Two-minute review

The BT TV service and Ultra HD YouView set top box package was among the first to offer 4K content beamed straight to your living room. It's been a few years since its launch, and it's a better service than ever before – despite strong competition from 4K broadcast competitors.

Technically known as the Humax DTR-T4000, the box certainly lives up to the hype surrounding UHD. With compatible systems now on the market from the likes of Sky and Virgin Media though, does the BT option still hold up though?

The Humax DTR-T4000 is a YouView+ box, virtually identical in appearance and functionality to the YouView from BT box, except with a 1TB hard disk capable of storing 60 hours of UHD content.

Live UHD content remains mostly limited to sporting events here, so you might well be filling the BT Ultra HD YouView box with HD or even SD shows, giving 250 hours and 600 hours respectively. Another difference is that this box is fan cooled, which makes it a bit noisy when the TV's been switched off but is totally necessary as it runs hot enough to fry an egg on.

To watch in BT Sport in 4K Ultra HD you'll need a compatible screen with at least one HDMI 2.0 input that can handle HDCP 2.2 content protection and a picture resolution of 2160p (50Hz). Most modern 4K TV screens will play nice with the UHD channels.

Incidentally, you can also watch 4K channels downscaled to 1080p on a non-4K screen, which is something to bear in mind if you've got an older set.

BT Sport is the crown jewel of the package, with picture quality so spectacularly good it makes it nigh-on impossible to revert to inferior Full HD pics once you've had a taste of its 4K heights.

If you're a sport-loving BT Infinity subscriber the extra cost to get the telecom company's 4K TV option thrown in with your package is almost a no-brainer. But for non-BT customers the cost implications are higher and more complicated. You can check what it will cost you here on BT TV's webpage.

With wide-ranging app support that takes in not only Netflix, iPlayer and Sky's Now TV content, it also includes Amazon Prime Video – a streaming service that class-leading Sky hasn't even secured yet. The Now TV addition makes for a complete Sky TV alternative too – even if the Now TV programming isn't offered in 4K, as it would be presented on Sky Q.

But all in, there's a lot to love about BT TV and the YouView box. It's speedy, sharp, and presents its content well, meaning those that make the most of its add-on package options will get a great deal of bang for their buck.

Price and availability

First up, you need to be a BT Infinity broadband customer (with a minimum 40Mbps connection) and a subscriber to BT TV's top-level Ultra HD packages, which start at £15 a month. Regular BT TV starts at £10 a month. What's accessible to customers varies from region to region, so we'd recommend checking out our best BT broadband deals page to find what works for you.

You'll also have to pay £50 for the box (free to new customers), line rental fees and an installation fee  if a BT Engineer is required to get you going. So there are plenty of potential additional charges to be aware of  during that initial sign up phase.

Note that the IP content including BT Sport will not work if you use a different make of router, and that the Humax box isn't wireless. BT does supply a 10m Ethernet cable, but you could try a Powerline connection.

You get 263 channels at BT's top VIP package tier, including premium entertainment, documentary and lifestyle channels. Freeview channels are delivered via an aerial, the rest via internet.

Various add ons can be bolted on to your package too, offering wider sports, entertainment and movie coverage as you go up the pricing bracket, with the 'VIP' set giving you everything – including full Sky Cinema and Sports access through the Now TV app.

As of September 2020, they're priced as below. (For more info on those packages, check out  https://www.bt.com/tv/packages/.)

• Sport Package: Now free for 3 months, 24 month contract – £29.99 upfront. £15 per month from month 4
• Big Sport Now: £20 for 6 months, 24 month contract – £9.99 upfront. £40 per month from month 7
• Entertainment: £12 a month – 24 month contract – £29.99 upfront
• Big Entertainment: £22 a month, 24 month contract – £29.99 upfront
• VIP: £60 a month, 24 month contract – £29.99 upfront

Channels, apps, features

Over 60 channels are in HD, with some of the sporting ones making the jump to 4K as live events allow. As with Sky, there are no dedicated 4K entertainment channels, with over-the-air ultra HD content confined to BT Sports broadcasts.

Netflix's Ultra HD content has now arrived to add some much-needed extra 4K content. You can also subscribe to Sky Movies and Sky Sports channels (as well as Now TV boxset content), but only in HD.

To operate the box you use the humungous remote control, which is a touch unwieldy but at least the operating system is pleasing to look at and logically laid out, with carousels of menu options appearing in narrow bands at the bottom of the screen.

BT TV makes use of the YouView+ platform and technology, which means you get an EPG that scrolls back seven days as well as forwards and allows you to record shows from the past week so long as they are also contained within the relevant on-demand engine (iPlayer, ITV Player, All 4, Demand 5, BT Player, Now TV, Milkshake!, UKTV Play, Sky Store, Quest, S4C), plus two apps (BBC News and BBC Sport).

There are also scores of movies, TV shows (including box sets) and music videos to rent or buy.

Unfortunately, the box is no quicker to power up than the BT TV YouView box, taking a good 20 seconds or so from standby, even when taking the Smart and eco-friendly power up options into account.

Considering how complex the content offering is, the box itself is pretty easy to get to grips with.

Recording shows and accessing them proves a cinch and seems reliable, with the MyTV section of the interface housing recordings and scheduled recordings. In a nice addition, there's also a Watch List option – letting you keep track of things you'd like to give a look at some point, without committing to recording them.

HD vs 4K

While live 4K football is shown simultaneously in HD and Ultra HD each channel has its own cameras, commentators and studio support. And both require a lot of equipment and manpower to capture and deliver the picture.

Having checked out some of the matches broadcast in 4K, we can say the extra resolution proves captivating, especially when compared with the HD feeds. The most obvious difference is the extra detail afforded by the higher resolution format.

Everything is sharper than it is in HD – not just a bit sharper, much sharper. The outline of players in UHD is much clearer, the detail in the grass is better (even in wide shots), and you can actually read the wording on the ads that run round the upper tier of the Wembley stand.

This additional detail allows the camera to zoom out wider, so you see more of an overview of the action. Static detail is especially good since there is some inevitable loss of resolution with motion and the frame rate isn't high enough to keep fast moving objects pin sharp, though it is running at a higher rate than HD.

Any Ultra HD screen will be equipped to show off the extra detail with motion resolution holding up pretty well thanks to a 50fps frame rate.

Happily, the IPTV stream is outside of your internet service, so watching a broadcast won't affect simultaneous streaming or web browsing elsewhere in the home on a computer. Also, the IP stream is user-agnostic so your speed won't be affected by the number of other users in the district.

What's lacking still is BT's own access to 4K movies and entertainment content. It's now a baked in part of Sky's premium Sky Q 4K package. Yes, there's access to streaming services like Netflix to get your 4K kicks from on the BT platform, but that's an additional subscription. 

Considering its diminutive size and unremarkable design the Humax DTR-T4000 packs one hell of a punch, offering a broad quantity of free and paid content including the YouView seven day roll-back EPG and BT TV's bespoke entertainment and sports offering.

Undoubtedly though it's the BT Sport Ultra HD channel that we're principally interested in, and without a doubt 4K UHD is the jewel in the BT YouView crown. Don't forget that extra content from Netflix and Amazon Prime Video, though.

Get if if...

Don't get it if...

