E! , A & E and Sci-Fi now require a box

[JZ1276]

Within the last 2 days Cablevision has made these channels unavailable to people with no box. Why do they do this? To make people spend the extra money to rent one of their boxes? I've refused for the longest time to shell out an extra $7-$8 a month to rent one of their boxes. However, a family member in the household decided to rent one (basically, for Soapnet), so i went to pick it up for her and find out there is ANOTHER charge besides the monthly price for the box?! They called it the "star" something service?! I've rented boxes for other family members before (within the last year or so) and never heard of this charge.

[Chucky Cheese]

No such thing

[stevenl]

Its not moved so you will pay more, its moved so they can free up bandwidth. Those 3 channels they moved they can add 6 new HD channels (maybe even 9 depending on the compression)

[JZ1276]

Yes but they didnt have to encrypt them. the additional fee i was talking about is called a digital navigation service. apparently, it're required when you get a box now.

[MergaTroy6]

If this is the first digital box in your home, CV waives the iO navigation fee for one year. It was mentioned in the letter they sent out about the channel changes.

[Chucky Cheese]

I don't think it's a must to have IO Navagation but could be wrong.

[Stargazer]

I think those stations are owned by Universal/NBC.

[JZ1276]

I don't think it's a must to have IO Navagation but could be wrong.

yeah, they told me i had to get it

[hbk409]

the way to get out of the navigation is to subscribe an premium channel (hbo, sho, etc), io sports pack or international programming

[RemyM]

I though someone once posted that they even counted the DVR as a digital service.

But yeah, if you just get Broadcast Basic or Family Cable and want a digital box then you have to additionally get at a minimum iO navigation for $5.95, but some of the other options are a better value.