Spoke to Access today and got updates on a number of subjects. It's basically a lot of good news. I'll just kind of list things in point form here:

- additional technical support - a number of months back Access recognized the growth in service issues on the television side. They hired additional technical experts with a mandate to help troubleshoot and improve things on the TV portion of the offering.

- the free HD tier preview is being extended into June. The structure of the HD tier(s) for after the preview ends is still unknown.

- WGN HD is being added to the HD tier any day now and will be part of the free HD tier preview

- a big project receiving a lot of focus is to make the channel lineups and mappings more consistent between the different cities.

- HD-NET launch is still not imminent - there is no SOLID info on this however it was noted that only certain carriers have HD-NET in Canada and certain other major ones still do not. Please note this next part is also speculation... it could be some kind of exclusive arrangement in which case it might be a couple more months before the exclusive is done and other outfits like Expressvu and Access can carry HD-NET.

- Access is trying to source low-def PVR's. Currently they have only HD PVR's available that some subscribers get who use them just for the PVR function, not HD. Having a low-def PVR option could help with STB/PVR pricing and availability.

- Motorola STB's are probably the standard for the near future at least. One possibility is for boxes with available SATA ports so subscribers can add capacity themselves using an external drive.

Access Communications could look at offering PACE cable boxes as they are intergratible into either Motorola or SA platforms.

thanks for that info neild,with wgn do they still carry cubs games in HD?

Motorola has the DCT 3080 which is a standard definition PVR. The only Motorola compatible box that Pace Micro has is just a cable box not a PVR.

Update - the WGN channel has been added. There appears to be very low amount of actual HD content on this channel with the exception of 'Everybody Hates Chris', baseball, and a couple other minor programs.

Update: The HD price at Access is changing effective June 1. The full HD channel package will rise from $5.95/month to $21.80

Customers that don't want the full HD package will be allowed a basic tier for $5.95 however it will contain basic networks only. Some of the channels previously included in the basic tier will be taken away.

Hi Bill,

Motorola has the DCT 3080 which is a standard definition PVR. The only Motorola compatible box that Pace Micro has is just a cable box not a PVR.

We offer both SD and HD DVRs for Motorola networks.

Linden
Pace Micro Technology (note the views expressed here are my own and not necessarily those of Pace).