Cignal Digital TV - are we ready for HD broadcast

Going into the foray of Digital TV broadcast in the Philippines, Mediascape's Cignal TV has been launched a while ago.  As this is a subsidiary of PLDT, you can subscribe also via Smart Wireless Center. This is directly competing with the Cojuanco's Dream Satelllite. Both are DTH (Direct to Home) satellite broadcast.  When you're subscribed to this you can immediately see the picture difference with the regular cable tv subscription of Skycable.  It's never hazy and absolutely crystal clear, well except maybe when there's a storm that may affect the reception of your satellite dish.

Cignal comes in 2 programming  packages:

• The Cignal Digital TV provides 20 standard definition channels including GMA 7, ABS CBN 2, TV5, QTV, Studio 23, NBN, CS9, IBC13, ETC, 2nd Avenue, Net 25, HBO, Disney Channel, PBO, and Viva Cinema. And digital radio broadcasts of DZRH Television, 90.7 Love Radio, FM 101.1 Yes FM, Joey 92.3, Magic 89.9, 99.5RT, and NU107.
  

• The Cignal HD offers 2 channels of High definition broadcast. Voom, a general entertainment channel that broadcasts a wide variety of programming from sports, fashion, concerts, and documentaries; and the History Channel which will show a variety of interesting topics that cover genres of world history - military, contemporary, historical, technology, and natural as well as science, archaeology, and pop culture. A 3rd channel might be Mickey's playhouse  if i'm not mistaken, but this is not yet updated in the official website.

I guess if you made yourself very happy with this purchase you can couple it with HD broadcast from Cignal. But before making that decision you might want also to consider that due to its limitation, you can only connect your subscription to a single television unit.  It works differently with the regular cable that you can splice the signal to every room in  your house that has a tv.  Well strictly speaking, in DTH you can still splice it but you control only the tv only where the Satellite Digital receiver box is connected.  Watching your satellite tv from another room needs some addtional gadget which you can set up yourself. Get yourself a video sender over at  Ebay  which has a myriad of choices. I got one a while back so i can watch my satellite tv either in my bedroom or in the family room.

As LCD TV becomes more and more affordable, breaking into the sweet spot of 20K for a 32inch, we might be ready for some HD love... maybe like in a year from now to reach market maturity.