• How BT gets all those pixels from pitch to picture.

How much would you pay to legitimately watch all the TV shows you're desperate to keep up to date with?

Now that the very best shows are being disseminated between terrestrial, subscription television and over-the-top (OTT) streaming services it's going to cost a fortune if you want to always keep up with the latest top TV.

Either that or we return to a time when you gathered around the water-cooler, office kitchen or bar to talk about the latest events in Game of Thrones, and where there was a complicit understanding that most, if not all, of you had torrented the show from some illegitimate site.

That's my concern with the growing number of different places - whether traditional pay-TV bods or new contract-free OTT folk - offering gated, exclusive access to their own TV shows.

As much as there is evidence that a great number of people have both an OTT as well as a standard TV service - some 57% of UK households and the same in the US - there are going to be far fewer that can sign up to multiple OTT as well as a host of pay-TV subscriptions.

Fractured

Game of Thrones can be exclusively found on Sky Atlantic here in the UK, The Walking Dead shambles around on Fox, Fear the Walking Dead is tied to AMC from BT, every Marvel show, and possibly all the Star Wars ones too, are on Netflix and the Emmy-nominated Transparent is exclusively on Amazon Prime Instant Video.

For all that you'd be looking at paying just over £800 to have the basic Sky package, the cheapest Netflix sub, Amazon Prime and BT TV for a full year.

And no one is going to do all that. Surely.

So something's got to give - and if you're not interested in getting your broadband from BT then it's going to be that which gets the first chop. Likewise if you're not bothered about next day delivery then you're probably going to ditch Amazon Prime and its £79/year price tag.

Those two both demand a full 12 month commitment to their cause - which is conversely what makes Netflix's monthly contract-free service such a good weapon against piracy.

You can jump in and out of a Netflix sub, so when your favourite show gets another series released in full on the streaming service you can pick up another month's subscription, get your fix and drop out when you're done.

Netflix though is obviously working hard at getting enough content signed up to its service so you don't let your subscription slide.

Sky has also been very smart about this with its separate NOW TV packages.

Like with Netflix you can come and go as you please - either drop £15 on a Roku-built NOW TV box and a month's entertainment package or just go online via a browser or mobile app with your month pass.

It's this sort of effort made by the content providers to make it as easy, and convenient, as possible for the consumer to get the content they want which will keep the piracy levels down and ensure the people making the actual shows get paid.

And Netflix especially is specifically targeting piracy.

Back in April Netflix's CFO, David Wells explained that "piracy is a governor in terms of our price in high piracy markets outside the US. We wouldn't want to come out with a high price because there's a lot of piracy, so we have to compete with that."

But with more and more money spent garnering exclusives for different platforms and services, with the express intention of tying the consumer into their own gated-community rather than maintaining lower levels of piracy, the TV market is going to become ever more fractured.

And with that the torrent sites are going to start getting a lot busier again.

It could be worse though, if you wanted to watch all the live Premier League and Champions League football there is that's liable to cost you nearer £900 for the year...

• Apple wants a piece of the TV streaming pie.

The new prequel/spinoff from The Walking Dead TV show aired this weekend in the US, but you can check it out for yourself when the start of the zombie apocalypse hits these shores August 31.

And the best bit? You can watch the Walking Dead online for free.

BT TV has signed up the new AMC UK channel exclusively for its pay-TV network and with that comes Robert Kirkman's new show. But thanks to the BT Showcase channel on Freeview we'll all be able to watch the UK premiere for free.

Fear the Walking Dead is going to be broadcast on both the AMC from BT channel (yup, that's its full name…) and on BT Showcase on August 31 at 9pm.

The only place you'll be able to watch it in glorious HD though will be via BT TV itself.

Record-breaker

We've heard good things about the new show, and given that it garnered a record-breaking 10.1 million viewers for its premiere in the US it's probably going to be worth a look if you've even a passing interest in the undead and their shambling ways.

AMC from BT has also announced a host of UK movie premieres for the channel too as well as first looks at the likes of Rectify from the producers of Breaking Bad.

And, speaking of which, AMC from BT will also be broadcasting the misadventures of Walter White later on this year and all seven series of Mad Men too.

These are interesting times for BT TV given the amount of exclusives it's starting to pile up. With the recent announcement of BT Sport's capture of the next Ashes series in Australia and the wholesale plunder of Champions League exclusivity too.

Sky must be starting to worry...

Just as the latest Ashes series comes to an end, with a rather ignominious defeat for the England team, BT has announced it's sealed the exclusive rights to show the next Ashes series live on BT Sport.

The next Ashes will be played on Australian soil across 2017 and 2018 and will be the first England away Test not on Sky for nearly thirty years.

As part of the deal BT Sport has also acquired the free-to-air rights to daily highlights packages of international matches and will be broadcasting the women's Ashes too.

In order to grab the next Ashes series away from Sky, the BT Sport deal means it will also be showing all Australian home international matches live for the next five years. That includes all test matches, one-day internationals and T20 internationals too.

It's quite a blow to Sky's cricket coverage, though the late night away Ashes series in Australia is arguably the less important one in terms of audience numbers with Sky still retaining the rights to the home Ashes series in 2019.

As Sky's deal with the England and Wales Cricket Board comes to an end in 2019, however, this latest BT Sport coup is likely to worry its negotiators - the next deal is likely to be a lot more expensive to procure.

"BT Sport is delighted to be adding international cricket to its line-up, and to be the new home of the next Ashes tour in Australia," said Delia Bushell, Managing Director of BT TV and BT Sport.

Money talks

Reports say BT Sport outbid Sky by some £20m to bag the next series and it seems that having saved money in some areas it is able to bid big in others.

"Having not overpaid for Premier League rights we feel very confident we're in a good position moving forward," said Bushell at the first Ultra HD Community Shield broadcast earlier in the month. "We're in a good position to bid for the rights we see value in."

It's a big thing for both BT Sport and cricket in general. This deal is likely to push up the price of the next ECB domestic rights deal and that is going to pump even more money into English cricket.

"[BT Sport] are uniquely placed to become one of the UK's largest sports channels and we think cricket can provide the content and opportunities to help them do just that," said Ben Amarfio, General Manager Communications and Marketing for Cricket Australia.

"With more cricket content now available via BT Sport, free-to-air television and through our digital platforms, we are making the game more accessible to more people. The principle of taking the game to more people is very important in our efforts to grow the game."

Though splitting the sport between two pay-TV companies is arguably going to diminish the live audience, which has to be a concern for the consumer.

• Behind the scenes of Wembley's first Ultra HD match.

It's a bright, hot day on what's been a pretty poor excuse for a British Summer - but then the sun always does come out for the start of a new football season. Normally the Community Shield though doesn't have much relevance, but this year it's got Capital rivals Arsenal and Chelsea fighting it out.

And it also represents a major technological first too.

This year's match is the very first live broadcast on the UK's only 4K UHD channel, BT Sports Ultra HD.

Considering the importance of this day I'm surprised at just how relaxed everyone concerned seems to be. We make our way around the bowels of Wembley Stadium, checking out the brand new Ultra HD broadcast truck, tripping over miles of high-speed cabling and have our hands swatted away from prodding the latest 4K cameras pitch-side.

