I haven’t even gotten the new ON DEMAND service at our house (Comcast is doing a good impression of the Three Stooges in coordinating someone coming out and replacing our old digital cable box), and I’m dubious about the service.
With video on demand, you can choose to watch games, movies and shows whenever you want. Best of all, you won’t have to wait for them to air. Just make your selection from an easy-to-use onscreen menu. While you’re watching, you can pause, rewind and even fast-forward programming. With flexibility like that, video on demand offers TV on your terms.
Two questions:
- How much does it cost?
- What shows are included?
The answer seems to be “Wait and see,” since the web page doesn’t really make it clear. It doesn’t sound like all programming is available, by any means, and it sounds like it’s available only within a broad time slot (no saving up several weeks of show X to watch), and it looks like some stuff will be free and other stuff won’t be.
It sounds like a crappy mix between a DVR like TiVo and Pay-per-View. I remain skeptical.
On the other hand, even if Comcast did offer some sort of DVR solution (which they don’t, yet, in our area), it would probably be crappy, too.
Out here, Charter now includes on-demand service with premium packages. When I had the Showtime/Cinemax or the HBO/TMC package, I would get access to many of their movies/series/specials/late-night shows whenever I wanted, at no extra charge. Each movie or episode would stay available for a week or two, then be replaced by another one. It was pretty cool, but I just don’t have enough interest in watching recent movies or cable shows to justify the extra $5/month for a premium package.
Sad, huh?
Okay, just read the story you linked to. I have the same box, and had the same problem. Charter kept insisting that the problem was that i had too many shows recorded. However, I was nowhere near the 48-hour limit, which I had previously reached with no problems. They also insisted that shows recorded from cable stations, such as TNT, were “larger” than broadcast shows, and thus reduced the HDD space further. Nonsense! I was taping from th same channels as before.
Unplugging the box reset it, and it proceeded to record just fine. Unfortunately, I had missed the “season finale” of Jeopardy! Drat!
My biggest gripe with this box is that it seems to be fairly low-res.
Night or underwater scenes show definite resolution banding (is that a legitimate ter?) in the darker tones, as with old 640×480 games. Blechh! The old cable box looked better, but I couldn’t pause shows when I run out to the laundry room or answer the phone, so it’s a trade-off I’ll take. (Plus they gave us a month free, just like a drug dealer’s first sample–they hooked me!).