Satellite TV in India: Airtel IPTV vs Tata Sky Plus

June 1st, 2009 By Vaibhav | 50 Comments » Tags: , , ,

A couple of years ago, I wrote about why I switched from Dish TV to Tata Sky. Today, the scenario is a little different. I have moved to a new house, and we had two Televisions. We moved our Tata Sky over to one of them, but we were debating what to do for the other TV. The choice was going to be between Tata Sky Plus (the one that comes with the DVR option) and Airtel IPTV.

So, which one did I choose? Before I disclose that, here are the factors that I took into consideration when I compared Tata Sky Plus to Airtel IPTV.

So, what are the considerations when you make such a decision. The usual suspects are:

  • Cost
  • Picture Clarity
  • Support Services Quality
  • Program Recording

For Tata Sky, these are the details:

  • Cost: there is an upfront cost of the device which can be prohibitive for some. Its between Rs. 8000 to Rs. 10000. The rest is your usual Tata Sky subscription along with Rs. 50 per month for using Tata Sky Plus.
  • Picture Clarity: same as Tata Sky, which is pretty fine.
  • Support Services: Tata Sky people are pretty professional and I have never had a problem with them. They have a great website through which you can make online payments and configure your bouquet of services.
  • Program Recording: this is where the DVR power comes in. All those Amir Khan advertisements are true. There is the ability to record any program on any channel, pause live TV, etc.

For Airtel IPTV, these are the details:

  • Cost: there is an upfront cost of around Rs. 3000 to Rs. 4000 for the installation and the devices. And then there are 4 plans which vary between Rs. 400 per month to Rs. 1600 per month. The cheapest plan doesn’t include Internet. The other 3 plans have Internet available at varying speeds and they are all of unlimited download types. What you get for all this, is a telephone, a DSL connection, and the IPTV service, and 135 channels.
  • Picture Clarity: while I have heard a lot of rants about how poor the picture quality is, I run it on a 40 inch LCD TV, and I find it comparable to the Tata Sky that we are running on our other TV (which is also 40 inch LCD).
  • Support Services: Airtel has excellent support services and once again there is a website through which you can do all of your transactions.
  • Program Recording: this is where things start to differ a little. Airtel IPTV has live TV pause, rewind, and all those features of the DVR, but with a caveat. It only has these for 35 odd channels. Also, you don’t need to record the programs that you want to watch later. For these 35 channels, Airtel records ALL programs for a week. Therein lies the other limitation, if you want to watch an episode from more than a week ago, you are out of luck.

So, which option did we go for? We went for Airtel IPTV.

  • First, because we needed an Internet connection and a phone anyway.
  • Second, because it really is pretty relaxing not to have to remember that you have to set some program for recording. Also in TataSky Plus, there is a limit on how many simultaneous programs you can record. In Airtel IPTV, at least the 35 channels are all recorded for a week.
  • Third, because it was something new and we had the option since we already had TataSky on the other TV.

How have your experiences been with Airtel IPTV?

Update (Dec 28, 2009): For the last two weeks, we had a very bad viewing experience, with lots of lag and glitches. Being lazy, I took that long to report the problem. Once I did, they came home and changed the Internet router, and that fixed it. Having said that, the Airtel guy told me that this is a common problem with one of their router models, and so they simply replace the bad router with a new model (as they did with me). Now, excellent viewing has resumed again.

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50 Responses to “Satellite TV in India: Airtel IPTV vs Tata Sky Plus”

  1.   Anju Says:
      September 7th, 2009 at 11:51 am

    Hey Vaibhav
    was looking for some reviews on Airtel IPTV and happened to read urs. Now since you are using it for the last few months ,how is the experience with watching. i have heard that its performance is more better with wired connection (not DTH,but IP)and the internet speed suffers while u watch Tv …is it true ?am waiting to know more about the IPTV performance before investing in one.

    Reply
    •   Vaibhav Says:
        September 7th, 2009 at 5:39 pm

      I am very happy with it, seriously. The quality is very acceptable, and so is the Internet surfing.

      The biggest advantage is that you can watch any program from the 40+ channels it records, from the last week anytime.