And all the BT folk are smiling and relaxed and acting like this is just another footie match.

I'm actually mildly disappointed there's no running about, no screaming and shouting in the dimly-lit underbelly of Wembley…

"To be honest it's been easier than when we launched the three channels two years ago," Jamie Hindhaugh, Chief Operating Officer of BT Sport, tells me.

The new Ultra HD truck, where the match feed is directed and controlled from, was only finished just five days before this first 4K UHD live broadcast. Though BT Sport has been running UHD tests over the last few months, getting the right mix of hardware, software and connections in place to make all this possible.

TechnoTruck

It's tested everything that goes into the new truck, but this is the first time the whole thing's been used for a proper live broadcast.

"In November Jamie decided he wanted a 4K truck," explains Dan McDonell, MD of the vehicle's manufacturers, TimelineTV. "That was when we first started to build it. It's been an incredibly tight turnaround."

Considering it took twenty-six weeks alone to put the chassis of this expanding techie truck together it's quite an achievement it's here at all.

"We've got an entire end-to-end 4K workflow," says McDonell. "A huge amount of processing power, and a lot of cabling and a lot of technology."

Inside BT's TimelineTV truck is the control-centre for the entire directorial operation. The centrepiece of the console is a full 49-inch Sony UHD monitor. Hindhaugh explains how important they've found it to have exactly what the end user is going to see in their homes displayed in the truck itself.

Arrayed around it are myriad screens, showing everything from the different cameras around the ground to the live Hawkeye goal-line technology feed.

Separate feeds

It's interesting that BT Sport has taken the choice to run two separate presentations of the match, so there's one truck with a separate director looking after the HD broadcast and this new truck putting together an entirely separate Ultra HD show.

"One of the things we were absolutely adamant about," says Hindhaugh, "when you launch a UHD channel the first thing you CANNOT see is up-rezzed HD. The temptation would be to up-rez our presentation before the game and then go to the game for live 4K. We're not doing that here, we've got completely separate presentation setups."

The UHD presentation then is shorter than the main HD broadcast, eschewing a studio setup for having the match commentators in front of a UHD camera in the gantry above the pitch giving pre-match and half-time analysis into the 4K lens.

"We're absolutely determined to keep this native 4K all the way through the journey," says Hindhaugh.

It feels a slightly odd setup at first, and means if you stick entirely with the Ultra HD broadcast you don't get BT Sport's headline presenters or guest pundits. BT Sport though expects people at home to tune in to the HD channels for the analysis and then switch to BT Sport Ultra HD for the high-resolution match coverage.

It would seem to make sense to film everything in 4K and then downscale it all for the HD presentation.

That's likely to be the future of things, once UHD is a more established format and not the niche audience it currently is, but there are very valid reasons for keeping things separate.

Directorial debate

Because of the quality of the cameras and the detail in the pictures it changes how the actual match is shot and directed.

"The key thing for me," explains Rob Levie, the 4K UHD director, "when we cover the game in UHD compared to what we do with HD, is we can afford to sit on the main camera one angle. We can sit a lot wider, so you can see a lot more of the players, you can see the movement of the play.

It's like you're in a seat in the main gantry, you can see everything."

BT Sport's signature BT Box, showing replays without interrupting the live game, is used a lot more too. With the wider angle it's not taking up as much of the main action.

"We can put replays in a lot earlier than we could in normal HD coverage," says Levie.

The camera operators themselves have to work differently too. "I ask them to pan a little bit slower," he continues." Naturally to them, because they're used to filming slightly tighter on normal coverage I need to ask them to come a little bit wider. When you go wide you can still see the names on the back of the player's shirts - it's that good."

But it's not all about that UHD broadcast truck though, there is an entirely separate little van full o' tech to provide the necessary high-speed encoding and transfer link to both BT Tower for piping around the country and out to the studio itself.

It's a complex process. The feed from the 4K UHD cameras is put together in the main truck and then the full 12Gbps feed is handed off in the carpark below Wembley to the link van.

The feed is then encoded - via four bonded H.264 encoders - to be more easily transported, compressed to a more manageable bitrate for transfer, and then sent out to BT Tower. Then it's on to the BT Sport studio where it's decompressed back to 12Gbps rates, lined up and recorded.

Then it's fired back to BT Tower, down the Infinity network and out to the new BT UHD Humax set top box.

Camera crew

The new BT UHD truck isn't the only new thing primed for this first Ultra HD live broadcast; the crew is the first to be using the new generation of 4K cameras in anger, along with their new lenses.

"We're using the first twelve Sony cameras in the world - new generation 4K," explains Hindhaugh, "We're using the first Fuji lenses in the world for 4K. It's very exciting for us."

The twelve Sony 4300 cameras are arrayed around the ground, offering different angles on the pitch, which means they need different lenses. There are six Fuji 80:1 box lenses and another six Fuji 22:1 lenses on show.

And boy does it all work beautifully.

Even on the slightly aged Samsung UHD TV we watched the coverage on upstairs the picture was crisp and the wider angle really gave more the impression you get from being at a live game.

The Ultra HD stream isn't just about higher resolution and more pixels though - BT Sport has also doubled the standard frame rate to 50FPS.

The extra frame rate makes the match seem much smoother and maintains the extreme level of detail even when the cameras are moving and the action picks up.

I'd want the Ultra HD service for that alone.

Ultra HD push

And the fact BT Sport is pushing ahead as the technological lead in the UK broadcast market is important not only for the company but also the TV manufacturers too.

"They're very supportive," Delia Bushell, MD of BT Sport, tells me just before kick off. "We probably work more closely so far with Sony, but all of the manufacturers are obviously very excited because 4K is the focus of what they're now trying to push."

And content has been such a big problem for the wider adoption of 4K. Things like Netflix's UHD offerings (soon to hit the new BT Humax box "as soon as we've got it ready") and now a live broadcast channel will really help drive that forward.

"When everyone moved from SD to HD it was very much sport that lead that," says Bushell. "So I think again it will be the same for Ultra HD. Live sport is always where it crystalises the step-change in the viewing experience. So, for BT Sport to come first launching Ultra HD for us is a real milestone."

The Community Shield coverage then was a success. The pictures were flung out far and wide across the country, spilling millions of pixels onto the Ultra HD TVs of the few lucky enough to have the advanced technology necessary.

But it doesn't stop there.

This weekend will see the first Premier League game - and the very first game of the entire top-tier season - broadcast live in Ultra HD as Manchester Utd. take on Tottenham.

Then it's out into the wider world of sport, with rugby, squash, MotoGP and others getting the full Ultra HD treatment.

This is the thin end of the wedge then, and an introduction into how sport and TV is going to be broadcast and viewed by everyone in the very near future.

• The finest Ultra HD TVs to watch this resolution revolution on.

BT TV has announced today that it's launching its new AMC channel exclusively to BT customers, with the Fear the Walking Dead premiere as its big attraction.

The new AMC channel will be automatically added to BT customers' boxes on August 28, without them having to do anything to set things up. The channel is going to showcase a number of AMC dramas, as well as content from other producers too.

The headline grabber though is that AMC UK is going to be the only place on these shores to catch the new series by Robert Kirkman, Fear the Walking Dead. The prequel show, set at the beginning of The Walking Dead's apocalyptic break out, is exclusive in the UK to AMC on BT TV and will premiere on August 31.

