[jacmyoung]

From what I can gather so far that if the merger is approved,


1. The new company will be under Echostar name, but under DirecTV brand of services and products.


2. From Charlie, the new receivers will be built on a new platform. Dish boxes will continue to be activated for Dish service, DirecTV boxes will continue to be activated for DirecTV service. When the existing Dish and DirecTV receivers are all converted to the new receivers, both existing services will be turned off, and a new service will be turned on, and all new receivers will be re-activated to receive the newly merged common programming services.


If this is true, will they have to replace my two Dish receivers, and one DirecTV receiver for free before the new common service turned on? If so, they must offer me one regular PVR box and two HDTV boxes, one of which must have HDTV recording capability. Seems to me a very costly switch over for Charlie.


BTW, I have a Dish501, Dish 5000/mod/AccessDTV and a RCA DTC100.

 

[jfischer]

Quote:

If so, they must offer me one regular PVR box and two HDTV boxes, one of which must have HDTV recording capability. Seems to me a very costly switch over for Charlie.

I would bet a large sum of money that the conversion of HDTV and PVR devices will NOT be paid for by Charlie, but by us.


Charlie may pay for a basic, cheap, POS box to replace your current equipment, but if you currently have a nice HDTV box or a DTivo, consider it worthless in 1-2 years. I'm glad now that I didn't pay $250 for a lifetime DTivo subscription...

 

[theprophe]

Quote:

Originally posted by jfischer I would bet a large sum of money that the conversion of HDTV and PVR devices will NOT be paid for by Charlie, but by us. Charlie may pay for a basic, cheap, POS box to replace your current equipment, but if you currently have a nice HDTV box or a DTivo, consider it worthless in 1-2 years. I'm glad now that I didn't pay $250 for a lifetime DTivo subscription...

In a couple years our HDTV's and HD satellite recievers will be using downconverted resolution anyways

 

[jacmyoung]

Based on Charlie's record on HDTV, he will not abandon the HDTV base easily. Of course without competition, he may raise HDTV programming costs a great deal, which makes him even less likely to alienate the existing HDTV base by making our hardware obsolete.


Not only that, in the next few months you will see both Dish and DirecTV to emphasis the continued support for existing new receivers that are for sale, and reassure buyers they will be guaranteed to work in the future. The last thing Charlie wants is a slow down of new sub growth. Now will be more than ever to keep the existing sub base and acquire new ones to pay for the costly merger.

 

[trafter]

According to other posts here, there is approximately $250 per consumer allocated to replace boxes. I'm guessing that is at cost.


I believe a lot of folks out there have various older models of STB's with fairly limited capabilities.


If it were me, I'd offer to replace their current box for free with a box of similar capability but at the same time offer an upgraded box for a nominal fee with a renewed service commitment.


This would mean that folks with the higher end boxes would get those boxes replaced with a similar box, the folks with a lower level box have an opportunity to upgrade at a discount, there is an offset to some of the costs of the transition from the upgrade fees and the transition time could be greatly reduced (depending on the availability of the new boxes - See Zenith 1080).


I don't think that current high-end box owners will get screwed simply because many of us also buy lots of programming. Why piss off your best customers??


I may be wrong but I'm not uncertain!

 

[jacmyoung]

I just realized this thread belongs in the Hardware section.


If the $250 is true, there is hope the high end users will be taking care of. Most subs' basic receiver costs are much less than $250 to replace.