Buh Bye Comcast, Hello Dish Network
I finally got so frustrated with Comcast's shortcomings, that I had to reexamine my options. I knew some guys at Echostar and asked a bunch of questions about things that urk me about the Comcast DVR's.
Here are a few of them:
- Is there 300x FFWD/RWD? YES
- Have you ever experienced any issues where your commands get buffered and the box doesn't respond until you are way past the part that you wanted to watch? NO
- Is there a 30 second skip ahead? YES
- To setup a series recording, is it as easy as hitting the record button twice once the show is selected? KINDA
- Do you put advertisements in the guide, using up valuable real estate and messing up the navigation? NO, that's a stupid question (not for Comcast)
- Is there search using a virtual keyboard? YES
- Are there dual tuners? Yes
I have always had this negativity about Dish Network. I have always heard negative things about Charlie Ergen's business practices, specifically around his hatred of all things Microsoft. All of which has either changed or is not true. Second, back when I had UltimateTV/DirecTV, Dish Network required two satellite dish's to receive network and local channels. I didn't want to put up two dishes. Lastly, isn't Dish Network for those rural, NASCAR loving, country bumpkins? City dwellers use DirecTV or cable right?
Well, I gotta say, I have been completely surprised. The box is fast, the GUI is unique but works well, and saves me about $40 a month over Comcast. That isn't to say that there aren't a few thing that could be improved.
- Recording a show is called a timer. Isn't a timer like so 1980's VCR lingo?
- If you are watching a show, and you decide you want to record it because something popped up and you have to leave, you have to rewind back to the beginning in order to record what is in the buffer. Maybe a little dialog that asks the user to record "all that is in the buffer", "from the beginning of the show" or from "right now" would be a good option.
- The guide doesn't seem to color code shows like Comcast did. Movies, kids shows, sports, etc don't seem to have consistent color codes.
A couple bonuses that I got:
- The Guide can be changed to display several different sizes (more channels per page)
- The Guide seems to know a lot more about the shows than on Comcast. It even tells you when the show originally aired.
- There are all kinds of options about recording shows including new only, same channel only, etc.
- The 622 has a coaxial output that lets you distribute signal to other TV's. Ya, it doesn't let you do Dolby Digital but you can select whether the second tuner is dedicated to the other TV's or if you watch the same thing that the main TV is watching.
- Lot's o' Hard Drive space. I believe that it has a 300 GB HDD.
Tomorrow, the installers are coming back to finally mount a Dish 1000 on my roof, with snow and ice about a month ago, the temporarily mounted them to my fence outside. This pissed off the neighbors and now the HOA is after me....