That's just over a week after its US premiere.

Fear the Walking Dead features a whole new group of survivors dealing with the start of the zombie deathgasm on the East coast of the US. You might get some fresher walkers that far North of Atlanta...

Apocalyptic

"We're delighted that our viewers will be able to experience the start of the zombie apocalypse when AMC's 'Fear the Walking Dead' debuts exclusively to BT customers", says Delia Bushell, Managing Director, BT TV & BT Sport.

It's not just about TV shows either with the network planning to also show a variety of movies 'from the world's most popular film libraries.

"The network will also feature other dramas from AMC Networks," said AMC President, Bruce Tuchman. "Including the acclaimed series 'Rectify' from the producers of 'Breaking Bad' to complement its line-up of popular movies."

BT is broadening its TV offerings at the moment, with the first Ultra HD live broadcast in the UK on Sunday at the Community Shield and kicking off the Premier League season in UHD this Saturday.

• Make sure you're getting the best picture on your TV for all this new content

BT has just unveiled the August lineup and pricing for its brand new BT Sport Ultra HD channel, the first live 4K UHD channel to launch in the UK.

The new channel will launch featuring the FA Community Shield contest between Arsenal and Chelsea, live from Wembley in all its super-sharp, 8.3million pixel glory on August 2. It will then kick off the new Premier League season with the competition's first game, Manchester United facing off against Tottenham Hotspur in the lunchtime match on August 8.

The rollout of live UHD content will be relatively slow, with only a further two Premier League games and the Silverstone MotoGP being shown on BT Sport Ultra HD during August. The big coup for BT though is its exclusive rights to showing UEFA Champions League games, which will definitely feature in 4K UHD-o-vision at some point in the coming season.

There will also be Aviva Premiership rugby and FA Cup action hitting the Ultra HD channel too.

Price of progress

BT Sport Ultra HD will come as part of the top BT TV package, dubbed Entertainment Ultra HD, with a £15/month price tag. For that you, of course, gain access to the sporty UHD goodness, get the new 1TB Ultra HD YouView+ box, 47 premium TV channels and up to 80 Freeview channels.

The new YouView+ box is the Humax DTR-T4000, the first UHD set-top box in the UK. It has been co-developed between Humax and BT to deliver the 3840 x 2160 visuals needed for the new Ultra HD channels.

BT TV is understandably excited about the new venture; the first 4K UHD channel ever to launch in the UK. It's quite a boon for the company.

"BT Sport Ultra HD is the next step in high definition TV and provides a truly cinematic viewing experience and is available only on BT TV," said Delia Bushell, MD of BT TV and BT Sport. "The BT Sport Ultra HD channel will bring you closer to the action than ever before. The picture quality is absolutely amazing – it's four times the detail of today's high definition TV. We are proud to be innovating and leading the UK TV market with our Entertainment Ultra HD package which offers customers the best in premium TV."

There are caveats though.

You will have to have either BT Infinity 1 or 2 as well as a line capable of supporting the speeds necessary to get the UHD stream from BT Sport Ultra HD. Looking at Netflix's UHD offering that requires you to have at least 25Mbps downloads on your home network.

You will also need to fork out another £44 to get the new set-top box installed in your home too.

In return though BT will give you a £500 voucher off an LG UHD TV, which might help if you accidentally ordered the service for your 1080p panel...

• The best 4K UHD TV for BT Sport

BT will no longer offer new customers BT Vision+ boxes, with the announcement that Sky's main sports channels will be available on the youView box spelling the beginning of the end for its legacy offering.

After an appeal by BT, Sky Sports 1 and 2 will be open to subscriptions to BT YouView customers, knitting together a hole which had previously been filled by BT allowing sports fans to opt for BT Vision+.

The existence of two differing BT TV services side by side was always an odd one, and the communications giant will no doubt be delighted it can now focus all of its energy on the newer, more feature-full YouView.

If you opted for a BT Vision+ box so you could get the Sky Sports package, the news is not so good: you'll have to wait until the end of your contract and then pay a £35 fee to exchange boxes.

BT Vision will continue as a supported service for the meantime, but the writing is very much on the wall for the older service.

BT has launched a new TV Everywhere service and announced that its buy-to-keep service is going multi platform - meaning that those people who buy a movie through their set-top box will be able to watch it on up to four devices.

Using its own new BT TV App, people who have bought a movie through its YouView or Vision+ services can download or stream their purchase on their phone, tablet or computer.

The app is launching on Apple and Android and will also be the home of the TV Everywhere which will allow streaming of TV channels to the device.

Pricing

It will come free as part of BT's multiroom 'extra box' offering which is priced at £5 a year plus another chunk of money for the box.

This is, of course, BT's competitor to the now familiar Sky Go app, although the addition of the digital locker element for purchased movies is an interesting one.

Sky's own buy-to-keep service offers a DVD rather than a digital device edition, but you would imagine that this could evolve if BT gains purchase.

Movie pricing apparently 'starts' at £3.99 for SD and £5.99 for HD (we don't know where it finishes) and includes titles such as 12 Years a Slave, Divergent, Despicable Me 2, Marvel's Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.

BT Broadband subscribers will continue to receive free access to the BT Sport channels in standard definition during the 2014/2015 Premier League season.

The telecoms giant will once again will screen 38 Premier League games during its second year as a broadcaster as it seeks to turn up the heat on rival BSkyB.

BT Sport, which also has the rights to the FA Cup and top US sport, is now available in five million homes across the UK, either through free or paid subscriptions.

Three million of those get free or paid access from BT either through set-top boxes, while the other two million pay through Virgin Media, which has a wholesale agreement with BT.

No free access to CL

Those seeking the channels in HD will need to pay an extra £3 a month, but that won't be too much of a stretch for the millions receiving free access to some of the UK's top sporting action.

BT subscribers are now also able to access the service via the £30 Chromecast dongle at no extra cost.

While the second term of free access is great news for BT Broadband subscribers, the gravy train will come to an end at the end of next season.

BT's deal to televise Champions League football kicks in in 2015/2016 and the company has confirmed it will charge all customers to view that content.

Via Telegraph

• Broadband deals
• BT broadband deals
• Virgin broadband deals

BT Sport has delivered a shocking blow to ITV and Sky by scooping completely exclusive rights to screen UEFA Champions League and Europa League football, from the 2015/2016 season.

The three-season, near £900m deal leaves current and long-time broadcasters Sky Sports and ITV with nothing, and gives die-hard European football fans little choice but to sign up for BT's offering.

Arriving on the scene this summer, bringing access to 38 live Premier League games a season, BT had promised to shake up the televised football landscape in the UK, and this deal does exactly that.

The company says the deal will make European football far more affordable and accessible to fans, despite free-to-air ITV channels showing live games from each round of the Champions League.

Here to stay

John Petter, BT Sport consumer chief told the Press Association the deal, which runs until 2018 proved that BT Sport wasn't a marketing gimmick but was "here to stay"

He said: "We're extremely pleased, I think this is great news for British sports fans too because the competition today, to get the whole thing, you've really got to pay £40 or plus a month and we will make the competition far more accessible and affordable to British sports fans."

BT also said all British clubs participating in European competition will appear on the channel free, at least once a season, throughout the three year agreement.

