Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #18488 in Consumer Electronics
• Brand: SKY

Customer Reviews

Buggy and unreliable
I got a brand new Sky +HD box installed and before the day was out it had failed! First sign of trouble was that when I tried to watch a programme I had recorded the box switched itself off. I had to disconnect it from the power for two minutes before the box would function again. However the picture kept freezing when I was watching the recording, again requiring unplugging etc. Then later that day when I went to change channel, the box would not respond - again a power off. Finally I had programmed it to record a programme when I was out. On returning home it had not recorded and would not record when I tried a manual record. I tried unplugging it again, this time it would not come out of standby mode. I phoned Sky went through their troubleshooting (repeating the unplugging, then unplugging both power and Sat cable feeds and finally trying to force reboot it). Nothing worked. I had to wait 9 weeks from ordering to get the box, now I have another week to wait to get it replaced. The box I was supplied with was made by Amstrad (although I had been told that it would be Samsung, Thompson or Pace) - bad news as the only other Sky digibox that has ever failed on me was an Amstrad. The Pace boxes (both standard and Sky +) that I have had, have never given me any trouble.

During the few hours my Sky +HD box worked, I have to say I was underwhelmed by the improvement in the picture on my LG 37inch HD (1080P) LCD TV. Not sure if this is because HD is over rated or my TV does a better than average job of upscaling SD broadcasts.

I will give this one more go, but if my replacement box gives trouble I will be asking for my money back and reverting to my 100% reliable Pace Sky + box.

Think twice before getting SKY HD
A word of warning to all those thinking about Sky HD. The HD boxes and customer service are rubbish! I've had Sky HD for over a year and am on my 4th box. The latest one I had to buy as Sky ignored the faults I reported within the warranty period and to cap it all I had to wait over 2 weeks without any Sky! Still waiting to have the conversation with them about compensation. I must have been mad to buy another box and commit to another 12 months. The latest box has never worked properly and I've spent hours on the phone to Sky, one call was 56 minutes, only to be past from one department to another, no one can help. I've submitted a couple of complaints via the Sky website, got acknowledgements and a promise of a "personal reply as soon as possible" but still nothing after 8 days!
This is supposed to be Sky's premium service - don't think so.
Morale of this story, think carefully before buying HD, if you do buy I really hope you have better luck and Service than I'm getting.

sky HD box - thomson
I wish someone would explain why, when Sky decided to provide an HD service, they chose to go with a manufacturer who provided the cheap, noisy unreliable boxes instead of PACE who make the quiet reliable ones.

My story is not untypical and as it could run into chapters I will give you the highlights. I had 7 sky HD boxes in 14 months. I spent what felt like weeks speaking to poorly trained automatons at sky cutomer service who are only capable of helping you if they can crowbar you into one of their few categories of problems. If not, stuff you - they certainly won't have a sensible conversation with you. Whatever happens you will have to go, every single time, through the pointless series of checks they force you to complete whether or not you've already done them or if you know, from bitter experience, that they are irrelevant.

My sky box(es) used to fail to record about 5% of what I put in the planner with one or other technical fault - 9 and 12 were most common. It would mark about 15% of what I planned to record as RECORDED - but the programme would not play back (and no a sky planner rebuild does not work sky customer services - not even after the 10th time - and the fact that it didn't doesn't mean the customer did it wrong!) About once a week the box would freeze mid programme, turn itself off and then take anything up to half an hour to come back on. HD was great but the picture quality on any content not in HD was far poorer than the PACE box - ie the vast majority of what is on. Sky replaced the box, the dish and all the leads over those 14 months (to be fair to them the engineers were fantastic) but to no avail. And noisy?? OMG you had to turn the telly up two notches just to be able to hear it over the sky box! In the end they concluded that 'HD just doesn't work for you'. I cancelled the HD service and am back with my ultra reliable little PACE box. Thomson? rubbish! Don't touch Sky HD til they change the manufacturer of the box - thats my advice.