@Tom+Adamson wrote:
Anyone regretting moving from SKYQ to Stream this year, and if so, for what reasons.
TIA Thomas
I don't regret switching from Q to Stream because it made me realise that I was paying far too much for a TV service that a large part of which I could get elsewhere for a lot less money or for free.
I was with Sky TV in various forms, from Sky+ to Sky+HD to Sky Q to Stream over about 17 years.
Being a single TV household, I really liked the PVR aspect of Sky+ and Sky Q - it made watching TV a pleasure, as it was simple to use and reliable.
When we got fast 500Mbps FTTP broadband installed and realised that we were streaming the majority of our TV viewing anyway from apps, I decided to try out Sky Stream as it made sense to get everything from the one place.
Compared to Sky Q though, Stream made watching TV a frustrating experience. It was relatively simple to use but just wasn't reliable in the same way Sky Q was. Everything just felt slower, more sluggish and glitchy. Granted, the apps were a bit quicker than those on the Sky Q box, but we rarely used them on Q, relying more on the apps on our smart TV at the time, which were fast and easy to use.
The best thing about Sky Stream were the live channel streams - they were easy to switch between, had very good picture quality and we rarely had any issues with them. Everything else: the fast forwarding, rewinding, ad-skipping, playlist, lip sync etc, just weren't in the same league as Sky Q because everything was coming down a broadband connection, rather than from a satellite or hard drive. It just lacked consistency so we got rid of it and cancelled Sky completely.
With a bit of research we discovered that we could everything we would normally watch from other sources via apps on an Apple TV 4K box. We could get discounted annual app subscriptions for completely ad-free services, some with 4K & Dolby Vision & Atmos, and get any Sky-only content from the NOW app. It works quickly and reliably and has transformed our TV viewing experience back to being a pleasureable one.
But that's just us. Don't get me wrong, Sky Stream can and does work well enough for some people, and is probably the best way to get huge quantities of live sport in the best quality possible (if that's your bag), but for others, like me, it just doesn't cut it.
The only way to find out if it will work for you is to try it. You can switch from Q to Stream and go back to Q if you find you don't like it. I still get contacted by Sky more than 6 months after leaving with half price offers to return to either Stream or Q, but have no need to.
I have no regrets about switching from Q to Stream because it led me to find an alternative means of getting all the TV we want from other cheaper, more reliable app-based sources on better hardware than Sky could provide us with.
