Summary: Works well ONLY when & where 3G signals are strong & consistent. Very good picture & audio quality. Tested on Nokia E-61i. Dolphin postpaid plan. Location: Mumbai – suburbs [Andheri- east to Ghatkopar – West & Borivli-West]. Time Frame: 30 days. WARNING : Can drain out your cellphone battery in just over 2 ½ to 3 hours of continuous usage. Also cellphone tends to warm up a bit. There is a delay of about 10-15 seconds only between watching the TV channels on a regular TV and this application which is acceptable.
When I subscribed for this service on 5/2/10, mtnl did not have any details about the same on their website. Today you can check at the link given below & download the application dolphin.mumbai.mtnl.net.in/services/mobile_tv.html
There are errors however on their website “It may please be noted that GPRS or 3G is not required for using the Mobile TV service” – this is not true, as without 3G or 2G you cannot avail of this service. Mtnl-Dolphin also does not have any separate billing details for using this application. I deduced that mtnl has billed me in the section 2, Local usage; [d] short message usage; i.e. sms services !!!
Charges are fixed – based on daily usage or monthly package usage. There are no additional bandwidth charges. So no matter how long you watch streaming TV the charges are fixed as explained in the next section.
Channels Available:
A] Rs 150/- per month package includes [also available @ Rs 10/- per day per channel] : Aaj Tak; NDTV; India TV; CNN; Times Now; Star News; NDTV-India; BBC World; CNBC-TV18; TOTAL; Headlines Today; CNBC Awaj; NDTV-Profit; CNN-IBN; IBN-7; Z-News; E-TV; Mobi TV Specials; Pogo; F-TV; Zoom; Songs; Bindass and Popeye [as you would notice these are mostly news channels only].
B] Premium Channels @ Rs 50/- per month for each channel !! or Rs 10/- per day : Hollywood Movies; ESPN; Star One; Divine Vistas; New Releases; Bollywood Latest; FTV-Hot; Bollywood Hits; Bollywood Hungama; Mobile Jockey TV; Evergreen Hits; WWE; Bolly Theatre; UTV AT Play; Regional Music.
Note: Where movies or songs are concerned these ARE NOT LIVE & STREAMING, rather as I checked with
“Hollywood Movies” – Only 3 movies were available and each of them split up into 4 to 6 sections. The choice of movies was pathetic and although the size of my Nokia E-61i screen was decent enough, yet watching them was hardly enjoyable. I could not continue watching for more than 15 mins and gave up [audio quality was not the same & you have to use your headphones]. Where songs are concerned, again these ARE NOT LIVE & STREAMING, rather 10-12 songs are available which hardly get refreshed even after many days [I did not play/watch through the entire list !]
Conclusion : Actual availability of 3G signals and consistency of watching TV was only about 10-20% at any given point of time [ so a rating of only 1-2 out of 10!]. It’s a novel experience to watch live & streaming TV on your cellphone and something that one can flaunt. Until other cellphone service providers open their doors to the 3G experience. MTNL & BSNL are losing the “leader advantage” that they have had over the past 18 months or more since 3G services were launched. Their Customer Care and QCSC Service center’s still are uninformed about the availability of this “Mobile-TV” appn; apart from so many other advantages that 3G offers. Lastly, I received an sms on the 30th day of the usage of this application stating that, “Thanks for your subscription to MONTHLY PACK. You have been charged Rs.150/-. Your subscription expires on 5/4/10” – This was without my consent to extend usage and since I was not entirely satisfied with this experience, I immediately “unsubscribed”.
Now am I still going to be billed ?