Satellite of Love…

Ok, having witnessed a little demonstration at the weekend (the promotional video for N.E.R.D’s ‘Everyone Nose’ magnum opus no less, in glorious HD), i’m seriously considering Freesat now, like seriously.

Sure, Sky Plus (as Felicity Kendall and Ross Kemp are so very eager to tell you) allows the pausing and rewinding of live TV, and I’ll never have to miss another episode of one of ‘my programs’ (Gossip Girl, Ed, anything with Dawn Porter in it) again, but the image quality on Freesat HD is astonishing.

I don’t intend to finish each paragraph with a word in bold incidentally, I’ll stop that now.

I’m about 70/30 in favour of taking a dip in Freesat’s shimmering waters, so what did I learn over the last 48 hours that I didn’t know already? In truth, quite a lot:

• There are no subscriptions or contracts involved with Freesat whatsoever; all I need to pay for is the cost of the equipment, which stacks up at….

• £150 for the HD Box and £80 for installation and dish. Fairly reasonable in my opinion.

• Existing Sky Digital dishes can be used in conjunction with the Freesat box without affecting the service, so I might be able to negotiate a discount on the installation. Tasty.

• By Christmas, the Freesat EPG (electronic program guide, or channel list if you like) will have evolved to 200 channels. Currently, 80 channels (including BBC HD and ITV HD) are on offer.

• In a similar fashion to Freeview, the Freesat technology instantly updates itself each time a new channel is added.

• Freesat is available to 98% of UK households, including mine.

I was especially impressed by how future proof Freesat is. The box allows you to connect to the internet via an Ethernet port for extra services, iPlayer being the most eye-catching. This is exactly what I’m looking for. Moreover, the HD service is effectively free, and you don’t get that with Sky.

As Sting once said, sort of, “If you love someone, get them Freesat”. Or was that Richard Bach?

Either way, I’m getting it.