      My family now watches their favorite programs whenever they want. To me its a no-brainer – go ahead and get it.

      Finally, there are people who are talking about some weird schemes that Airtel is offering on the IPTV connections – don’t go for any lifetime free or something like that. Get a monthly plan so that you can change it whenever you want.

      Reply
  2.   Sheikh Says:
      September 27th, 2009 at 7:15 pm

    Hi Vaibhav,

    How is the movie on demand in Airtel IPTV? Do I get the whole range of Hollywood/Bollywood movies available when I want? I do not like the showcase feature of Tata Sky.

    Reply
    •   Vaibhav Says:
        September 30th, 2009 at 1:11 am

      For the movie on demand, there is more choice than Tata Sky. That’s all I can say. However, whether one shows better movies than the other, I cannot say. Since I personally don’t use Movie on Demand.

      However, I have both Tata Sky and IPTV at home, and if you really want to know, then I can ask someone at home to compare the two… :)

      Reply
  3.   Anju Says:
      September 28th, 2009 at 3:06 pm

    Thanx Vaibhav , I want ahead and now have IPTV at my home.
    It is cool and the quality is great but i have to compromise with my bandwitdth of internet which was supposed to reduce according to the plan i take.
    but overall the experience is great and the service excellent.I am happy with Airtel.
    Thanx again

    Reply
    •   Akshay Says:
        September 30th, 2009 at 12:45 am

      Hey Vaibhav
      I just want to know in which area do you live? i live in Dwarka and I want to go for airtel iptv. reason being there is
      no hassle in paying bills to different persons and I also want a new internet connection (tired of reliance pathetic service)moreover i am getting a fixed line phone which i think is a good thing. So should i go for it? as people are giving so many rotten responses to airtel iptv. Waiting for your reply.

      Reply
      •   Vaibhav Says:
          September 30th, 2009 at 1:08 am

        Akshay, I live in Gurgaon. I think most of the bad reviews regarding Airtel IPTV have to do with its pricing and package deals.

        And once again, you need to remember that no service is perfect. But, at the end of the day, its your decision :)

        Reply
    •   Vaibhav Says:
        September 30th, 2009 at 1:07 am

      I don’t think any service is perfect. And each service has its pros and cons. But yes, overall I have been satisfied with Airtel IPTV as well.

      Reply
  4.   Nidhi Says:
      October 30th, 2009 at 12:05 pm

    Hey i am Nidhi this side from Delhi and i am using MYWAY IPTV. It also provides very good service in respect of good picture quality, more interactive features like maps, rail info, interactive learning quiz, karaoke, Games etc. You can also look on the website for details, am sure you will like it. The connection is through BSNL /MTNL.

    Reply
  6.   Udit Says:
      November 1st, 2009 at 3:50 pm

    Hi vaibhav,

    I am seriously considering of buying airtel IPTV, i alredy ahve 1 mbps unlimited plan from airtel, i want to know how is the quality of this, I have 47inch LCD. Is it worse than TATA sky?
    Also will there be any effect on my internet speed, I download a lot.

    Thanks
    Udit

    Reply
    •   Vaibhav Says:
        November 1st, 2009 at 4:22 pm

      Hi Udit,

      IPTV comes with 3 different Internet Plans, and I don’t think 1MBPS is one of them. I have two Airtel lines at home. One for IPTV and one for my Internet.

      Cheers.

      Reply
  7.   Udit Says:
      November 1st, 2009 at 6:24 pm

    Well they have a plan on the website which says, 1 mbps unlimited its for 1999, my concern basically is over the picture quality and the service.I have a 47 inch LCD i hope the image doesn’t get pixelated.

    Thanks

    Reply
    •   Vaibhav Says:
        November 1st, 2009 at 6:51 pm

      Well, I watch it on my 40 inch LCD, and the quality is no worse than Tata Sky. The underlying connection that they use for the streaming is actually 8 mbps (the Internet is metered).

      You will have to get used to the slow remote though. For me the fact that I can use my weekends to catch up on the shows that are recorded for the entire week makes it a no-brainer for me.

