Sky Q vs Sky Stream

[ovine]

I thought I'd post back having finally got around to swapping out Sky Q for Sky Stream.

I've had a good experience to be fair; bear in mind I only use it for live TV so I've not spent much time in the parts of the UI for the apps, films, tv series etc. I have Apple TV for all the non-live content which is super-solid and reliable and I see no need to indulge Sky in their own platform for any of this. Sorry Sky!

I've not had to reboot the box or anything, I've seen the odd glitch but nothing repetitive enough to bother me.

Picture quality is very good, perhaps overall marginally better than Sky Q though hard to be 100% sure without a side-by-side comparison. I have Hyperoptic 1gbps up/down broadband so I presume I see the maximum quality available.

It's nice to have such a small device compared to the old Sky Q box.

The biggest downside vs Sky Q is when watching live football the lag in the broadcast can mean getting goal alerts on the phone before seeing it on the screen but I can live with that.

Hopefully Sky can optimise their content delivery to reduce that over time.

[MarkGoldsmith]

@ovine For the sports lag, check out channels 921 and 922 which are low latency UHD and HD tests channels of Sky Sports Main Event. There is certainly an improvement in the latency.

[ovine]

Interesting - will do, thank you.

[Bairéad]

I got Sky Stream. I was in a sky store and asked just this question and he gave me a honest answer.

Sky Q will be shut down in the next 2 to 3 years and replaced with Stream. It's ready happening.

Any new channels or HD channels go straight to Sky Stream, Sky Q does not get all the new HD, UHD channels that come out anymore unless that channel pays extra to Sky to get it on Q. That's why they are now charging new customers for features on Q that are free on Stream to encourage people to start moving.

If you have Q today it's fine but you will likely need to move to Stream in the next 2 years.

[ovine]

The counter to that is as a Sky Q subscriber, the online ordering system appeared to specifically prevent me from ordering Sky Stream. It would always take me to a page saying I had the optimum setup (with Sky Q).

I was only able to switch by ringing them up.

[MarkGoldsmith]

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@Bairéad wrote:

I got Sky Stream. I was in a sky store and asked just this question and he gave me a honest answer.

Sky Q will be shut down in the next 2 to 3 years and replaced with Stream. It's ready happening.

Any new channels or HD channels go straight to Sky Stream, Sky Q does not get all the new HD, UHD channels that come out anymore unless that channel pays extra to Sky to get it on Q. That's why they are now charging new customers for features on Q that are free on Stream to encourage people to start moving.

If you have Q today it's fine but you will likely need to move to Stream in the next 2 years.

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Sky have a contract with the satellite providers running until at least 2028, so it's extremely unlikely Q goes before then. 

[Padam_Padam]

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@Bairéad wrote:

I got Sky Stream. I was in a sky store and asked just this question and he gave me a honest answer.

Sky Q will be shut down in the next 2 to 3 years and replaced with Stream. It's ready happening.

Any new channels or HD channels go straight to Sky Stream, Sky Q does not get all the new HD, UHD channels that come out anymore unless that channel pays extra to Sky to get it on Q. That's why they are now charging new customers for features on Q that are free on Stream to encourage people to start moving.

If you have Q today it's fine but you will likely need to move to Stream in the next 2 years.

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Sky Store staff like to think they are the experts on the products they sell. For the most part, they are not. They are just salespeople. They are not privvy to Sky's future commercial plans so anything they tell you can be taken with a very large pinch of salt. (Particularly if they are on a greater rate of commission for selling the newer product...)

[Jason+Golding]

Sky Q will not stop operating within 2 to 3 years, but I suspect Sky will have certainly stopped selling it by that point. I firmly believe that Sky will close all satellite transmissions by 2028. There is no way they will sign another extremely expensive contract with Astra.  It will not make any commercial sense