What do you watch DSTV for? And on what?

Foxhound5366

Foxhound5366

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I know, I know, there's an anti-DSTV cabal on MyBB who start frothing at the mouth whenever they see the name. Nonetheless, I've found that doing the opposite of that cabal is usually very sensible, and so I find myself engaged in a difficult conversation with myself: is the Explora Ultra worth having over the much cheaper Explora 3B? And ... just what the heck would I watch on DSTV anyway?

Like most people I've got Netflix, Disney+ and YouTube Premium, and that gives my entire family just about enough to watch. Sometimes we'll subscribe to Apple TV when there's something worth watching.

From a practical perspective, then, I don't even know where I'd find time to watch something else. Which is why I'm keen to hear from DSTV viewers here: what do you regularly watch on DSTV?

From a hardware perspective, my biggest gripe with non-PVR DSTV is I cannot sit and wait for my favourite TV programme like it's 1995. I also don't like the DSTV Stream interface, it feels too clunky. Whenever I dip my toe back into DSTV, it never lasts more than a month simply because of that friction.

And that's where DSTV PVR comes in. My best DSTV experience was in an apartment I rented where the landlord included a early PVR and DSTV Premium in the rental ... and I believe the Explora interface will be a LOT better these days.

I'm still on the fence about an Explora Ultra: I've already got all the streaming apps on my Smart TV natively, so I don't get why having it wrapped up with DSTV will be any better. Does anyone here have an Explora Ultra and knows whether it is better than the 3B?

So yeah, the trigger for now is the Soccer World Cup next month. I'm not even a soccer fan, but I do enjoy supporting our national teams ... but now I'm trying to figure out if there's a case for getting DSTV for anything other than sport.
 
Foxhound5366 said:
I know, I know, there's an anti-DSTV cabal on MyBB who start frothing at the mouth whenever they see the name. Nonetheless, I've found that doing the opposite of that cabal is usually very sensible, and so I find myself engaged in a difficult conversation with myself: is the Explora Ultra worth having over the much cheaper Explora 3B? And ... just what the heck would I watch on DSTV anyway?

Like most people I've got Netflix, Disney+ and YouTube Premium, and that gives my entire family just about enough to watch. Sometimes we'll subscribe to Apple TV when there's something worth watching.

From a practical perspective, then, I don't even know where I'd find time to watch something else. Which is why I'm keen to hear from DSTV viewers here: what do you regularly watch on DSTV?

From a hardware perspective, my biggest gripe with non-PVR DSTV is I cannot sit and wait for my favourite TV programme like it's 1995. I also don't like the DSTV Stream interface, it feels too clunky. Whenever I dip my toe back into DSTV, it never lasts more than a month simply because of that friction.

And that's where DSTV PVR comes in. My best DSTV experience was in an apartment I rented where the landlord included a early PVR and DSTV Premium in the rental ... and I believe the Explora interface will be a LOT better these days.

I'm still on the fence about an Explora Ultra: I've already got all the streaming apps on my Smart TV natively, so I don't get why having it wrapped up with DSTV will be any better. Does anyone here have an Explora Ultra and knows whether it is better than the 3B?

So yeah, the trigger for now is the Soccer World Cup next month. I'm not even a soccer fan, but I do enjoy supporting our national teams ... but now I'm trying to figure out if there's a case for getting DSTV for anything other than sport.
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I've not actually really used my exploras for awhile, but yeah besides being slow and clunky they were better then the old pvr. The ultra is probably the better option.
 
saor said:
I thought you got this only if you want sports coverage?
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Aah man, I can't be the only person who used to watch Ice Road Truckers, Storage Wars, Come Dine with Me, MasterChef Australia, the Travel Channel, and eNCA back in the day? Who cares even if some of the content is older now: if you haven't watched it before and it's entertaining now, job done.
 