      Reply
  8.   Udit Says:
      November 1st, 2009 at 7:12 pm

    Alright, i think i’m gonna go ahead with it. Slow remote is not that big an issue, as long as the quality is good.

    Thanks

    Reply
  9.   Pradeep Says:
      January 11th, 2010 at 9:13 am

    Hi can I use this service in America

    Reply
  10.   jalil jan Says:
      November 24th, 2010 at 8:51 pm

    Sir,
    i would like to know is this Tata sky plus working in afghanistan?dose the internet conection work in Afghanistan too.
    can i use my laptop in it to check my emails with it too?
    if yes how much it will cost for the hardware and monthly cost?
    plesae let me know soon.
    Thank you.
    jalil jan.

    Reply
  11.   pawan Says:
      December 9th, 2010 at 12:42 pm

    hi vaibhav,
    i too have been using airtel iptv for some time now.
    earlier i used to watch it on my 25″ flat screen, and the image used to be pretty good, but recently i bought a samsung 40″ series 6 lcd,and i was disappointed to see that the image quality was quite poor .. the pic quality improved slightly when i put in a component cable instead of the default RCA cable, but the image quality is nowhere nearly as good as HD content or even digital quality content that i play on my tv..i was told that iptv is not recommended for tvs over 37″ as the pixels start to break beyond this point.. i think it is high time that iptv be broadcasted in hd ..then iptv will truly dominate the competition..i’m sure you already have,but try downloading some hd content(720p maybe) and see the difference..for instance,if you watch lie to me on star world,try downloading an episode in 720p resolution and see the difference..
    i wish airtel would improve the image quality on iptv soon ..
    P.S. try using component cable instead of rca cable,i’m sure your tv has the required port..

    Reply
  12.   pawan Says:
      December 14th, 2010 at 9:19 pm

    sure !
    P.s. The iptv engineer in my area informed me that they were testing HD on he iptv, and it should be coming out in the near future.

    Reply
    •   Vaibhav Says:
        December 15th, 2010 at 10:25 am

      that’s really good news. however, i think that they have really gone down on the quality of their set top box, and it’s interface. And I believe their network is not geared to support HD streaming yet, so I don’t expect to see a large roll out anytime soon.

      Reply
  13.   pawan Says:
      December 19th, 2010 at 11:18 am

    Just saw the times now ad, they’re giving a hollywood movie channel in HD,1080i, but only to DTH services as of now.. i waaaant it!!! damn you iptv ..

    Reply
  14.   Rohit Says:
      January 10th, 2011 at 3:36 pm

    I have been facing continuous problems with Airtel IPTV. Since the complains were not taken care at all, I wrote directly to Sunil Bharti Mittal, hope this helps!! Here is the context of my mail, your views please!!

    ========
    Dear Mr. Mittal

    Though I used to have a very high respect for Bharti Group, I feel disappointed to write this email to you!!

    Please accept my apologies if you feel that I have written something undesirable. I had taken a new Wi-Fi+ IPTV new connection ( Landline No 0124 xxxx618). Though this connection is only 20 days old, I have been facing multiple problems with the performance of IPTV that too multiple times. I keep spending my time coordinating with field engineer to get problems rectified.

    Since the problem become repititive, I logged a complain with customer care (Complain ID: 41676100). I was given to understand that my problem will be resolved by 1:30 PM 7/01/11. I got atleast 10 calls from different engineers only to understand the problem but nobody cared to visit and rectify. I again called customer care and since senior folks were not available, I was assured of call back (Request No 48485043). I didn’t receive any call back till now.

    In the meantime, engineer visited my house and told that in the absence of laptop, he can’t detect and rectify the problem. When I called customer care again, to my surprise, I was given to understand that Airtel system shows that problem has been resolved and hence I am supposed to log a new complaint. I have few questions which I would like to ask very humbly:

    1. What is the use of IPTV if it is not available whenever it is needed? I never faced such problems with Tata Sky, while I faced these problems 3 times in last 20 days with Airtel?
    2. If such problems are unavoidable, shall the customer not be updated while applying for the connection?
    3. Is it mandatory for customer to keep laptop at home all the time so as to facilitate Airtel Engineer rectifying the problems? And if the same is not available, is Airtel not responsible for the problems? If yes, why not Airtel charges for the laptop at the time of selling connection and provide customer with the one?
    4. What is the accountability of employees who feed wrong data in the system to show that problem has been resolved and fool the management? Is this the mode of creating WOW perception about Customer Experience?
    5. Since I am highly dissatisfied, if I decide to surrender my connection, do I deserve refund of my one time charges paid to Airtel as per the policy or does that get confiscated?