Regardless of that, it's a blow to supporters who'll now have to pay expensive monthly subscriptions to both BT Sports and Sky Sports if they wish to have live access to all of the game's top action.

Sky said BT's bid was "far in excess" of its own valuation, but customers will surely be disappointed that the broadcaster has failed to hold on to one of its key selling points.

• BT said 2013 is the year it claims British Sport. Getting more difficult to argue with that bold prediction now?

British Telecom has today denied that a sizeable price increase for BT Broadband customers has been brought in to help cover the cost of the expensive BT Sport channels.

The ISP will raise the cost of the majority of home phone and broadband packages by 6.5 per cent on January 4, as part of its annual price review, the company admitted on Friday.

However, the launch of the BT Sport channel, which has the rights to 38 Premier League football games for the next three seasons, has reportedly cost the company in the region of £1 billion.

BT is offering the channels free to BT Broadband subscribers, but it appears that even those who're getting it free will be paying in one way or another.

Own goal

In a statement given to the Guardian, BT denied the two were related. "These price changes are not linked to the launch of BT Sport.

"We revise our prices every year in what is an intensely competitive market and whilst some go up, others come down."

Only those who sign up for current deals or those on the new copper or fibre broadband connections launched in tandem with BT Sport will avoid the price hike.

For those who won't abide by the new charges, BT is offering users the opportunity to get out of their existing deals in ten days.

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Today was a huge day for BT's new sports channel, as the telecoms giant broadcast its first Premier League game at Liverpool took on Stoke City in the season's curtain raiser.

However, for some users of the BT Sport mobile app for iOS and Android, those curtains remained firmly closed as technical issues prevented some viewers from enjoying the game.

Some users complained the coverage kept cutting out, while others were perturbed that the broadcast only worked over Wi-Fi, when BT promised 3G and 4G coverage.

As hundreds of unhappy users took to Twitter, the company posted: "Sorry, some customers have seen an intermittent issue with the BT Sport App. We are working to resolve this, apologies to everyone affected."

'Responded quickly'

The issue is believed to have affected those who attempted to log in after game had kicked off, with BT claiming the problem had been resolved in time for most viewers to tune into the second half.

It wasn't the best start for BT Sport, who's televised coverage of the game impressed on Saturday morning. Perhaps a few teething problems were to be expected for the newcomers?

A BT spokesperson said: "Those customers who logged in before the game have experienced no issues but a minority of customers who tried to login once the game had started may have seen an intermittent issue and an error message.

"Our team responded quickly and were able to make a difference so most of the customers who were experiencing problems were able to enjoy the remainder of the second half."

BT has forked out £738 to broadcast 38 Premier League games a season, over the next three seasons.

• Next: Discover how stats have changed the Premier League forever.

Via BBC

2013 is the year that BT goes all in. Come August it will go head to head with Sky by launching its own rival sports service, BT Sport, offering 38 exclusive live football matches from the Barclays Premier League and a tonne of other sports available across its two channels. It's a market that has long been dominated by Sky, but BT has its own unique kicker - the service is free for its Broadband customers.

And despite both Setanta's and (before it was bought by BT) ESPN's previous failed attempts to break Sky's stronghold, there's an air of confidence about Marc Watson, chief executive of TV at BT Retail. "We're feeling very optimistic," he tells us. "We think there's a really big opportunity to expand the market."

He even bats away suggestions that Sky's retaliations, including offering its first free-to-air live Premiership League match on the first day of the season, are a cause for concern. "We think it's a really good endorsement of the model we've developed and we think it's a positive," he says.

"I think it's great. I think they should do more free actually. I think it's a model the customers like and we'd encourage them to roll that model out across more of their products."

BT's plan is to bring in the masses by waving the "free" banner although you'll need to be an existing BT Broadband customer to enjoy the service charge-free (and pay £3 a month for HD if you sign up after August 1). Those with Sky broadband, meanwhile, can get BT Sport for £15 a month in HD or £12 a month for standard, with a one-off activation fee of £15.

"What I'm hoping it will do is bring more customers into the market who want to watch this sport. Sky is doing one day for free. If [customers] want to watch this kind of sport going forward then there's only one company that's free all the time and that's us," says Watson.

"Only one in five households in the UK take premium sports at the moment," he adds. "And that's not because only one in five households are interested in sports, but because only one in five households can afford the premium sport that's been out there so far."

Vantage point

It's been by standing on the sidelines that BT has been able to plot its attack on the market, and now it's ready to strike. But the proof will be in the BT pudding. Although it's keeping cagey on the numbers right now, Watson is able to tell us that they're "very pleased with the progress so far" in terms of uptake for the service.

Still, Watson agrees that it remains a challenging market. "And the regulation of the UK market is very unbalanced," he adds. But BT's vision is long term, and goes well beyond the two channels it will be offering from August.

"The main difference is that [ESPN and Setanta] only had one product to sell which was the channel," he says. "We're a big business with a bulk of products to sell to customers. And the reason we're interested in sport is because we think it can help us sell our range of products to customers."

BT believes that it can use its sports service to demonstrate the power of its superfast broadband. "There's a lot of money - £3 billion almost - rolling out for superfast broadband around the UK," says Watson.

"The fastest superfast broadband anywhere in the world. That's a network that's primed and ready to go. And one of the things we can use sport for is to showcase that network. We'll be looking at features and ideas and innovations that help us to do that."

However there are still some worries that it might not stay that way. "It's not a short term gimmick, that's for sure," says Watson, though he adds that BT will review its pricing "next year" before making any further announcement. "But this is no short term gimmick, it's a proper price at this point," he reassures.

On the topic of innovation vs gimmicks, we ask him about the next evolution of media consumption - 4K. "We're interested in 4K so we'll have a look at that and see what that offers," says Watson, though when we mention 3D he's a little less enthused.

"Take up on the 3D has not been huge in the UK and I've noticed that ESPN in the States has just withdrawn its 3D coverage," he says. Indeed ESPN, one of the first big names to embrace the 3D format, announced in June that it will be pulling the plug by the end of the year. "I think 3D is not taking off in the way some people thought it might but we will continue to monitor it."

BT recently told TechRadar that it would be having conversations with Microsoft about putting its service on the Xbox One. Watson declined to say whether there had been any further developments, though he told us, "We are keen to get BT Sport out, and our other products too, out in the market as widely as we can, so we're talking to a number of companies about that."

Broader horizons

So, is BT the ultimate British success story? "In terms of BT, we are very much a British company," says Watson. "We're investing a lot in the UK but we're also very much a global business. We're a British company that's doing a lot overseas."

With its move into sports programming, BT's image is changing and evolving as the company continues to grow from its telephony roots. "I think the perceptions of BT are changing, I think people are starting to think about us differently," Watson tells us.

"About the company that does more than just telephony. That process has been going on for a while. But our involvement in TV and our involvement in sport has accelerated that process."

BT is also adapting to Britain's ever-growing catchup culture, with BT Vision helping the company to keep its finger on the pulse of the times. "We were the pioneers in this space," Watson is quick to jump in and highlight.

"We were the first national video on demand operator, we have a very strong catch up service, customers really like it and it's growing." But as he acknowledges, with viewer consuming habits changing so much, now is not the time to be complacent.

