Sky vs Virgin Media (4 Viewers)

torchomatic · Apr 4, 2013

We were in Cov today - going to the Herbert - when I finally decided to go into the Virgin Media shop in the Precinct to order it. I have Sky HD and have been with them for about 15 years altogether but the boxes are rubbish and I've been meaning to jump shipfrom Sky for a while.

Has anyone had both? What is better TiVO or Sky HD?

WillieStanley · Apr 4, 2013

TiVO is literally the best thing to ever happen to TV... apart from Jenna-Louise Coleman.

After having the two (Sky and Virgin... unfortunately, not TiVO and Jenna-Louise Coleman) I can honestly say that Virgin is superior in every possible aspect. From customer service to facility. Internet is ridiculously fast even on the lower packages and there's no limits, TiVO has so much potential it's unbelievable and HD is completely free. On XL you get all ESPN channels thrown in which to me makes up for the loss of Sky Atlantic.

Massive advocate of Virgin here, after having them for over 3 years!!

SkyBlueHomer · Apr 4, 2013

Another vote for Virgin here, used to be on sky.

Never had any problem with Virgin, sky TV used to drop out regualrly during bad weather which affected the signal.
We also have a Tivo box. Can be slightly annoying at times as it also records things it may think you will like and puts them into a suggestions folder but the number of times we have found loads of programs we enjoyed that didnt even know about far out weigh thats.
As willieStanley said the broadband is really fast especially useful if your are into online gaming, basic braodband package and still get 20Mb. Will drop slightly during peak periods but not much.

torchomatic · Apr 4, 2013

Thanks both. That's a relief. It did look good while we were playing around with it. We went with the XL package half price for 6 months. DOn't watch Sky Atlantic that much, so won't miss that too much. I'm on BT Infinity 2 at the mo, but the speeds are disappointing, so looking forward to the 100MB package - although in theory I should get up to 80MB now I never manage over 40MB.

They were desperate for me to sign up today that they offered me a £20 high street voucher and when I chose Argos, they sent someone out to buy one! I have to wait until the end of May, but looking forward to it already. The final straw was our Sky HD box which is really unresponsive. Sky said I could have another for £200! Yeah, right.

covlad1986 · Apr 4, 2013

I would like to get Virgin TV but I live in a maisonette where there is a flat on top of another flat in spon end but for some reason the flat below mine can get virgin TV but I can't which P***es me off

Nick · Apr 4, 2013

Not in my area also

olderskyblue · Apr 4, 2013

torchomatic said:
Thanks both. That's a relief. It did look good while we were playing around with it. We went with the XL package half price for 6 months. DOn't watch Sky Atlantic that much, so won't miss that too much. I'm on BT Infinity 2 at the mo, but the speeds are disappointing, so looking forward to the 100MB package - although in theory I should get up to 80MB now I never manage over 40MB.

They were desperate for me to sign up today that they offered me a £20 high street voucher and when I chose Argos, they sent someone out to buy one! I have to wait until the end of May, but looking forward to it already. The final straw was our Sky HD box which is really unresponsive. Sky said I could have another for £200! Yeah, right.

I can't get Virgin, but threatened to leave sky anyway. I actually cancelled, but a week before they were supposed to cut me off, they offered a 1/2 price for a year deal, and exchanged my box with a new one with bigger storage capacity.(I had been having problems with it, but they wanted me to buy another)

Decided to continue

Dan Griffin · Apr 4, 2013

I have Virgin TiVo, it's class, but the broadband is wackkkkk, laptop iPod and Xbox can sometimes (alot recently) have problems connecting via wifi

WillieStanley · Apr 4, 2013

Dan Griffin said:
I have Virgin TiVo, it's class, but the broadband is wackkkkk, laptop iPod and Xbox can sometimes (alot recently) have problems connecting via wifi

I'd ask about that!! My Wifi is great!!

torchomatic · Apr 4, 2013

Didn't offer me anything like that, the bastards. Anyway, a change is as good as a rest.

olderskyblue said:
I can't get Virgin, but threatened to leave sky anyway. I actually cancelled, but a week before they were supposed to cut me off, they offered a 1/2 price for a year deal, and exchanged my box with a new one with bigger storage capacity.(I had been having problems with it, but they wanted me to buy another)

Decided to continue

Flying Fokker · Apr 4, 2013

All this talk......I just phoned up and told virgin i was cancelling. Ended up getting what I wanted. A Tivo set and 2.25 off monthly bill. 49.95 installation though.

Not sure I could have pushed for any better deal given that I'm happy with my 100mb internet.

Did you know that they reduce internet down to 25% of internet speed if you are a high user. I have had this problem. 260Gb or MB? per month usage.

In May they are changing this in that they are only going to reduce the internet by 25% when you are heavy users.

stupot07 · Apr 4, 2013

Dan Griffin said:
I have Virgin TiVo, it's class, but the broadband is wackkkkk, laptop iPod and Xbox can sometimes (alot recently) have problems connecting via wifi

Is that a router problem rather than an internet problem?

