Sky Pod is good but not great

I reviewed Sky TV’s new My Sky satellite TV set-top box a while back. While it is a capable contender for those wanting 4K TV when Sky starts UHD broadcasts, many people don’t want satellite TV or a dish on their roof. The now-defunct Vodafone TV had catered for that option, but it has officially ended, leaving Sky with a conundrum. With affordable streaming options such as Amazon’s Fire TV Stick and Google’s Chromecast with Android TV widely available, Sky faced being left behind in the streaming space if they didn’t fill the void left by the Vodafone TV box.

Their answer to this? The Sky Pod. Designed as a low-cost replacement for the Vodafone TV box, I wanted to see if its super-affordable sticker price made it a workable option.

Would you like to support our mission to bring intelligence, insight and great writing to entertainment journalism? Help to pay for the coffee that keeps our brains working and fingers typing just for you. Witchdoctor, entertainment for grownups. Riveting writing on music, tech, hi-fi, music, film, TV and other cool stuff. Your one-off (or monthly) $5 or $10 donation will support Witchdoctor.co.nz. and help us keep producing quality content. It’s really easy to donate, just click the ‘Become a supporter’ button below.

As you’d expect, the Sky Pod is a media streamer with Sky TV subscription package access. Getting set up was relatively straightforward. After following the bundled startup instructions and inserting the supplied batteries into the remote, I was good to go. Getting set up was a doddle.

The Sky Pod has a white-on-white finish and sports a largeish, round puck-like design with one Ethernet and two USB-C ports. When connected to a spare HDMI port on your TV and plugged in its included power supply, it asks to be connected to your home network.

It runs Google’s Android TV with a custom SkyTV interface. Anyone familiar with the new My Sky box should be able to pick the remote and go with few to no issues. The learning curve isn’t too steep for those unfamiliar with the new box.

One of the key pros to streaming vs satellite is that streamed content appears to be either high-quality HD or UHD, with detail, colour and contrast looking great on my Panasonic OLED TV. As part of its Android TV DNA, it also has Chromecast baked in, which means I could stream from many devices straight to the Sky Pod and TV. Sharing YouTube clips, videos, photos or music is about as easy as falling off a log.

Its remote controller is identical to that used on the new set-top box and has a built-in mic. This allows you to access Google Assistant via voice commands (you need a Gmail account to get this working). For finding shows and getting content, it worked a treat. However, your results can vary depending on what you’re trying to do. If you’re a Netflix user, the other good news is that there is a dedicated Netflix button on the remote.

The Sky Pod comes with Netflix, TVNZ+, Three Now, Disney+, Neon and PrimeVideo preloaded, and you can download other apps from the Google Play store. I installed Kodi, and it runs like a charm.

On the surface, there’s plenty to like, but there are some gotchas buyers need to be aware of. These include the lack of TVNZ 1 and 2. If catching the 6pm bulletin is a regular part of your viewing habit, you’ll need to switch to TV3 News or use the TVNZ+ app. Why TVNZ isn’t included in the Sky Pod EPG is baffling. That said, the TVNZ+ app is preinstalled, but instead of scrolling through the EPG to access TVNZ content, you have to fart about with the app, which while not a deal breaker, is still a bit of a pain in the ass.

The other issue is the complete lack of recording capability. While this was part and parcel with the Vodafone TV widget, its omission on the Sky Pod probably has more to do with the lack of cloud-based recording infrastructure at Sky TV’s end and perhaps even fears of locally recorded content being used for file sharing. This is the only explanation I could conjure up, as the Sky Pod has two USB C inputs. One of those is used for power, but adding an external drive to the other did nothing. This strikes me as bit of a wasted opportunity.

The last gotcha is that you’ll be charged a multi-room fee for using the Sky Pod if you already have a My Sky box. Given that you could use a Chromecast with Google TV and the Sky Go/Neon apps without incurring any additional fees, this seems to be a perverse disincentive to use the Sky Pod.

This is a real shame, as the video quality of streamed content over the Sky Pod was great, easily on par with the new My Sky box. Its reverse EPG – the ability to scroll back up to 72 hours to catch shows you’d otherwise have missed – is also a welcome addition. Last, but by no means least, is its price. While the Sky Pod is priced at a very reasonable $100, customers will also need to add in the cost of a multi-room subscription assuming they already have a My Sky box. I really wanted to like the Sky Pod. Having Sky in several rooms might be dead handy, but the pros of the Sky Pod are outweighed by its cons.

www.sky.co.nz