"The broadcast television remains very, very important so it's about having the right mix. And obviously for customers, flexibility is really what they want. They want a real breadth and depth of content and they want flexibility in how they consume it.

"So they expect to have the main channels, they expect to be able to record those main channels, they expect to be able to catch up on TV they didn't manage to record, they expect a good lineup of content, they expect a good lineup of live sports and other entertainment, and you know, they expect to be able to consume this content wherever they are on whatever device."

Britain on the tech scene

When it comes to the British tech scene as a whole, however, Watson feels like there's much more to play for. "I think there's more that [Britain] can do in the technology space, there's more we can do in the UK," he admits.

"There's a lot of talent in the UK, our creative industry is very strong, I think the opportunity for us to do more is there. I think we need to do more to attract international technology companies into the market, and we need to do more to encourage British companies to invest in product development and R&D."

When asked if there's anyone else in the tech space he's got his eye on right now, Watson stops to consider for a moment. "I think Imagination Technologies is really interesting," he responds. "They're doing a lot of interesting stuff. They're a British success story. I've watched them for a few years growing their business."

"And there's one British success story that we're very close to and that's the Premier League," he adds. "If you look back at its growth over the last ten years it has become a phenomenon. It's driving a lot of revenue back into the UK, and it's a real success story around the world, it's really dominating a lot of markets out there. So it's not just going to help us here in the UK, but it's a great story overseas too."

Whether or not BT can ride on that same wave of success come August, it'll to be an interesting spectacle to watch unfold. Right now, we'd say it's got a sporting chance.

In a move taking it head-to-head with BSkyB, BT today announced the roll-out of its BT Sport service, which will offer a range of sports channels to its broadband customers.

The best news comes for existing BT broadband customers, who will be able to access the new service completely free of charge.

BT Sport 1, BT Sport 2 and ESPN channels will be available to BT Broadband subscribers to stream via the web or YouView as well as iOS and Android smartphones and tablets, with an app on its way.

Non-BT customers, meanwhile, will be able to get BT Sport via Sky equipment for £12 a month – or £15 for HD - even if they don't currently have a Sky subscription. Customers with non-fibre connections will be able to get BT Sport via a Vision+ box, however ESPN won't be included in this.

As for content, BT has secured the rights to bring 38 live Premier League matches next season, as well as a range of other sports. It marks the first time that live weekly Barclays Premier League football matches will be free to view.

While BT didn't make any official announcement regarding launch date, Gavin Patterson, chief exec of BT retail division, confirmed in a roundtable that while sales go live today, the channels won't be available until August.

"We're going to connect people to sport in a completely new way," said Patterson. "Our focus on fibre means that we're in a great position to create the next generation of television."

• Broadband deals: compare the best prices around

Fruit 'n' Fibre

The announcement comes as BT continues to aggressively roll out its fibre broadband service around the UK. BT confirmed that it is on track for fibre to cover two thirds of homes and businesses in the country by next spring.

As for going up against Sky, a BT spokesperson told TechRadar: "A lot of our broadband customers have defected to Sky because Sky came in with a very aggressive offer... we really want to get those customers back on our broadband"

"There's a degree of BT and Sky rivalry, undoubtedly," he added. "But we're wanting to pinch broadband customers back from Virgin and Talk Talk as much as from Sky."

"This is really a battle for broadband but the TV is the bait."

ESPN has lost the rights to show live Premier League games for 2013-2014, with BT snapping up the 38 matches on offer.

It was thought that ESPN would have a touch time holding on to the rights, with broadcasters such as Al Jazeera mooted to bid for the games, but it's BT which has won the rights and will get to show Premier League content when the 2013 season commences.

ESPN had originally bought up the rights to show 46 Premier League games back in 2009, taking the content off the hands of beleaguered broadcaster Setanta.

The games were made available through BSkyB but you had to sign up and pay extra for the ESPN channel.

Money spinner

Now BT has the rights but the number has been lowered to 38 - it includes 18 of its first-choice picks and this means that BSkyB has managed to get its maximum quota of games, which is 116.

When it comes to money, Sky is now paying £760 million a year for 116 games, which is a huge increase considering it is currently paying £541 million a year.

Break this down to a game by game basis and it equates to £6.6 million – let's hope the likes of newly promoted Reading understand that they need to put in a good display for this money to make any sense.

In total, the Premier League is set to gain over £3 billion for television rights.

Compare Broadband and TV deals with Broadband Genie

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BT insists that it is not simply building up BT Vision for the arrival of the eagerly awaited IPTV scheme Project Canvas, and is looking forward to enhancements to its platform, including the arrival of Sky Sports 1 and 2.

Speaking to TechRadar, BT's Andy Baker insisted that the arrival of two of Sky's premium channels was not the beginning of a journey towards a Canvas branded BT Vision box, but the continuation of a long term project to improve the much maligned service.

"I think we are doing lots to our online TV service and there's a lot of exciting things happening," said Baker.

"There's Canvas happening, there's our investment in a fibre network and all of those things are working towards a better TV service for our customers.

"I don't think this is the start of the journey – we have been on the journey for a couple of years and we already have a very, very good TV service but what we haven't had is a very good TV service for sports fans."

Strong service

"I think that [the arrival of Sky Sports 1 and 2] will make our TV service phenomenally strong and as Canvas goes along we will enhance again," he added.

"We will continue to build and build, as more of these propositions come to market."

Sky has already accused BT of using the IPTV Canvas project as an excuse to relaunch BT Vision – but the platform will clearly benefit from the sports offering.

Interestingly, even without factoring in Sky's price hike, BT are making a major loss on the offering, so it appears that the communications giant is prepared to swallow a major hit to its profits if it can lure people to its bundled services.

BT has described Ofcom's ruling on Pay TV – which will force Sky to sell its two main sports channels to rivals at prices set by the watchdog – as 'disappointing, but a step in the right direction."

BT raised complaints against Sky's handling of premium content and the wholesale rates they charged their rivals for access to movies and the likes of Premiership football, and had a large part to play in Ofcom's decision to investigate.

However, the media giant believes that the media watchdog should not have ducked the issue over movies by referring it up to the Competition Commission, and should have been made to offer all of its sports at rates set by Ofcom.

"Today's decision from Ofcom is disappointing but a step in the right direction," said Gavin Patterson, Chief Executive Officer, BT Retail.

"We will at last be able to sell two premium sports channels. We aim to offer Sky Sports1 and 2 at lower prices than those which have been available.

"We hope to bring them to the market in time for the new Premiership football season but that will depend on Sky now complying with Ofcom's decision."

Criticism

"However, Ofcom should have gone much further than it did," added Patterson.

"They have dropped movie channels, which should have been included.

"They should have included all Sky Sports channels, not just two.

"The wholesale price for the two sports channels is higher than the regulator had previously suggested.

"Pubs and clubs should also have been offered some help as they have no option but to pay sky high prices.

"Ofcom has not set a regulated price for HD channels.

"Sky may appeal against this decision but Ofcom's remedy should be implemented without delay so that customers can benefit from lower prices."

BT's Richard Young insists that the company's involvement in Project Canvas does not spell the end of BT Vision, believing that the company can benefit from serving as an aggregator of both free and paid-for content.

