Which providers offer reliable “Triple Play” – and where does the simultaneous use of downloads, uploads, telephony and TV reception cause bottlenecks on the lines? We put it to the test.
Triple Play offers (packages combining internet, phone and TV) are now on an equal footing with TV reception via broadband cable, satellite dish or terrestrial antenna (DVB-T).
Cable offering such as that from Unitymedia or the Giga TV provided by Vodafone use digital cable TV (DVB-C) to supply TV and supplement this with additional streaming services. As this is not comparable with the transfer of classic TV stations via IP packages, this test only considers the latter offerings – and thus (V)DSL- and fibre-based IPTV.
However, they have also increased in number: New candidates M-net, NetCologne and EWE have joined the more established Telekom Entertain TV and Vodafone TV services. They all use the same technical platform – the B2B offering from Zattoo.
1&1 is a special case: While the Montabaur-based company marketed the older IPTV platform from Telekom as “Digital-TV provided by Telekom”, it now also uses the IPTV solution from Zattoo for its new “Digital-TV”.
Overall, our results show big differences in quality and performance. In connect issue 9/2018, find out where IP-based TV really runs smoothly – and where there are still hitches.