    After sending this email, I would not allow any of Airtel employees to rectify the fault unless I receive any official response to my email. Further, if I don’t hear from Airtel soon and don’t get convinced about permanent resolution, I would like to surrender my connection irrespective of whether I get the refund or not!!
    =================================

    Reply
    •   Vaibhav Says:
        January 10th, 2011 at 11:40 pm

      Rohit, if you get a reply, please do post here.

      And from my experience, yes IPTV has been a pain to use in the past few months, and almost every time I watch TV, I think of switching to TataSky or some other provider.

      I have had this for a long time, and their user interface was bad and slow to begin with – they then updated the set top box, and the user interface now is pathetic.

      I get frequent ‘waiting for signal’ messages and the incoming video hangs several times.

      The only reason I am keeping it is because of the killer feature of being able to access any program that I have missed on the many channels that they record for 30 days.

      But, the moment someone else is offering this, it will be goodbye Airtel.

      Reply
  15.   pawan Says:
      January 12th, 2011 at 12:17 am

    MTNL does offer this service..but take my word for it, if you get mtnl,you’ll get so frustrated with the service and the quality,that you’ll probably through the STB out your window..
    but airtel DOES need to pick its game up…

    Reply
  16.   Rupesh Says:
      January 15th, 2011 at 3:14 pm

    Hi All,

    Many thanks for sharing valuable information here. I am continuously getting calls from Airtel regarding IPTV. I already have TataSky at home and wanted another connection for my new 37″ LCD. May I know what is your final opinion on TataSky vs Airtel IPTV? Though, I can already sense, it against Airtel IPTV, from the above conversation :)

    Reply
  17.   Jitendra Says:
      February 10th, 2011 at 3:48 pm

    I had already set my mind to go for Airtel IPTV…but after reading this review I am confused again :(

    One more thing the sales person told me that calls above 300 are free from the landline…Is that true?

    Now a days the installation cost is 1750 and monthly plan is 999 which includes 512kbps speed till 8gb downlaod after that 256kbps unlimited.

    Is it worth going for Airtel IPTV??

    Reply
  18.   Kabir Says:
      February 14th, 2011 at 9:39 pm

    Hi All

    I am in fact looking to buy a 42 inch plasma (Panasonic Viera) with the purpose of watching TV. My friend bought a 52 inch viera and uses Airtel iptv. I went to his house to check it out and thought the picture was horrible – absolutely no comparison with even the ‘local’ cable provider.

    - Picture is super pixelated
    - Lot of blur (stretch like effect)

    I think IPTV is not a good option if TV viewing is one of the primary things you will be doing with your connection. Also, from what I can figure you have to see it on a TV under 25 inches. Otherwise the glitches are too prominent to bear.

    Reply
    •   Vaibhav Says:
        February 15th, 2011 at 12:06 am

      And the problems are not just the picture resolution. The streaming itself is of very poor quality.

      Lately, they have started showing a scrolling message at the bottom of the screen – ad for some shopping channel usually. And whenever that happens, there is a lot of lag for a while in the streaming.

      Also, this is a bloody paid connection, I don’t want to see those ads.

      I find Airtel IPTV to currently be the worst customer experience of all the services I use in my life.

      Reply
  19.   Amit Says:
      February 17th, 2011 at 6:19 am

    Hi Guys,
    I am in Sydney (Australia). I want to have Airtel or any other good IPTV . I got ADSL 2+ (22 mbps) .
    Is there any technical hitch ?

    Thanks
    Amit

    Reply
  20.   Pawan Says:
      February 18th, 2011 at 8:30 pm

    well, at-least they have made the channel surfing a bit faster,it was so slow these past two weeks or so it was a complete disaster .. a lot of work these people still need to do to get their game back up..scroll message is truly very annoying ! i plan to write an email to them regarding the same.

