Sky’s 24 hour news channel becomes the latest Sky-owned channel to cease broadcasting in standard definition on Virgin Media’s cable TV network in the UK.
- Second Sky channel to switch to HD only this month for cable viewers
- Sky News HD unlocked to all subscribers who previously only got the SD version.
Just in time for this year’s General Election, all Virgin Media cable viewers can access Sky News in HD on channel 602.
To facilitate the change, the HD version of Sky News was opened up to all cable TV and Virgin Media Stream subscribers. Previously only some cable and Virgin Media Stream customers had access to the channel in HD.
The standard definition removal follows a similar change to Sky Arts earlier this month on the cable network.
As a result of the changes, viewers on older V6 receivers who used to access Sky News SD on channel 603 now need to switch to 602.
Among news channels, the majority are now distributed in HD by default.
By: Marc Thornham | Image: Sky