Video on Demand on BellTV ?

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jft436

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Rogers has been ofering Video on Demand which is a nice feature on channel 100 for some time now. I have searched around and can not find any information that Bell TV is contemplating the same feature.

What I did find on some postings that there are technical problems operating VOD on a satellite service.
Does anyone have any information that Bell would be offering VOD in the near future ?
 
VOD is a cable only offering because you would essentially need a separate transponder for every subscriber!

There have been satellite variants proposed in the past where movies could be downloaded to a reserved portion of your PVR's hard drive but it's not VOD
 
It would be interesting to see if Bell follow the lead of Dish and offer a similar type of VOD where you can download a 1080p movie to the Hard Drive. My understanding of this feature is that it is not Blu Ray quality but it is better than DVD.

I think thats a long way off though.
 
Both of you have answered my question I suspected that Bell did not have the technical capabilities to do VOD. I have a PVR and that would be nice if they could download something free of charge but I will not hold my breath on that one.

Thanks for the info
 
I would disagree since the definition of "VOD" is too general.

It may not be full VOD as offered by cable companies, but a limited selection (even 1 would qualify) of shows/movies can be viewed on demand as they are stored on a PVR.

Personally, I don't see any advantaqge in this. Since you need a PVR to qualify, then that means you already have the capability to record it at any time and watch it "on demand". I guess in a sense, PR owners have a sort of VOD already.

jft436 - Not sure what your "free" reference is about. VOD is typically a PPV scenario, unless you are refereing to the firmaware update to enable these capabilities.
 
Having used the VOD on Comcast and Rogers I find them very entertaining.
The programming they store is in excess of the size of hard drive of any current PVR cable or satellite.
When you use the vod system it operates just like a pvr Fast forward, still ,and reverse.
You can also turn it off and go back some hours later and resumethe program where uou had previously paused the the program. In some cases it can be one or two days later if that programming is still be offerred on the site.

Comcast changes their programming on a weekley basis. The type of material they store are movies from HBO AMC amd TMC along with regular programming the likes of CSI The Unit 3rd rock from the sun.They also offer pay per view movies

The Comcast system is superior in content to rogers but having said that rogers is improving with content.
VOD is a very nice system that compliments cable and at this point in time there is no cost to the viewer except for the pay per view movies which forms a small part of the vod system.
 
I found VOD pretty amazing when it first came out on Rogers and was a big fan.

I now have Bell and am surprised that I really don't miss it. With an external HD, I always have more programming recorded than I need and if I truly don't have anything to watch, I can always check out Apple TV for on demand content.

I'm sure if I had VOD now, I would use it occassionaly but things have changed so much in the last 4 to 5 years that its not quite as compelling.
 
I would likely never use it. With 5 PVR's, what's the point? :)
I don't consider this a splitting of hairs. The term VOD is meaningless as was/is HD-Ready, Full-HD, etc. In many ways, there are numerous VOD services and unless qualified with other conditions, you can't say Bell can't offer VOD. Maybe we will have to agree to disagree :) From an editorial / news / information point of view I feel it necessary to point out that VOD is possible, but a definition of the term is required.
 
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