What is IPTV? (in layman’s terms)
Its the transmission of standard television channels over telephone copper wires. The technology is already in use in other countries.

Who is offering it and how do you get it?
In Delhi MTNL has teamed up with AKSH OPTIFIBRE LTD to provide this service to existing mtnl triband internet subscribers.

You can either call MTNL at 1500 to book this service or call Aksh directly at 26991500-08

From the day you book the service it can take upto 2 weeks to get the service up and running at your place. The installation takes place in two-three stages-

first mtnl checks your line and makes the required changes to alloted bandwidth for IPTV to run smoothly. Second the local exchange sends somebody to replace your existing modem with one that has 4 lan ports. Finally aksh takes over and installs a Set top box with your TV.

COST
Currently MTNL is running a promotional offer. you can see the details here
otherwise the normal tarrif can be seen here. (this tariff plan would most probably be amended after the promotional offer comes to an end)

Currently the tarrif is as follows-

* Security deposit - Rs 1000 (refundable and gathering 9% interest pa)
* Registration/Installation - Rs 500
* Rent on the set top box - free! (after the promotional offer you can buy it for rs 3300 or rent it @ Rs860/year)
* Vod, tstv, subscription for all channels is free for 6 months..
* Aksh gives upto 5mtrs or Lan cable free but after that they charge Rs20/mtr, so it might be a good idea to buy your own wire which costs Rs10/mtr in the market

Now on to the review >>

HARDWARE ~

* The set top box provided by iptv guys is a sleek ut starcom box. its very light and is about twice the size of your modem but is thinner. the stb comes with a stand with which you can make it stand like a cpu.The build quality screams ‘made in china’ but still it is better than the quality of 300r2u modem that ut starcom makes.
* The STB has component out, S-video, SPDIF apart from the normal analog output.
* The audio output is stereo so make sure your tv supports stereo input or you will have to buy a conversion jack on your own.
* The stb is basically a router which dials a connection in bridge mode which is configured on you modem by iptv ppl … so as the connection you use for internet and iptv are seprate there is no risk of the data being used for iptv being counted in your internet usage.

SETTINGS
you won’t have to configure these setting yourself, but they are still good to know..

On the modem
Apart from the connection that already exists on your modem (pvc-0), a new connection is made, pvc-1 with vpi=0 and vci=33. this connection is set to bridge mode so that the STB can dial through it.
dhcp needs to be disabled also

On the STB
domain - iptv.com
username - ur phone no.
password - 12345678
(these settings are only entered once by the iptv guys)

SOFTWARE
The software on the iptv box is not great, infact its borderline crappy. It looks like it was made by some old tv videogame programmer. The software is not fully developed .. and none of the program descriptions are entered..instead they are just left as ‘default program description’. The only good thing about the software is that it does not make switching channels impossible even when it is malfunctioning, u just need to enter the channel number.

TV channels
Displays the list of all the channels available along with the number for each channel. you can either move the cursor(with the 4way keys on remote) and press enter or just enter the channel number

Time shift TV
Takes you to the time shift menu, giving you the option to watch programming upto 3 days old. However the list of channels available on TSTV right now is very limited and the ones which are available are also not too great

This is a feature unique to iptv. You can watch programming upto 3 days old.
after selecting the channel you want to watch you just pause it and then you can enter the time you want to ‘jump to’.. and after displaying ‘jumping’ for a second it starts playing the programming for that time.

You cannot pause or rewind a channel from the main channel list, and even if the channel is available on tstv you won’t be able to pause it unless you are playing it from the tstv menu.

VOD
Displays the list of movies available through VOD classified under english, hindi and sub categorized under drama,action etch etc. The list of movies currently available on Vod is given below.

Rest of the buttons are not fully functional right now, but the ‘Favoraties’ does seem to remember where you left of the last few movies you watched on VOD, which of course is a nice feature

AVAILABLE CHANNELS
There are currently 100 odd channels available, the list of these channels can be seen HERE

PICTURE QUALITY
It is great on most channels, somewhat inferior on a few like ddsports and pix (but thats maybe bacause of the basic transmission quality). The audio and video are out of sync for a second after you switch channels, after that its perfect.You can sometimes see a little distortion on the edges of things if the image is very dark.
The quality seems to improve a great deal after a few minutes of viewing a channel, sometimes the quality becomes so good on some channels, discovery and star movies especially.. you start to wonder is this HD?
But there are a few glitches too, enter10 is one of the channels which shows some amount of skipping/flipping from time to time
Conclusion
I think the picture quality is very much dvd like and can surely give tatasky/Dishtv a run for its money

List of movies available on vod ~
hindi-
anand
azaad
border
paheli
1942 a love story
hum kissise kum nahin
do jasoos
kahani kismat ki
sultanat
pukar
gupt
razia sultan
mela
tesri manzil
sholay
waqt
rocky
ghulam
hera pheri
gopi chand jasoos
daag
devdas
kalyug
main hoon na
yadon ki baarat
deewar
munnabhai mbbs
tridev
jab jab phool khile
victoria no 203
humara dil aapke paas hai
har dil jo pyar karega
muhobbat
krantiveer
beta
daryavan
falak
dil
dus
murder
pyar mein twist
lagge raho munna bhai
akele hum akele tum
chaila
kahin pyar na ho jaye
khoon pasina
mohra
umrao jaan
family
elaan
qayamat se qayamat tak
pyar ka mausam
hindustan ki kasam
pyar deewana hota hai
satya
shri krishna bhakti
dil se
gadar
phir wahi dil laya…
farz(old)
harishchand tara..
ram balram
agnipath
baghban
intequam
baadshah
ardhangani
dum
ek chaddar maili si
jab pyar kissise hota hai
zamaane ko dekhne do
eklavya
karan arjun
kareeb
mast
mrityudand
sainik
baaz
garv

english-
supercross
havoc
king kong
kill bill 1
kill bill 2
trapped
aviator
an unfinished life
godzilla
the phanttom of the..
my boss’s daughter
transamerica
universal soldier

Bandwidth issue
There is some confusion over whether or not you can keep getting 2mbps speed on your internet connection after subscribing to iptv also. My internet’s speed was limited to 256kbps on a plan that gives 2mbps after i got IPTV. So beware. The subscribers of IPTV in mumbai have faced no such issues.

Source: MTNL IPTV Delhi Review with pictures