Covstu · Apr 4, 2013

I have virgin also and generally happy with the service. Tivo is 'okay' but very slow to navigate which is frustrating! Internet line is generally very good also. Cannot complain.

SkyBlueHomer · Apr 4, 2013

Dan Griffin said:
I have Virgin TiVo, it's class, but the broadband is wackkkkk, laptop iPod and Xbox can sometimes (alot recently) have problems connecting via wifi

Do you have a spare network cable? Plug 1 end in your laptop and other end in your router. If you can connect ok you have a poor signal. We had same problem here due to location of the PC. All I got was a TP-Link Powerline adaptor pair from play.com, very cheap.
Setup inside 5 minutes even for a novice and now have a perfect connection.

Dan Griffin · Apr 4, 2013

Probably is a router problem tbh, but when an Ethernet cable is plugged in its perfectly fine and quick. Had to call them about 3 times in the past it just doesn't get any better or change.

Real · Apr 5, 2013

Dan Griffin said:
I have Virgin TiVo, it's class, but the broadband is wackkkkk, laptop iPod and Xbox can sometimes (alot recently) have problems connecting via wifi

I've just got TiVo and broadband with Virgin, and I have had the same problem. I'm assuming once I ring up and complain they will put me on a different frequency and I won't have any more problems.

Otis · Apr 5, 2013

Virgin me for.

Super fast broadband, good customer service (always has been for me anyway).

Beats Sky hands down. Fell out with Sky many years ago when I asked them to freeze my account for a few months as my receiver blew up (in the days when you had to buy your own receiver) and they said they would freeze my account so that I couldn't watch anything (which I obviously couldn't do anyway, as my receiver had just blown up!) but they said that I still had to pay. :facepalm:

Really happy with Virgin. Have tv, broadband, home phone and mobile with them. No problems at all.

hutch1972 · Apr 5, 2013

torchomatic said:
Thanks both. That's a relief. It did look good while we were playing around with it. We went with the XL package half price for 6 months. DOn't watch Sky Atlantic that much, so won't miss that too much. I'm on BT Infinity 2 at the mo, but the speeds are disappointing, so looking forward to the 100MB package - although in theory I should get up to 80MB now I never manage over 40MB.

They were desperate for me to sign up today that they offered me a £20 high street voucher and when I chose Argos, they sent someone out to buy one! I have to wait until the end of May, but looking forward to it already. The final straw was our Sky HD box which is really unresponsive. Sky said I could have another for £200! Yeah, right.

Moved to virgin last oct after donkeys years with sky, the reason was an extra recordable box (not a tivo though) in another room which has no monthly charge, An internet speed which i could only dream of and all half price for 6 months.
There are lots of pros and only a couple of cons which are ; no sky atlantic ( game of thrones), it took 4 months for them to actually change my charge to half price , and i find the box set up (after installation ) a little long winded, its certainly not as fluent as sky control wise .
All in all though a good choice , after 20 years at sky i never a penny off feck all and they had the cheek to phone and ask why i was leaving !!

SkyBlueHomer · Apr 5, 2013

To those having Wifi issue's - we had recently the same problem. Works fine with network cable but wifi kept dropping out. What we do is log onto the router and change the channel ID within the wireless settings. This is usually caused by other router conflicts on the same ID in your area.

Hutch1972 - We had the same and was with Sky since it started almost to get football and never got penny off or offers, took 10/15 minutes trying to cancel and was offered the world including an upgraded dish to help reception during poor weather. They got in a right mood when asked why it took a threat to cancel to get this and told them to stuff it anyway

Johnnythespider · Apr 6, 2013

The best thing about tivo is the sounds it makes when using the remote, paticularly when you try and choose an unavailable option and it makes a sound like someone hitting a bass drum, do this everytime your'e wife sits down, it never fails to bring a smile to my face.

The CableGuy · Apr 6, 2013

Johnnythespider said:
The best thing about tivo is the sounds it makes when using the remote, paticularly when you try and choose an unavailable option and it makes a sound like someone hitting a bass drum, do this everytime your'e wife sits down, it never fails to bring a smile to my face.

I like TiVo, but I HATE that sound. Couldn't swicth that off quick enough.

TiVo isn't perfect mind you. The menus aren't the quickest and some of the apps are a joke (the eBay app was launched 2 years ago and still doesn't let you login to your account - seriously, what's the point?)

The only other thing to consider is ESPN - they lose the rights to show EPL footy at the end of this season. There's no word on if Virgin will manage to get BT Sports into the XL pack for free (and considering BT paid x3 what ESPN did, I doubt that very much).

Sky Blue M · Apr 9, 2013

I am the other way round to most people. Moving over to sky at the end of the month. Cant have any complaints about virgin. I thought it was really good. Sky is however about half the price of what we are paying for Virgin for 6 months. Will probably go back to Virgin once the contract ends with Sky.

Sky vs Virgin Media (4 Viewers)

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