XBox Solution

If you’re the inquisitive sort, then the arrival of Sky Player on the Xbox 360 in the autumn is likely to raise a whole host of questions. Fortunately TechrRadar has been beavering away to get to the facts behind the first announcement and, not content just to bring you a first look and plenty of screenshots, we also asked a whole host of pressing questions to the Sky and Microsoft spokespeople. So if you want to know the expected minimum connection rate, the potential for future growth or if a non-UK version is in the pipeline then read on as we look to give you a little more information about Xbox’s Sky Player.

When is Sky Player for Xbox 360 arriving and how much will it cost? In the autumn – expect a big marketing push from both companies and to see plenty of Ant or Dec’s girlfriend Georgie Thompson. On pricing, neither company is prepared to talk – the Sky Player service sees people with multi-room get access to the channels they subscribe to; people with one box have to pay a multi-room rate to add a single Sky Player account, and people without Sky will have to pay the equivalent of what they would to have a traditional Sky service.

How fast will my broadband connection have to be to be able to watch Sky player? Xbox Live Product Unit Manager Jerry Johnson: “Right now the minimum requirements are minimum 1Mb connection with a suggestion of 2Mb to get an optimal experience of that. When we see the continued penetration of higher and higher connection then that may change. “We are continuing to work with Sky to enhance that experience using the various technologies that are available.”

Will the service be coming to countries other than the UK or Ireland? Jerry Johnson: Microsoft are making a lot of announcements at E3 and other markets are very impressed with what we have done here in the UK as a world first.” In other words – you can all but guarantee a US (non-Sky) version.

Does encoding the stream mean that there is a huge delay in the ‘live’ pictures? Will my friends watching on Sky+ HD know the team has scored before I do? Sky’s Adrian Pilkington: There is a 15-20 second delay. We’ll never eliminate latency altogether but we are work on reducing it. As the codec improves then the picture will get better and better …but we are both on that curve. It’s an evolution.

What channels/content will be on the service? “We aren’t talking about channels right now,” is the official response from both Sky and Microsoft, but we can make some assumptions based on what we have seen and from hints that were dropped at the launch. Sky Sports will feature heavily – you can bank on Premiership football being available to those who have the requisite package, the interactivity that we were shown centred around the live football. Movies are more than likely to feature as well – with Premium subscribers likely to get on demand movie content. Sky Sports News and Sky News are virtual shoe-ins as well, along with the host of Sky One shows that are from the UK. US shows ( Lost and so on) are likely, but there will probably be more details about them later on.

I don’t want an Xbox – will the service be arriving on the Sky+ HD boxes soon? Sky’s Stephen Nuttall: “We firmly believe in the power of HD. If you want to do HD movies and sports, which are very high bandwidth channels, then satellite will be the best delivery system for a long time. The plan with the DTH platform is to have this hybrid of broadcast and broadband delivery and local storage in the box. We think the combination of those three things will be very strong in the future.” Yes – Sky’s networked home is moving ever closer.

When did Sky and Microsoft start working on this deal? “It was about 18 months ago,” said a Sky spokesperson. “We have been working on the deal for that long and working on the technology side for a considerable part of that.”

Will there be more interactive content or is it confined to the Premiership Avatar room? Jerry Johnson: “Interactive people and the social people – bringing the two together is a very powerful thing. We are working with Sky to improve the service.” Adrian Pilkington: “Sky has always done things in broadcast rather than through a broadband connection, so the opportunity is very interesting.” The Avatar room in Premiership football is likely to be just the start of the interactive options. The Interactive team at Sky Sports have a track record of innovative content through the red button and the prospect of a more powerful interactive platform will bring a huge opportunity.

How will the Sky Player sit alongside the likes of Zune Video service. Xbox spokesman: “They will both be on the box but will sit alongside each other, it will be very obvious what is the Sky player and the branding is clear.” Jerry Johnson: “I think it comes down to choice. When a user turns on the box the thing they will see is Sky and that resonates with them; they understand what that means in terms of the breadth of content and the quality of content. Adrian Pilkington: “The Sky brand is about aggregating the best possible content around. Sky is in the best position to bring the best content possible and we’ve got to be confident with that.”

Will Sky Player be exclusive to Xbox? An interesting question – Sky stuck firm on its ‘platform agnostic’ stance refusing to rule anything out, but for the meantime, don’t expect to see Sky Player on the PlayStation 3 for a considerable amount of time, if ever. Stephen Nuttall: “So we – Microsoft and Sky – are very focused on making this an enormous success this autumn and working together to deliver a great project. “…To be honest we’re kind of neutral about how people access our content and don’t feel we should proscribe how people should be watching Sky. Our job is just to give people options.” Related Stories Actually, TV is your friend Sky Player to launch on the Xbox 360

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In Depth: Sky on Xbox: All your questions answered

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