Press News

Budapest, September 4, 2006

In the last stage of a test period of several months, which T-Online Hungary launched as first in Hungary, the provider will make available open television (IPTV) service on its broadband IP network in Budapest and in several other big cities. After the free test period the commercial T-Home service is expected to be started before the end of this year.

The T-Home television service will bring customers a wide range of new content services, in addition to the conventional television service, including digital video rental, electronic program listings, delaying and replaying the programs on all channels, inbuilt video recorder with which the selected programs can be recorded at the press of a button or by marking them in the program listings, as well as child lock and many other interactive features.

Viewers will have the option to stop the program running and continue watching later, rewind the program they are watching and repeat pieces of it and record any TV program up to a total time of about 90 hours. The user surface can be customized flexibly, and while watching a program the spectator can also look into other running programs with the “picture in picture” feature, and do all this without using a computer, on any standard television set.

T-Online Hungary pioneered the preparation for switch-over to IPTV – the provision of television content on broadband network – in the autumn of 2005. The internal technical tests began in the spring of 2006, parallel with the extensive network, platform and content development jobs. The tests have run so far with the involvement of over 200 users and 42 television channels. At present the second generation of IPTV platform and terminal equipment is operating.

T-Online has offered some of its existing ADSL customers the chance to test the new service in Budapest, Debrecen, Nyíregyháza, Pécs, Székesfehérvár and Zalaegerszeg, and the company plans to start selling the T-Home service on a commercial scale before the end of this year.

By the end of the year several thousand IPTV termination points will have been tested and further expansion of the content choice and the areas serviced is also in the pipeline. The IPTV package which counts as a novelty in Hungary will offer 48 excellent quality digital channels (including the two biggest Hungarian commercial channels and four premium movie channels) and a choice of several hundred video films. The basis of the service is the Microsoft TV platform, and the suppliers include such internationally renowned names as Cisco, Alcatel, Hewlett Packard and Intel.

T-Online considers it very important that the T-Home commercial service should start with excellent picture and voice quality, very simple use, broad content choice, language choice and a reliable security system. To this end it is cooperating with renowned film studios and distributors and will also make available several premium services (like individual or monthly subscription video rental, premium film and adult channels).

The company will serve its customers with an ADSL technology that ensures sufficient bandwidth for the reception of two excellent quality parallel MPEG4 coded television streams, besides the Internet. The set top box used by the system supports both conventional and HD television sets, giving users an even better quality image.

T-Online will offer the T-Home service with its ADSL packages: on the ADSL line Internet access will be provided with the help of a router, with wireless home internet access (wifi), and the IPTV service with the help of a set top box, which will convert the digital signal stream coming in via the ADSL connection for the television set, and with a special remote control.