Sky Q Multiscreen

splats

Hi all,

I'm currently looking at Sky TV and Broadband packages and I'm confused about Sky Q Multi-screen.

I see that the standard box is a Sky Q 1TB box and I've read that for £99 you can purchase a Mini box that allows you to watch sky on other TVs. I need this functionality so that my wife can watch her recorded programs in the kitchen while I watch something else in the living room. However, I note there is a £12 a month option called "Sky Q Multi-screen" which allows you to watch stuff pretty much anywhere including on tablets.

To allow my wife and I to watch different content do I need to pay £99 plus £12/month for 18 months? If so, that seems nuts to pay the equivalent of £17.50/month just so she can watch neighbours while I watch the main TV.

The next issue is that most of the stuff she watches isn't Sky stuff anyway (Crap soaps, One Born, etc) so I'm pretty any Freeview Smart TV would allow her to watch those programmes for free. The issue is, she wants to be able to record them to watch when she's ready.

Am I missing something, is there a work around or do I have to simply fork out £17.50 a month for what, in 2018, is a pretty basic service/feature.

P.S. I have no interest in watching stuff on more than two TVs or on phones tablets, etc.

[Deleted User]

No, it's £20 a month for Entertainment plus £20 setup and if you want the multi room option that adds £12 a month plus another £20 for the first mini box setup. So £32 a month plus £40 one off fee, the boxes BTW are "loaned" so have to be returned when you leave.

do I have to simply fork out £17.50 a month for what, in 2018, is a pretty basic service/feature

That's not a basic service/feature though, it works out at £14.22 a month extra for an 18 month contract.

Whether it's worth it is up to yourself, your alternatives are the likes of a recordable Freeview or Freesat box if you want to record the free channels.

brewerdave

If all your wife wants is to watch soaps at a time of her convenience, then I'm pretty sure that they are all available via the catch up services eg I Player,All4 etc. These can be watched via a cheap "box" (eg Firestick, Now TV BOX ) attached to the TV as long as you have a decent internet connection.

ballyblack

so I'm pretty any Freeview Smart TV would allow her to watch those programmes for free. The issue is, she wants to be able to record them to watch when she's ready.

Buy a Humax recorder from ebay under £100

keith1950

Why do most people appear to criticise the £12/month multiscreen fee......if you wanted multiscreen on SkyHD+ it was £10/ month extra wasn't it ?
I might be reading the OP incorrectly but I thought that to use the £99 mini box you needed the £12/month subscription anyway.....not just for the ability to play on mobiles, tablets etc.

splats

My beef with the £12/month for multi-screen is that it's still a significant cost in the overall package and has been for decades. In nearly all other technology sectors features have become cheaper or free as the services are streamlined and developed.

For example, you used to have to pay a fortune to phone mobile to mobile, then it was included in your inclusive minutes. Then generous plans came out that allow unlimited calls, texts and all the data you need. Of course, you still got destroyed if you even switched your phone on in another country, but that changed too. I currently have a £20/mth sim only deal that allows me to make unlimited text and calls and use something like 20GB of data in pretty much any country in the world I'd care to visit. If you compare the flexibility of this £20 deal to a £20/month deal from 10, 15 or 20 years ago the difference is night and day.

Moreover, to achieve the above, Vodafone have to broker deals with other networks all around the world and continuously invest in new transmission infrastructure. Meanwhile, Sky still want to charge a fortune to watch their service on more than one TV when the signal and infrastructure is all ready in your home. In 2018, I honestly would expect that you should be able to buy as many £50-70 "add on" boxes as you like and ping the service all around your home.

....and don't even get me started on paying £5/month for HD content. !!!!!!.

[Deleted User]

splats wrote: »

....and don't even get me started on paying £5/month for HD content. !!!!!!.

Or an extra £6 a month for Sports HD on top of that, plus if you want UHD you have to pay for the 2GB box plus the £12 charge for multi screen (even if you only want 1 box) rather than the 1GB. Even then you'd only get UHD on the main box.

They don't even throw the HD in for free if you're paying extra in order to get UHD on the very limited number of channels it's available on.

splats

It's scandalous really. I'm guessing the problem has been a lack of viable competition. In the previously used phone example, there were 3-5 big players all keeping each other in check and poised to slit a throat if anyone got too far out of line.

Thankfully, I'm not massively into TV/Sport, etc because, looking at the pricing, you could easily be over £100 per month for your TV/Broadband if you were. That's a significant part of your monthly budget if you live alone and bank an average £1,500 pcm.

It's going to be an interesting few years for me. This will be my first home in 10 years with broadband faster than 5mbit/sec (expecting 75mbit/sec) so I'll finally be able to stream content with ease. It could potentially see Sky being ditched entirely if I find myself happy to use Freesat and streaming services. As these services improve and internet speeds get faster, there could be more and more people thinking the same way.

mije1983

splats wrote: »

you could easily be over £100 per month for your TV/Broadband if you were. That's a significant part of your monthly budget if you live alone and bank an average £1,500 pcm.

But if you live alone, you could probably cope without the multi screen element

It's like anything though, you have to cut your cloth according to your earning power. If you can't afford it, you can't have it. Not being able to afford it isn't really a reason for Sky to reduce the cost. There's lots of things I'd like but I can't afford them all, so have to make decisions on what I have and what I don't.

splats

I agree with your sentiment to a degree, especially as it relates to luxury products, fancy holidays, cars, etc.

My point is that Sky still seem to view and price their product as if though it's a luxury when, in this day and age, it really should be viewed as a pretty standard part of every day life. People were losing their sh*t at refugees coming to the UK talking on their smartphone as they falsely believed such technology was a luxury and "things can't be that bad".

Smartphones aren't really a luxury anymore. It's as basic a part of your life as some clothes on your back and if Sky has been subjected to the same competition as the phone companies for the last 20-30 years, their product would likely be viewed and charged similarly.

It doesn't put me up or down, I can afford it, but I don't feel like it's great value and I do feel it's an unnecessary strain for those on the breadline.

mije1983

splats wrote: »

My point is that Sky still seem to view and price their product as if though it's a luxury when, in this day and age, it really should be viewed as a pretty standard part of every day life.

I'm not sure why it should be viewed as standard? I know a lot of people who don't have Sky. Indeed, many people on this forum don't have Sky. Sky isn't a necessity so it is really a luxury product. The FTA channels could be considered standard.

splats wrote: »

if Sky has been subjected to the same competition as the phone companies for the last 20-30 years, their product would likely be viewed and charged similarly.

Of course it's possible, but it's not Sky's fault that nobody else wants to make the billions of pounds of investment in infrastructure to challenge them. It's not a surprise that nobody has though, given the issues faced by Sky's predecessors when they started out.