Video Asylum

Posted by Fred S on July 22, 2002 at 11:41:06

In Reply to: Dish Network or Direct TV?? posted by Gersonic on July 17, 2002 at 19:48:44:

There are devotees of each (check out www.avsforum.com, www.dbsforums.com, and www.dbstalk.com and you'll find bigots of each service).

DIRECTV has far superior sports packages. This is important to some, but not to others.

DISH has more foreign language offerings.

With DISH, you can only use their proprietary receivers. They are just now releasing a PVR (i.e. something like TIVO) with a dual tuner, so you can watch one channel while recording another. Next year they should have an HD version of this.

With DIRECTV, you have the option of several manufacturer's receiver. Shop carefully.

There are differences in which HD channels are available. Both have HBO-HD, SHOWTIME-HD. Beyond that, DIRECTV has HDNET, which show a lot of sports, but other programming also (Bikini Destinations was a popular broadcast). DISH has DISCOVERY-HD, which is programming similar to regular DISCOVERY, but in HD (actually, this is some of the best HD material I've seen).

I have DISH, but have tried to give you some objective info. Good Luck!