First thing first – I was contemplating for it since January but was waiting to shift into a new appt looking at costly shifting affair.
And after moving in to new appt, the Tata sky guy suggested waiting for price-off scheme expected anytime then. And as advised, the scheme got introduced shortly thereafter and I booked my order. The STB was delivered at my place after a days delay and some mess up. Though the Tata sky sales guy was ok and booked the installation right then for me. (Though this guy is yet to deliver a freebie offered to me - negotiate a discount on the card rate, I got a freebie). The installation slot given to me was of next day’s morning. When I rechecked with the customer care the next day, I was told the slot has been shifted to the evening (without any information to me). Then, after calling & following up with the sales guy+local installation office etc, I got the installation done. Keep all the phone numbers handy and call any body and everybody available to fasten your installation. I expected more organized and professional processes from this company.
The installation job was bad. The engineers (so called), messed up badly with my new wood work and left it damaged with the drilling machine. And the same for my wall also. They used the drilling machine from the wrong side and left me 700/- poorer for the repairs. The installation of the disk seems to be ok but the wire is just hanging outside, not sure if they can withstand strong winds.
On top of it, the engineers were the lot of most ill-mannered and impolite. Over all rating of service engineers – a big Zero (if not negatives). Tatas – this is not expected of you. My recommendation is to take extra care yourself during installation and guide them at each point; otherwise they will play terminator at your house.
But everything is not bad. Welcome to the bright world. The picture and sound quality is simply superb (except for zee network channels which are marginally lower). It was nice to see all the channels with equal quality of picture which was impossible during cable days.
Now coming to features and navigation:
Active features (newsroom, star, sports) take lot of time to come up, which sometime becomes irritating. It looks like they have created this feature without any care and left out basic requirements. For e.g. when you are watching active newsroom – you are stuck with the mini screens and cannot enlarge the screen to medium size and if you enlarge it to full screen you are out of active news room and then you again need to start from scratch to reach there. What a waste !! Another e.g. - highlights of any match in active sports can only be seen in medium size screen and not full size. Come-on!! Why can’t I switch full screen for highlights. What a lack of common sense!! I find these camera angles in active sports useless, don’t understand how this is the USP for selling the Tata sky connection. Though, ready live scores and statistics is fantastic feature.
Setting reminders is easy. Information and story idea of every movie or program is available which is a real good feature. However, sometime I miss a PIP feature in this. I am sure this is next to come.
Till date, have not faced any signal related issue, even during the rains (Dwarka, Delhi got some showers during last month), which I was expecting as mentioned in other reviews on MS.com
For the overall opinion – let’s put it this way – DTH is a new concept in India, and keeping that in mind, this product changed the entire TV viewing experience taking it to a completely new level. For basic users like me it is a mind boggling experience with amazing features and all.
But from the Tata sky point of view. This is a product which needs lot of improvement in itself. For starter, it is ok but am sure competition is going to be tougher once Reliance and Bharti are into this industry.
Lastly – there are some basic points which Tata should take care of for e.g. shifting cost of 1000/-. What on earth you will do in re-installation which will cost 1000/-. It is simple laying down wire and screwing the dish. This charge is really absurd. What’s the logic behind this? I hope not to prevent people to shift the house J….. And to tell you Mr. Tata, I know at least 4 people who have decided against Tata sky only because of high shifting cost. So, better do something about this.
Will keep updating.
1st Update - 20th April
About the showcase - this is a section which can show movie on demand. Currently it has only 3-4 movies avaiable which keeps changing every 5-8 days. The company charges 75/- for one movie. I have strond doubts if any of the subscriber has ever used this service. But imagine a stituation - a database of 1000 movies instead of just 3-4 and a charge of 25/- instead of 75/-. This will be a viewer’s delight. Anybody listening at Tatas ?
2nd Update - 20th April
Suddenly Tata Sky has taken few zee channels off air - some 12-13 in number. Popular ones among them are Zee movie channels (zee cinema is active). I have also noticed 3 occurrence of the hanging of the system. The picture just hangs when in the navigation mode and then only option is to restart (power switch off and then on) the system.
Another interesting stuff -
After reading my review on mouth shut, some Tata Sky executive called me up from Bangalore, when I was driving back home. He started with apologizing on the installation guy’s mess up in my house. Also promised to find out the guy and take corrective action. Since I had the details of the installation guy, I offered to give the same to him. I asked him to call me once I reach back home. But he never reverted, guess he never wanted to do anything concrete.
Dear Tata Man, if you have no intention to take corrective action, please don’t further defame your company’s name by doing what you have done. Incase you read this again, do call me up, I still have the details; I don’t want to publish the details in this public forum for obvious reasons.