Thinking of switching to BEV...need some help

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I am currently with Cogeco and I was thinking of switching to BEV for more HD options, but I'm a bit hesitant to switch to satellite. How often do BEV users notice pixelation/screen freezes/audio dropout etc. Is it true that even in rain or snow that it affects the signal and picture quality?

Comparing what I have now with Cogeco (HD PVR rental, TMN pack and all normal channels along with the most sports channels, incl. Leafs & Raps TV) my bill is $93 month for cable. For the same package with Bell it looks like it would be $103 a month. (with some additional HD channels that Cogeco doesn't have.)

Is it worth it to switch?

Thanks in advance!
 
That's difficult to say. It depends on what improvements Cogeco plans in the next two years. EV's HD service quality has deteriorated in the past year (with the addition of some new HD channels that exceed their theoretical capacity) and there is little room for improvement or addition of more new channels until 2009. Some cable companies, such as Rogers, have surpassed EV in quality of service and actual full time HD channels.
 
I actually am paying less with BEV than I was with Cogeco. I notice far less problems with HD on satellite than I ever had with cable. The picture is very good with all channels being of equal high quality. With cable some channels were fine with others being anywhere from average to terrible. I rarely have problems due to weather. It would have to be a real deluge of a storm (rain or snow) to degrade the picture. We have had BEV for about 3-4 months now and have lost the signal once (for about 5 minutes). Now keep in mind that you will not get local channels with BEV but you can use a roof antenna for that. Or you could subscribe to a basic analogue cable package at about $26 per month just for the local content.

As a point of reference we have HD, premium movies, 5 theme packs, 4 receivers with one being PVR and another HD, time shifting channels, and kept the basic analogue cable package for local content and still save $30-40 per month even with the basic cable added into the total. And considering that I get some channels that cable did not offer such as NFL Network, Oasis, Treasure, Equator, and we are never sorry we switched. If you do be sure to question the agent about promotional packages where you can save some money per month. Also we rent and since we signed up for 2 years the installation was free and was very well done. With Cogeco they hooked up one tv then left withoout checking signal strength. The BEV installer ran all new cable and checked every TV.

JJO
 
Due to the downgrade of many Expressvu HD channels to HD Lite, I will be canceling the service when my contract expires in December.

I didn't spend big bucks on a good HDTV to feed it HD Lite.
 
Shear Force, I completely agree with you but what are your options? I'm not sure my local cable provider or the other satellite provider would be any better. I switched from HD cable last year.

Leafs Nation, beware of the BEV contract. I signed a 2 year deal last year with 2 receiver rentals. If I want to change anything with the receivers (give one back or get a non-hd model) or service (downgrade) they will penalize me $100. If it comes to that, we are going to cancel, give them their $100 and never return. But, until we have a viable alternative we are stuck. We are sick of paying for lower and lower quality HD. It's getting to the point of ridiculous.
 
your subject line ... "thinking of switching to expressvu.... need help" is right, if you're thinking about that, you DO need help.

i have been a BEV customer for probably, 8 years now. the programming is alright, i haven't had many complaints in that department, until, as has been the ongoing theme in this thread, the quality of HD, or rather, lack of quality, in the past year.

i've never really known if the HD quality has dropped significantly over the past year, or if my eyes have just grown complacent. with the addition of HD channels over their bandwidth limits, yes, there has to be quality loss due to compression. i just feel, in my mind, that the PQ of broadcast hdtv should be the same, or, very very close to the same, as hddvd/bluray. don't get me wrong, hdtv still looks waaay better than SD, but on bell it has definitely lost some of that 'wow' factor it had last year.

the biggest issue, by far, with bell, is customer service. (i find myself asking "what customer service?") it's simply atrocious. it seems like maybe one in every 5 calls you find someone friendly/professional/intelligent enough to actually help you, rather you're calling for billing inquiries or technical support. and once that person helped you, you find out later that what they tried to do has been reversed, or unfixed, by someone else. it's seriously like pulling teeth. you ask to talk to their supervisor, they give you every excuse in the book not to. you want to talk to a higher level of tech support? they put you on hold for 5 minutes, come back, and say "level 2/3 says the same thing i do, so you don't need to talk to them."

the ONLY good thing about BEV customer service agents, is that if you don't get the answer you want, just call right back and talk to someone else.


in conclusion, if you simply want a lot of HD programming, and never really need to call in for questions/help, BEV isn't a bad solution. however, if you have discerning tastes in HD PQ, and good customer service is important to you, then surely you can find another option.
 
If your interest is HD , then I would not choose BEV. I have BEV (till Dec 16th )and *C . *C on the whole has better or equal ( CBC HD ) picture quality except for ABC HD east. Though I believe the problem lies with the Detroit station more than with *C.
 
Thanks to all who have replied and offered their experience etc. The biggest reason for me to even think of switching to BEV was because they have more HD content and usually get it WAY before Cogeco even thinks about adding it. But if the quality is dropping off, then it is not worth switching, as I find Cogeco's quality fine. And 9 times out of 10 there CSR's are usually helpful.

Thanks again!
 
I think it should come down to whether the extra HD options that they provide are even interesting to you. I was a 8 year customer that just got fed up with the BRUTAL customer service.
I have less HD channels (they look much better than my reception with Bell IMO) with Videotron but I am not missing any of the ones I would actually watch.
I think I had "buyers remorse" (the one thing I will give BEV is the time splitting channels) the first week but now I love the system and would not go back to bell (I have had issues and....the CSR's actually helped me out....gasp).
 
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