BT is one of the partners in Project Canvas, which is awaiting the final approval of the BBC Trust, but already has its own IPTV offering, BT Vision, in the market.

Vision has hardly been the success that BT hoped for, and Sky's Mike Darcey recently went on record as suggesting that BT was using Canvas as an opportunity to re-launch its television offering.

Aggregator

Speaking at the IPTV World Forum, Young, the Business Development Director of BT Vision, admitted that Project Canvas will bring more competition to BT Vision, but remains confident that a BT Vision with Canvas package will prove irresistible to consumers.

"We will continue to provide BT vision to our customers," said Young. "We need to aggregate key content and we see services which we think will come on to Canvas as complimentary

"We can see a role for us as aggregating free content but also the best pay content as a on overall package with services."

With Canvas designed to be an open platform that could feasibly bring IPTV from any number of other companies, Young confessed that competition to be the most successful Canvas platform would be big, but he believes that BT is ready for the fight.

"We face more competition...but we are ready to accept that challenge to provide what's best for our consumers."

BT has revamped its Vision+ set top box, radically overhauling the chassis and controller and tinkering with the power consumption.

The new set top box's overhaul means it's now available in black (compared to silver before) which matches the 'iconic' (according to BT) Home Hub wireless router.

The controller will also be made iconic too, being encased in the same black as the box - but also features "enlarged characters to improve legibility in lower lighting conditions and for the visually impaired."

Less power to the people

Power consumption has been addressed as well, with the box now consuming 12 per cent less power when in use, despite being probably 25 per cent more iconic thanks to the new black chassis.

BT did say that a future Vision box will be able to receive Freeview HD channels, but TechRadar has spoken to the company and it has confirmed that this release will not be sporting the upgraded channel list, but a future update will still fulfil this promise.

The service has been underperforming since its launch, with CEO Marc Watson stating that the service will not hit the three million subscribers targeted by 2010, but it's likely the company is looking to this new launch to help boost uptake of the service.

If only BT can now find a way for the Vision+ box to stop recording Scrubs half way through for no good reason on a semi-regular basis then perhaps that too might entice customers to stop paying for another service instead.

The ASA has upheld a complaint against BT over an advert that misled people over the availability of movies on BT Vision over the Sky Platform.

The advert suggested that movies were available on the misfiring BT Vision platform 'before they're shown on Sky Movies'.

Which is technically true, but of course if you compare like-for-like, BT's paid-for on-demand service is really comparable to Sky Box Office – where the movies were available at exactly the same time.

That technicality was not enough for the ASA, and the complaint – by Sky and two members of the public (R.Murdoch and J.Stelling?) – was upheld, despite BT insisting it was merely trying to show that movies are available without subscribing to a movie channel.

Like for like

"We considered that, because in terms of the on-demand availability of new release films, the most similar Sky service to BT Vision was Sky Box Office, whereas the comparison drawn was between BT Vision and Sky Movies, the ad was likely to mislead by giving viewers the impression that they would be able to see new movies more quickly with BT Vision than with Sky when that was not the case," said the ASA in its ruling.

"We noted on-screen text stating 'New release films are available on Sky Box Office at the same time as BT Vision' but concluded that was insufficient to remove the overall impression that new release films were available more quickly with BT than with Sky. We concluded that the comparison was likely to mislead."

Some would suggest that BT look a bit pathetic if it has to resort to these kind of cheap tricks.

On demand TV platform BT Vision has confirmed that a future generation of its V-box will be able to receive Freeview HD channels.

Speaking to TechRadar, BT's Head of Programming, Michael Barry, revealed that work is in progress, although no firm date has been announced.

"BT Vision are working on a Freeview HD compatible box," said Barry, "however, we don't currently have a date for launch."

Freeview HD broadcasts will begin rollout next month though only the Granada region and London will be able to receive channels before Christmas.

To receive HD channels consumers will need set-top boxes with DVB-T2 tuners, though none are expected to go on sale until 2010.

Broadband customers

BT Vision is only available to BT Total Broadband customers and all of its video on demand content (which includes new and classic films, US TV box sets and kids TV) is delivered via broadband.

"High definition is challenging for us because of the bandwidth," Barry told us. "We're focused on blockbuster films and the key TV genres that really benefit from HD, such as wildlife programmes, which have to be downloaded over a few hours before they can be played.

"We are constantly looking at ways of improving compression of HD, but BT has begun its roll-out of a new fibre-optic network." One of the main reasons for the new network, Barry told us, is for delivering HD content. "Our next generation V-box is coming soon and will be able to handle HD," he said.

It's likely that dedicated Freeview HD set-top boxes will also feature broadband connectivity and full access to the BBC's iPlayer. Although BT Vision already includes a 'catch-up' service from the BBC, it doesn't have access to iPlayer.

BT Vision's CEO Marc Watson has admitted that the service will not hit its target of between two and three million subscribers by December 2010.

The old target has been something of a millstone for BT Vision, the IPTV service which has not had the expected impact on the British TV market.

That goal was set by BT's CEO Ian Livingstone, but Vision Chief Watson has now downgraded that to around one million, which is still more than double its current subscription level of 433,000.

"We have not yet found the best way of explaining what the benefits are to consumers, and what [BT Vision] stands for," Watson told the Financial Times, when the 2010 target was raised.

"We won't hit 2-3m customers over that time."

Rivals

Despite its financial might, BT has some major rivals in the TV arena that are making it difficult to get purchase.

Virgin Media's cable service has proven popular, not least because of the packages that include high-speed broadband such as the flagship 50Mb offering.

And Sky is closing in on the 10 million mark for subscribers to its satellite television platform.

In the latter's case, IPTV is very much on the agenda; Sky Player has been running from some time, offering live channels, premium downloads and catch-up TV over the internet and it is only a matter of time before Sky's HD set top boxes will be enabled for connection to an ethernet cable.

BT Vision has renamed its Freeview/VOD PVR, edged up its subscription prices and is planning to charge for the digital recorder.

The box will now be know as the BT Vision+ . It will continue to be made available free of charge for the first year to new broadband subscribers, but the connection fee of £30 has been dropped.

The monthly price of its Bronze viewing package will also rise from £13.70 to £14.68. BT says: "This is the first price increase since the launch of the value packs.

"In this time we have greatly added to our OnDemand content and extended the TVReplay service to cover all 5 terrestrial channels."

Silver and gold

The monthly cost of the Silver and Gold packages remains static at £17.61 and £19.57 respectively.

BT admits it will also levy a one-off payment of £90 for the box when a customer renews their broadband subscription. If they choose not to renew, BT says it will levy a charge of £194 .76 for the unit.

Speaking on its forums, BT explained: "The higher price only applies to customers that are out-of-contract for broadband and choose not to commit to us for a further 12 months.

"We previously provided a VBox and Powerline set for free, only to see these sold again on auction sites.

"To keep the prices down for customers that are willing to make a commitment to us we felt it was fair to ask a reasonable price from those that choose not to commit."

From Home Cinema Choice

Only recently launched amidst a fanfare of TV and print advertising, BT Vision is a 'hybrid' service which gives you a Freeview PVR that can also download TV shows and films via broadband.

