Big TV, the DTH arm of Reliance Communications on 5th May 2010 launched India’s first ever High Definition (HD) set top box equipped with Digital Video Recorder (DVR) priced at INR 7,490.
The set top box will be the first to bring recording facility to a High Definition set top box in India and is touted to compete with TataSky+ and Airtel digital TV recorder, none of which have HD capabilities yet.
Here are some of the features:
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200 hours recording on a 160GB hard drive
The set top box will support recording 200 hours of content on the internal 160GB hard disk. Such high recording time is achieved by using latest MPEG4 compression codec. However, I believe the 200 hours of recording time is for standard definition (SD) content. For HD content, it will be a lot less. -
Universal Remote
You will be able to use the set top box remote to control your TV and DVD player or music system. This is something that Airtel has been offering even in its entry level model of digital TV. -
High Definition (HD) channels
Currently only Discovery and Nat Geo high definition channels will be available. Later on Reliance will add more HD channels including some of its own movie and entertainment channels in HD. The HD channels will give you much better picture quality with 5 times the resolution of SD, 16:9 wide aspect ratio and 5.1 channel Dolby Digital sound. -
Pause & Rewind
You can also pause or rewind live TV.
There is no word on whether the set top box offers remote recording facility as offered by TataSky+ and Airtel digital TV recorder.
There are 3 offers under which you can purchase the new STB:
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INR 7490
This includes GSK worth INR 2490 and activation fee of INR 5000. There is no free usage with this price and users will have to buy Big TV packs separately. -
INR 7990
This includes GSK worth INR 2490 and activation fee of INR 5000 plus 3 months of Diamond pack which will also include Nat Geo HD a no additional cost. -
INR 5990 for existing subscribers
This offer is only for existing subscribers of Big TV who can upgrade their STB from SH to HD at this price while continuing their current subscription pack.
The new set top box will be available from 7th May 2010 across 100 cities in India.
[via ET & Shaswat Patel]
4 responses to “Big TV launches High Definition DVR set top box in India”
Well, I think its costly, as I got Sundirect HD for Rs.7500 for one complete year subscription, but most of all I get dolby 5.1 digital surround sound, which as I checked and Big TV Does not have, they have some digital sound…
And about DVR, yeah this is an interesting feature, I want to know more about this, does this remote have an option to skip the video for sometime, can you help me with this…
But reliance have to reduce their price if it is giving its pack for just three months and with only one HD Channel as of now…
The HD DVR STB has HDMI which can carry 5.1 channel sound signals. But you need to have a 5.1 channel home theater system to enjoy it.
Even if Sun is giving a year worth of subscription free, it is not equivalent to the advanced recording capable DVR.
You cannot skip (fast forward) live video but you can skip recorded ones. So just record your favorite shows skip the ads when you watch them. The DVR is similar to TataSky+. You can read about it here: http://woikr.com/home-entertainment/tata-sky-next…
And prices will come down soon as competition piles up.
Yeah I guess, lets see… 🙂
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