    Reply
  21.   Pawan Says:
      February 18th, 2011 at 9:44 pm

    yes lets do it, and then we’l write them a nice big ‘fan letter’ :p

    Reply
  22.   Probal Says:
      February 25th, 2011 at 1:22 pm

    Hi Vaibhav,

    I’m considering getting Airtel IPTV, although your comments above have made me think twice.

    Just one question, mate.. Is Ten Action+ available on it? This is the only reason I’m shifting from TS.

    I have a 21″ TV, so pixelating should not be a problem, I think. Your thoughts?

    Cheers!

    Reply
    •   Vaibhav Says:
        February 28th, 2011 at 10:29 am

      Hi – sorry for such a delayed reply. I have been waiting for a chance to go and check out that channel. However, still haven’t got a chance.

      I don’t remember that the channel is available, but wanted to confirm. If this is the channel which the India-SA series was broadcast on, then no it is not available by default. You have to call them to get it activated.

      Cheers.

      Reply
  23.   prashant Says:
      March 6th, 2011 at 12:46 pm

    i already have tata sky in my home and look forward to get a new broadband connection and 2nd TV. Shall I go with iptv or get a second setbox with tata sky.

    My only concern for iptv is

    a) picture quality
    b) will HD channels available in iptv. If not will they be in future.

    Reply
    •   Vaibhav Says:
        March 6th, 2011 at 11:26 pm

      I don’t think HD is going to happen in the near future. It would require too much bandwidth to work since the TV is delivered over an Internet connection.

      Picture quality is okay – not too good, nor too bad.

      Reply
  24.   sameer.snu Says:
      March 6th, 2011 at 1:05 pm

    I used tata sky for almost 2 years, but just four months back I switched to Airtel Iptv. The only reason Airtel Iptv is success it is because it gives you internet with phone and tv experience in 999 Rs, and the best part is few predefined close to 45 channels have recording of last two weeks. I’ve stopped watching movies on Star movies and HBO when they are Live, but watch them after it is finished (running the Ad quickly), this way I kind of watch english movies of DVD quality in exact movie time (1.5 hrs). I really enjoy this feature and this recording feature is enabled by default for few selective channels (c.45) by airtel management.(e.g. Star Movies, HBO, Mtv, star plus etc.) (not included Sony Pic, Utv Action, star sports, espn etc.).

    Also I never subscribed sports channel on tata sky because of cost but here in 999 Rs I enjoy espn, star, neo, ten all such branded sports channels.

    Few weeks back Airtel did some upgrade which slowed down everything means just three channels you can switch in a minute, but after a lot of complains from so many people and few of my abuses on some of the consumer forums, they have rolled back their this change, and I’m back enjoying Airtel IPTV record and play experience.

    Since I get cable service through fibre, my reception is not deteriorated in heavy rain which is good feature compare to tata sky or other dth.

    I now can let my kid see CHOTA BEEM at any time on POGO, but then channel like Hungama where Doremon comes is not available on Airtel IPTV.

    The no. of channels could be less comparatively like it does not regional channel like Surya Tv, some of the kid channel like Hungama, but still its recording feature lets you watch almost anything and all branded channels are part of it.

    Hope my comment helps some1.

    Reply
  25.   Pawan Says:
      May 7th, 2011 at 7:29 pm

    hi, anybody tried their new stb for iptv? is it faster / smoother in any way? i guess the picture quality would be the same but the new stb’s motherboard might be faster, could provide a smoother (less annoying) experience.. heard its got an hdmi port as well, but right now obviously there wont be much of a difference since they are still broadcasting in SD..

    Reply
  26.   Praveen Says:
      July 31st, 2011 at 1:44 pm

    Hi Vaibhav,

    I’m thinking of purchasing Airtel IPTV.I lives in Vaishali, Ghaziabad.

    Is the service still “pain to use” as you have mentioned above or it has improved??

    I plan to download a lot.So is picture quality degrade or some problem is faced with TV viewing while using Internet?

    Thanks in advance !!

    Reply




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