BT's pricing schemes change like the British weather, but the V-box is currently free, although there's £90 of installation and connection fees to contend with. A self-install option should remove £60 of this by the end of the year. The catch is you have to be a BT Total Broadband option 2 subscriber, paying at least £23 a month for up to an 8Mb connection.

On paper the V-box is a sexy proposition, with twin Freeview tuners and a 160GB hard disc. It's hi-def capable, (although there is no HD material currently available, this may or may not appear at some point in the future) and has an HDMI output. There's also an RGB Scart and digital audio out. On-demand content is routed from your broadband modem via BT's Home Hub wireless router (although any BT other router should work as well).

Aside from a free PVR (allegedly worth £199), users get free access to the BT Vision EPG, a 14-day onscreen programme guide. By Sky or Freeview standards it's quite slick, with not just series links, but a magazine-style experience.

As a Freeview PVR, the V-box is a worthy alternative to Freeview Playback or Top Up TV Anytime, especially if you're getting the broadband anyway.

As with Philips' Freeview adapters, picture quality is good, whether live or recorded. BT's broadband network isn't perhaps as impressive as Tiscali/Homechoice, and that's reflected in the high compression seen on the recordings, which push even MPEG-4 to its limits. Don't be surprised to occasionally encounter the sort of blocky images you're used to from second (even third) division Freeview or satellite channels.

The on-demand part of BT Vision is all subscription-free, with pay-per-view charges varying from 29p for a music video to a competitive £2.99 for top movies. Many users are likely to go for a subscription, though, which start at £3 for TV Replay, going to £9 if you add a general entertainment library, and £6 for unlimited music videos or children's shows. The whole lot (not including PPV films) can be had for £14. If you're used to Sky One then you'll find the range a little outdated, but as a Freeview upgrade it's quite good.

Sky Sports isn't available, but from August you'll be able to replay any Premiership matches as soon as the live game has finished.

We're quite surprised the TV Replay catch-up service isn't thrown in for free, and £3 a month is a lot for a service that currently only has Channel 4 highlights. BT's hoping to add the BBC and ITV this year, although Five's way behind.

Conclusion

The BT Vision interface is built by Microsoft, and it looks pretty nifty, with lots of picture-in-picture menus and slinky graphics that put the other services to shame. But what looks good in a showroom has to be reliable every day at home, and we've had continuing trouble with our test boxes. There are numerous angry reports on user forums, too.

The service will get a Firmware upgrade in the Autumn, which may cure these hiccups. Until then, we can only give BT Vision a cautious recommendation. As an HD source it's a non-starter and its VOD selection is limited and expensive.

High-definition rating: 1/5. Video on demand rating: 2/5

BT Vision's iTunes-style movie and TV download store is branching out into free content supported by adverts. So far just three movies have been made available as part of a three-month trial, but it could eventually lead to more free content being released in this way in future.

The three movies - Mischief Night, Played and The Punk Rock Movie - can be downloaded from the BT Vision Download Store now, but you'll also need to grab the Hiro Media film software from the same site to see the films in full flow.

Naturally the free movie downloads are only open to PC users who have Windows 2000 or higher, alongside Windows Media Player 9. Yet again, Mac and Linux users are excluded.

BT says once the films have been downloaded there are no further restrictions - you can watch them as many times as you like in a month, and even share them with friends. However you will have to complete a demographic survey so you can be targeted with adverts that suit your interests, the ads changing dynamically every time that you watch.

Ad-free content too

You will, of course, still be able to buy advert-free content from the BT Vision Download Store, from individual TV episodes to blockbuster Hollywood movies. Prices start from as little as £1

BT Vision has launched its sports package, with matches available for £1.99. But although the pay-as-you-go nature of the service sounds like a great idea, BT Vision Sport will only enable you to watch 'near live' broadcastings of Barclays Premier League matches.

You won't be able to see those matches shown live on Sky Sports and, er, you'll have to watch them after 10pm on the day of the match. Time for the matchsticks.

You can, though, get a month's worth of 'near live' matches for the princely sum of £4.

However for £12 a month BT is enabling you to add some live matches to your package in the form of the pay-per-view package held by Irish-based Setanta Sports . This is the batch of pay-per-view matches also available to Sky Sports subscribers, which for the last few seasons have been known as Prem Plus. The price also includes Scottish Premier League games, too.

BT is, of course, focusing on the pay-as-you-go nature of the deal coupled by per-match pricing unrivalled elsewhere. The pay-as-you go and £4 monthly subscription will also cover 'near-live' coverage of up to 125 Coca Cola League and Carling Cup games.

Setanta Sports

BT's hybrid Freeview and IPTV service has had a low-key start since its launch in December. But it said on launch day that it would be partnering with Setanta to show the so-called 'near live' coverage, which is simply time-delayed with no editing.

BT Vision says subscribers will be able to get 'near live' coverage of 242 Premier League matches per season. Setanta Sports' live action includes 46 Premier League matches from England and 60 from Scotland. It also includes action from other European football leagues, US PGA tour golf, Nascar and Magners League rugby.

BT has dismissed the claim that a unified BBC-ITV-Channel 4 on-demand TV service would pose a threat to its own BT Vision IPTV service . Details emerged last week which suggested that the terrestrial broadcasters were discussing teaming up to launch a unified on-demand venture, codenamed Project Kangaroo .

Such a service would be in direct competition with BT Vision as well as the Sky Anytime on-demand service for the PC.

But a BT Vision spokesperson told Tech.co.uk this morning that BT is not worried about Project Kangaroo as it would be aimed at a different audience. "BT believes customers increasingly want entertainment on their terms and on the device of their choice - whether that be laptop, MP3 player, TV.

"For the moment, Kangaroo appears to be a project concentrating on the former, whereas BT Vision is concentrating on the latter. We expect convergence will mean that the markets will soon overlap. But BT is very confident that we have a compelling and exciting proposition, and that customers will agree with us."

It's a bit of a cagey response from a company which will surely feel threatened by the prospect of a free on-demand terrestrial service.

At the moment, BT Vision allows programmes to be downloaded to its set-top box, and charges for each download. The question is: would people be willing to pay for BT Vision if they are able to get a similar service for absolutely nothing?

BT announced today that it has made some exciting new additions to its BT Vision Download Store . New partnerships with a whole new batch of content partners has made a vast new range of content available for download.

The BT Vision Download Store is a non-exclusive online video store available to all of the UK's 14 million broadband customers - regardless of which internet service provider they use. Customers of the store can download a wide range of film, television and music to PCs and portable devices for viewing indoors or on the move, at prices starting from under £1.

The new content partners announced today are: Avalon, Cookie Jar, Contender Home Entertainment, FremantleMedia, Gong, Nelvana, Real Estate TV, Revelation Films, Shorts, TVF, TwoFour Broadcast, Vidzone Digital Media and Warner Bros.

Examples of the new material available include Edinburgh and Beyond (Avalon), Arthur, Mona the Vampire and The Adventures of Paddington Bear (Cookie Jar), Peppa Pig (Contender Home Entertainment), Till Death Do Us Part and Tommy Cooper (FremantleMedia).

Dan Marks, CEO BT Vision, said: "BT Vision Download Store is proving to be a really compelling service. Now with even more content from the best producers in the business including great music videos, TV and film, it's one of the most innovative entertainment options available anywhere."