HD Battle for Sports Fans
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Saturday, 27 October 2007 |
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The race to roll out high-definition channels is heating up with a focus on sports networks. DirecTV is offering hockey games in HD to their NHL Center Ice subscribers this season. They are slated to launch the NHL Network this month, while Dish Network said it will launch NHL Network HD.
Cable systems operated by Comcast, Time Warner, Cox, and Cablevision are rolling out the NHL's standard def channel, but cable operators are also promising to offer the NHL Network in HD this hockey season. However, cable has not freed up enough bandwidth to deliver any and all HD channels as they become available.
DirecTV has been publicizing its race to 100 HD channels by year-end and 150 next year, and is increasing the cost to its HD fans for offering the additional content. This week, DirecTV emailed subscribers a notification they will lose three networks that have been longstanding high-definition networks (HDNet, HDNet Movies and Universal HD) that have been a part of their basic $10/month HD package unless they pay an extra $4.99 per month.
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