Smiggles said:
I don't. IPTV is much cheaper and better quality and with much less restrictions. Heck even a free pirate sport betting stream is better quality than DStv.
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I mean, literally do you just pop in to bad mouth everything... You know the old saying, if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all. I so wish in your case that would come about
 
Foxhound5366 said:
Aah man, I can't be the only person who used to watch Ice Road Truckers, Storage Wars, Come Dine with Me, MasterChef Australia, the Travel Channel, and eNCA back in the day? Who cares even if some of the content is older now: if you haven't watched it before and it's entertaining now, job done.
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I did back in the day, originally kept DSTV for the young ins and the kids channel, but they don't really watch anything anymore.
From our side it's actually the newer CBS stuff
 
Smiggles said:
I don't. IPTV is much cheaper and better quality and with much less restrictions. Heck even a free pirate sport betting stream is better quality than DStv.
Click to expand...
Don't get me wrong, I've pirated a good few series over my early years, before streaming was what it is now. These days, I can generally find enough content on the legitimate streams and don't have any objection to paying a couple hundred for the privilege. Piracy is still theft, if you had the opportunity to feed money back to the artist by enjoying that same content on a legitimate channel, so I feel better about supporting content creators financially.

Pirating these days is a mess of scammy websites, where the premium experiences are locked away behind premiums anyway. It is hardly encouraging for me to bother teaching myself how to be a clever criminal, when legal options are plentiful and frictionless.
 
Monkeys put my dish off alignment 3 years ago. Moved exclusively to streaming since then. But I only watch soccer, so don't use the other channels. Not the best app but easy enough to get a game on.
 
Lupus said:
I did back in the day, originally kept DSTV for the young ins and the kids channel, but they don't really watch anything anymore.
From our side it's actually the newer CBS stuff
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I live in hope that Canal+ will bring us some better international content, but the reality is that the DSTV is still a curious mix of TV "like they used to make it" which is actually pretty nostalgic compared to slick but hollow Netflix productions. Disney at least tries for a bit of emotional depth, I'll give them that ... and Apple is insane when they get it right.
 
Lupus said:
I mean, literally do you just pop in to bad mouth everything... You know the old saying, if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all. I so wish in your case that would come about
Click to expand...
MyBB Super Filter activated
 
Lupus said:
I mean, literally do you just pop in to bad mouth everything... You know the old saying, if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all. I so wish in your case that would come about
Click to expand...
1779451327951.png
They're a joke. Nevermind taking 2 months to give me a simple R300 Showmax refund. Madness.
 
I was part of the Showmax group that have the R99 p/m for 12 months for DSTV Compact. Great value for money at that price. The decision to continue or not will be for next year.

I only watch sport, specifically the football. I was watching on my tablet but can now watch on the TV at least.
 
Ecko_1 said:
Monkeys put my dish off alignment 3 years ago. Moved exclusively to streaming since then. But I only watch soccer, so don't use the other channels. Not the best app but easy enough to get a game on.
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Aah, DSTV over satellite felt like magic to me, back in the early days of the internet where I had low speed 3G and bought data bundles 512MB at a time lol. Here you could receive a stream of video from the fricking satellites, dude, which could be crystal clear even with bad mobile network reception in your area. These days with unlimited WIFI, we forget how good that really is.
 
Foxhound5366 said:
I live in hope that Canal+ will bring us some better international content, but the reality is that the DSTV is still a curious mix of TV "like they used to make it" which is actually pretty nostalgic compared to slick but hollow Netflix productions. Disney at least tries for a bit of emotional depth, I'll give them that ... and Apple is insane when they get it right.
Click to expand...
Netflix stuff is sometimes too flashy, no depth. I would like us to go back to how TV was made, 20+ episodes every 9 to 12 months is so much better than 8 episodes whenever :-(
 
Lupus said:
I mean, literally do you just pop in to bad mouth everything... You know the old saying, if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all. I so wish in your case that would come about
Click to expand...
Schticks are sticky things.
 
Foxhound5366 said:
Don't get me wrong, I've pirated a good few series over my early years, before streaming was what it is now. These days, I can generally find enough content on the legitimate streams and don't have any objection to paying a couple hundred for the privilege. Piracy is still theft, if you had the opportunity to feed money back to the artist by enjoying that same content on a legitimate channel, so I feel better about supporting content creators financially.

Pirating these days is a mess of scammy websites, where the premium experiences are locked away behind premiums anyway. It is hardly encouraging for me to bother teaching myself how to be a clever criminal, when legal options are plentiful and frictionless.
Click to expand...
I did that until more and more streaming services appeared all costing money and then still if I want to watch some older movie it's not available here and I need to use a VPN to watch it on Plex / Tubi in the states. I'll stay with piracy thanks. The music industry figured it out why can't Hollywood?
 
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