VOD Question

[narl]

Just wondering, Does N*L plan on having all channels on VOD? The reason I am asking is because after the new year I am thinking of getting a DBOX2 and would their be any point in N*L are going to have every channel VOD as we all know at present VOD isnt breakable.

 

[Insane_Jesus]

Bandwidth

The bandwidth required to make all channels VOD would be ridiculous. DOubt they will ever do it

 

[nozzer]

It may take a little while but I suspect all the premium channels will go to some form of VOD format eventually. Bandwidth probably isn't that much of a problem - remember that they are busy ugrading internet access at the moment to allow all customers to have upto 10Mbit/s connections so 3-4Mbit/s for a VOD channel isn't really significant.

 

[narl]

It may take a little while but I suspect all the premium channels will go to some form of VOD format eventually. Bandwidth probably isn't that much of a problem - remember that they are busy ugrading internet access at the moment to allow all customers to have upto 10Mbit/s connections so 3-4Mbit/s for a VOD channel isn't really significant.

With HDTV coming into effect quite soon the channel's bit rate will have to at least double. Most music video channels are about 3-5mbit max average is about 3.25mbit where as other channels like ITV are over 9mbit so the bandwidth will be quite emmense.

 

[nozzer]

I doubt HDTV will make much of an impact in the next 18-24 months and by then Telewest at least are hoping to be able to offer upto 50Mb/s broadband connections to users. With that kind of speed available you could easily transfer multiple hdtv streams at once - especially if you factor in some of the new compression algorithms.

With the kind of bandwidth that fibre offers there is no problem with vod requirements. The only real limiting factors are the headend and local connection equipment.