much content.

Monsters-HD, though...that single channel alone almost got me to go with Voom, and since whoever programs it has almost the exact same taste in movies I do, no matter how expensive it was, I'd still probably get my money's worth and then some out of it.

You might want to strongly consider Comcast. They have a decent lineup (they're missing HDNet/HDNet Movies, two channels I consider almost indispensable, but Voom didn't have 'em either), and at least if the posts on the AVS Forum are any indication, Comcast offers better looking HD video than Dish and D*.

pmreed

The satellite providers are dragging their feet introducing new HD programming, because they're about to switch to MPEG4 compression from MPEG2. If they start offering more MPEG2 programming, they'll have to keep those channels up for a while even after they migrate programming to MPEG4. I've got D* now, but I'm not going to renew my annual subscription (August) until I see the D* and DTV offerings later this year. Currently I'm getting my HD programming off air. I was surprised to see that the image quality of even the digital SD programming off air was quite superior to my D* image. However, I still watch satellite almost exclusively due to my hatred of commercials. DVRs RULE!!

Phil