At the end of last year, Bright House officials announced that by end of 2009, customers would have 100 high definition channels to choose from. It was an ambitious pronouncement at the time because Bright House only offered 37 HD channels.
But on December 17, if everything goes as planned, Bright House will indeed have more than 100 HD after it adds another 24 on that day.
Here's how the math breaks down. Bright House currently has 67 HD channels. On Thursday, the service plans to add another 12, bringing the total to 79. Finally, on December 17, another 24 HD channels will be added, to give Central Florida's largest cable company a total of 103 HD channels (the total does include HD Movies on Demand, a pay per view channel).
The additional 24 HD channels were revealed in a legal notice published in today's Orlando Sentinel.
The majority of the new HD channels will be premium services.
The new free HD channels are:
- Turner Classic Movies HD, channel 1314
- WE HD, channel 1317
- Outdoor Channel HD, channel 1321
- Disney Channel XD, channel 1338
- Investigation Discovery HD, channel 1352
- Fox Business Network HD, channel 1354
- Planet Green HD, channel 1362
- Style HD, channel 1363
- TV One HD, channel 1379
The new premium channels are:
- HBO West HD, channel 1240
- HBO Latino HD, channel 1244
- HBO Comedy HD, channel 1245
- HBO Zone HD, channel 1246
- HBO Family HD, channel 1247
- HBO 2 HD, channel 1249
- HBO Signature HD, channel 1250
- MoreMax HD, channel 1252
- Action Max HD, channel 1253
- Showtime West HD, channel 1265
- Showtime Too West HD, channel 1266
- TMC extra HD, channel 1272
- The Movie Channel West HD, channel 1273
- TMC extra west HD, channel 1274
- Independent Film channel HD, channel 1286 (available as part of the Movie Pack service)
All of the new HD channels will be delivered using a technology known as "Switched Digital Video (SDV)." Although the customer won't notice any difference, delivering channels with SDV allows Bright House to more effectively use its bandwidth to deliver more HD channels and services.
Without SDV, every channel is constantly being sent to all home regardless if anybody is watching it or not. But SDV channels are only sent to someone's TV when they tune to one of them.
In other Bright House channel news, the cable company also announced that on December 17 NBA TV will be available to digital cable customers for no extra charge. Previously the channel was part of a sports pack of channels. NBA TV standard definition will be available at channel 108 and NBA TV HD will be available at 1008.
That's good news for sports fan as NBA TV broadcasts regular season and NBA playoff games.
What do you think of these new HD channels? What other HD channels would you like to see Bright House offer? Post a comment.