Scott Greczkowski

Let the Games Begin!
August 6, 2008

All eyes will be on Beijing this week with the opening of the 2008 Summer Olympics, and satellite viewers will get the best seats possible. (Without a passport!)

Both Dish Network and DirecTV have reached deals with NBC Universal to carry over 750 hours of HD coverage of the Olympics.  Both providers will be adding two special all HD channels which will cover Olympic Basketball and Olympic Soccer.   In addition companies will be offering foreign language coverage of this year’s games in Mandarin (Chinese) as well as Korean.

Both Dish Network and DirecTV will offer both interactive and video on demand content of the Olympics including a special feature called “Rewind” which will offer 5 to 10 of the best games / events per day.

DirecTV will also offer a special NBC Olympics Guide which customers can access on their receivers by pressing the red button on their remote; this will give a details list of current and upcoming events.  DirecTV’s interactive coverage will also include real-time Medal Counts and even Olympic trivia.

(A little Satellite Dish Trivia for you… my Cousin Brandon Greczkowski participated in the 1996 for the United States Judo Team.  He didn’t win any medals, but we were very proud of him!)

While the opening ceremonies haven’t yet happened the games have begun and live Soccer was the first event to be shown from the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing.

If you don’t have tickets to Beijing then the best way for you to enjoy all the action is at home with your satellite system, Let the Games Begin!

Dish Network Satellite Outage

On Tuesday Night Dish Network customers lost their service for close to 40 minutes. Viewers reported losing signals from the 61.5, 110 and 119 orbital locations.  The reason for the outage was believed to be a large storm at Dish Network’s Cheyenne, Wyoming uplink center.  This outage happened at the start of primetime and many customers were unable to get through to customer support.  Those who did get through were told that it was an issue at the uplink center.  That had to be a huge storm; I can’t remember any storm knocking out transmission to 3 orbital locations at the same time.

DirecTV Looking at VOOM?

There have been a few reports that Cablevision is looking to possibly sell off a number of its companies.  One of those companies which may soon be for sale include Rainbow Media, the parent company of VOOM.  Reports online have stated that if Rainbow Media is sold that Liberty Media (the owner of DirecTV) would look into possibly buying them.

A number of folks online got excited with the news hoping that the VOOM HD service could be returned to satellite on DirecTV.  My feeling on things is IF they purchase Rainbow that they will be buying it for the content, and I don’t believe that we will ever see 15 VOOM HD channels on satellite again.

I got to admit it though, I miss VOOM and I know I am not alone.

Posted by Scott Greczkowski on August 6, 2008 | Comments (0)