Ordinary Gweilo

Hong Kong's digital terrestrial TV isn't as bad as I had been led to believe.  So what about Now TV HD?  Well, it's not very good, I'm afraid to say.

For a start, the choice of channels is very limited – HD versions of Discovery and National Geographic, something called Voom TV, and the sports channel.  That's it – no movie channels, and no American or British drama shows (many of which are now made in HD).  But, it's early days, I suppose.

My main interest was in the HD version of the football coverage.  It's incredibly frustrating watching games with the grainy pictures that both Now and Cable TV provide.  Surely HD would be a huge improvement?  Well, yes, up to a point.  For close-ups and action replays, the difference is quite noticeable, but for the long shots the detail is simply not there – which is presumably a consequence of the compression they use. 

Also, the Now Sports HD channel is only available for a few hours a week.  If you're lucky there may be one EPL game a week (often at midnight on Sunday), and a couple of Italian Serie A games (often at 3 am).  That's it.  The rest of the time the channel has nothing on at all.  ESPN and Star Sports aren't available in HD.

Compare that to Sky Sports HD in the UK, which has two channels that are on-air 24 hours a day and features several live soccer games each week, test cricket, and other sports.  The only advantage of Now is that they have an 'on demand' service, but that doesn't even feature the 2 or 3 live games that they show on Now Sports HD.

How about prices? 

In the UK, Sky charge for the HD Box (£199-£249), but this does includes an excellent PVR function, and then there's a flat £10 a month (HK$154) on top of whatever package you have (and you get all the channels in that package that are in HD) e.g. if you pay for sport you get the two sports channels, if you pay for movies you get all the HD movie channels.

Now TV don't charge for the box (unless you want the digital terrestrial function as well), but it isn't so good either – because it doesn't have a PVR function. 

The monthly charge depends on which channels you want in HD. 

Here we have a problem comparing the two offering.  Now TV have an incredibly opaque pricing structure, and I doubt if anyone pays their published prices – instead there is the 'all normal channels' package, or 'buy one get one free', or the special offers they manage to conjure up when you call them (you want to add two extra channels and they tell you that if you spend an extra HK$25 per month you can have 10 more channels).  So all I can do is base it on what I am currently paying.

I pay HK$140 per month for Now Sports, which includes 6 or 7 channels (plus some others that are used for live football only).  For an extra HK$48 per month (35% extra), you get one more HD channel that shows a handful of live games each week (from the English Premier League and Serie A).  Only a small fraction of the soccer games that are on Now are available in HD, and no other sports are currently available – though they are advertising NFL TV).    

I pay H$12 per month for three National Geographic channels, whereas the single HD costs an additional HK$35 per month (300% extra).  Discovery costs HK$32 for six channels, and they charge more than that (HK$35 per month extra) for the single HD channel.

So it is possible to get selected HD channels for less than the HK$160 per month you would pay for the Sky HD service, but on the other hand I'd be more than happy to pay that for all the channels that Sky have in HD:

Sky One HD, Sky Sports HD (2 channels), Sky Movies HD (2 screens), Sky Box Office HD (2 screens), Sky Arts HD, National Geographic HD, Discovery HD, The History Channel HD, Luxe TV HD, Channel 4 HD and BBC HD.

What will PCCW offer in the future?  It shouldn't be difficult to convert the HBO channels to HD, and there has been talk of a BBC HD channel.  A reasonable proportion of the shows on Star World and AXN are made in HD, so maybe they will offer HD channels as well.  However, if each of these was charged at HK$35 the total extra cost of HD would be much more than Sky are charging.

What about Cable TV?  I find it baffling that they haven't yet announced an HD service.   A bit of competition ought to help bring down prices, and maybe even force Now to offer more and better channels.  Well, I can live in hope…