VZY Live TV

[sloj]

vzy.one/en

VZY has launched Live TV channel plans of 1(₹179), 3 (₹499) and 12 (₹1849) months. They mention 200+ TV channels. There is OTT plans too for similar duration which can be combined with TV channel plan for 10% discount. There is an auto-renewal toggle which shows up when both OTT and TV plans are selected but can't be disabled.

I took a 1 month TV plan to test. Not all listed channels in plan details are available but that may be because some channels are tied to OTTs and I didn't take any OTT plan. or they might add them later. You get Star, Sony, Zee, Colors, Discovery and Star Sports channels and Eurosport too. No Unite8 or Sony Sports channels for now.

Channels play fine with good picture quality and can be changed from high to as low as the channel supports. Star channels redirect and the logos have digital written under them. And the channels can be changed with number buttons on remote but if you play Star channels then changing channel with number buttons leads to a black screen. The UI still works but channel fails to load.

 

[sloj]

After using it briefly, I realized it needs to fix so many things.

Starting with the web, VZY and VZY lead to the same page but if you logged in to one, the other one will show as not logged in. Channel Guide doesn't list Colors HD and Animal Planet HD, there maybe other unlisted channels too but if you scroll down the page to Entertainment channels category Colors HD is there. And the sorting might be region based as News 18 Assam North East is at the top on the home page next to channel guide. Also, if some kind of adblock and privacy protection is in use like Ublock or Brave Shields then Sony streams might fail to load.

Android mobile app seems to be mostly fine and has the option to change audio stream on the channels that supports it like Discovery, Animal Planet, CN HD+, etc

Android/Google TV however, Discovery and Sony streams pause after a few seconds. While Sony streams show a retry button but the error keeps coming up every few seconds, Discovery streams don't show any retry button and go on a loop even if you close and open the channel again. Clearing the app cache helps but also doesn't as the loop keeps happening. Channels which are not in the guide under all channels do not load on entering their LCN (local channel number) on remote and instead loads the next nearest channel to it.

Expanding on the Android TV, the Nvidia Shield TV has the same issues but the channel change to Hotstar streams and then to other like Zee, Sony, Discovery doesn't result in a black screen when changing using number buttons on remote as I mentioned in the first post. So that's a positive.

Zee seems to be using DTH stream for their channels as it shows the unique identifier numbers during channel playback.

Also, the channel guide loads instantly on web but takes a little bit on Android phone and TV.

 

[gopichandpai]

Have you taken the OTT packs? If yes, does Sony, Z5, Jiohotstar have 4k contents or limited to 1080p?

 

[sloj]

No, I mentioned that in the first post. I already have OTT bundle from BSNL. There are limited 4K content on all the OTTs anyway. And they will probably play on 4K TV only.

 

[sloj]

Got a new update today on Android/Google TV. The channels play fine now and don't stop or loop. Can change using number buttons without any black screen issue on the Rocktek GX1. Will check on Nvidia Shield later.

But the LCN and channel guide is yet to be fixed.

 

[sloj]

Unite8 Sports also kind of works now. On the website at least. Search for Unite8, then click on the search result, not play button but just the icon. A popup will show up saying you will be redirected to the Z5 app. Click proceed and the channel just starts playing on a new tab.

This is probably a bug because clicking on play will redirect the user to the subscription page.

 

[sloj]

Unite8 links have been removed. Search doesn't show anything and removed from watchlist too. The redirect link now plays a 30second clip and stops.