Bruno,
I dont understand why they are putting HD on the 105 with super dish..i think it will hurt them trying to sell the bigger dish. When you can get HD with the small dish from directv. I know that most of my customers dont want a bigger dish.
As someone else mentioned, right now, Dish Network doesn't have any capacity left for additional HDTV at their core DBS ("small dish") slots. DirecTV doesn't have much, if any, capacity left either right now, although will be gaining enough for 6-8 channels when a new satellite launches next spring. But after those ~8 HDTV channels, DirecTV won't really have the means to add additional channnels (before 2006) unless they also migrate everyone to a new, larger dish.
The new 105 slot was supposed to be a competitive advantage for Dish Network. As they've said, it will give them capacity for up to 50 HD channels, while DirecTV's total HD channel capacity until 2006 will be remain in the range of 12-15 national HD channels (with higher compression) -- unless they also deploy a larger dish using leased capacity from PanAmSat.
But if the Superdish is 36" wide and remains that way--with roof-mounting discouraged-- it will be too large for a substantial percentage of customers. A 26-28" elliptical dish with a superior HD offering would've been a significant competitive advantage, imo, but I don't think they'll get nearly the same benefit in the market with a 36" model.
I hope Dish realizes that 36" is a significant deterrent, and they'll need to have all the HDTV they can to overcome it. A comparable offering, or even a few more HD channels than DirecTV, won't cut it. If that means west feeds of HBO-HD and Starz-HD (2 HD feeds per premium movie package), then so be it.