Does it mean no censorship for astro channels?

I'm would be very happy if no censorship   
but truth is astro already have backup plan if anything happens...

I guess this means that VOD on the decoder is not regulated   I guess if people complain about VOD isn't censored then can say that " who asked you to watch it"

Does anyone know why all the Phoenix News channel have been removed?

This question has been answered on this post dated 18 June 2020:
https://forum.lowyat.net/index.php?showtopi...post&p=97179611

Another correction: ch.318 isn't available on astro Go.

So how is it? Are you able to receive the channels now?

Other channels no issue, right?

Go to Satellite Settings there, make sure entry point is either "01 M3B VL - 10732" or "01 M3 VL - 10982" .
And then press OK all the way...

And check again.

Now CH318 and CH323 can watch already?
If still no, then you press home>Settings>STB Diagnostics

Tell me what's the % reading of "Strength" and "Quality" written on top corner of the screen.

The signal strength is too low. Recommended Strength reading is 70-80% and above.
Issue might be one of these reasons:
- satellite dish position is misaligned (even a slight misalignment can cause loss of signal)
- something went wrong with your satellite cable
- LNB equipment on the satellite dish is faulty (rarely happens)
- the tuner of your Astro box is faulty (rarely happens, and if it does, then needs to be replaced with new Astro box)

You may look for an Astro technician to help you check/solve your technical issue.
You could either look for third party/private technicians or call Astro customer service 03-95433838 and they'll send their appointed installers over to check.

Or else, you may try align the satellite dish by yourself (at your own risk).

Then the issue might be due to misalignment of the satellite dish.
I advise you to get it realign properly; get a good signal readings to make sure you get the best reception as possible.

Although you can still watch Astro even now, but because of lower signal readings, it also means your reception are not robust to withstand rain fade. Meaning, you will tend to lose satellite signal much easier (signal much more sensitive) during bad weather compared to those who have their satellite dish properly aligned and have strong signal readings.

So, in the future, if you see that your Astro reception keep on blackout repeatedly and pixelation appears even during clear weather, don't put the blame on Astro first (because I've seen many other customers keep ranting on Astro fb page about this).
The culprit is very likely due to your low satellite signal readings (e.g. misaligned dish, LNB faulty, Astro box faulty, etc.)

The SD version of these 3 channels has been ceased for Astro viewers, which are Astro Xiao Tai Yang (344), Astro AEC (346) and CCTV 4 (375).
If you are an Astro subscriber, and you tune to CH344/346/375 right now, you should be seeing this closing slide:

Source: One of netizen's comment on Astro Facebook page

If you are an Njoi viewer, and you tune to CH344/346/375 right now, you will still be able to watch the 3 channels as per usual, NOT the closing slide like what Astro subscribers gets to see now (refer photo above).
Note: The respective HD versions of the 3 channels (CH304, 306, 335) still appears as "This channel is not included in your subscription..." for Njoi viewers.

Astro and Njoi viewers are seeing different thing on the same channel number? How?
As you guys know:
- Channel List (Bouquet ID) for Astro subscribers and Njoi viewers are different (that's why you see some channels appears "missing" on Njoi compared to Astro). So to make it easier to understand, just assume there is at least 2 different versions of channel list, one is for Astro subscribers, another is Njoi viewers.
- Your Astro box will refresh the "channel list file" (Bouquet ID) regularly, so that whenever Astro make changes to the channel list (add or remove channels), the channel list shown on your Astro box will stay as up-to-date as possible.

So what happens now technically is, the broadcasts of the 3 SD channels mentioned is still going on like normal, and aren't interrupted at all. They are still on the same respective Measat 3 transponder/SID/PIDs like previously. Nothing is changed there.
So I realise what the Astro tech guys did to its latest "channel list file (Bouquet ID)" that applies to all Astro subscribers that tunes to CH344/346/375 is, they programmed it to redirect to different transponder frequency/SID/PIDs that shows you the closing slide (as shown on picture above) INSTEAD of the usual Astro XTY, AEC and CCTV 4 SD broadcasts like what Njoi viewers gets to see now.

In a more layman term is, let's say you're an Astro subscriber, you tune to CH344/346/375, so the tech guys "instruct" your Astro box to go to another TV channel on a different satellite frequency that shows the closing slide (refer photo above), rather than continue letting you watch the usual TV broadcasts of Astro XTY, AEC and CCTV 4 SD channels like what Njoi viewers gets to see now. So far get what I mean? 

The advantage of them doing this, is to avoid the closing slide "suddenly appears" on your screen, where you're still in the middle of watching the 3 SD channels as the transition takes place on 15 March 2021 at 12:01am.
If you are an Astro subscriber, and if your Astro box have not "auto refresh" its channel list file due to whatever reasons (e.g. your Astro box still remain on CH344/346/375 and you didn't change to other channels, or never put to standby mode or never reboot), you will still be able to watch the SD version of Astro XTY, AEC and CCTV 4 as per usual (because you don't give chance for it to update channel list  )
Later once the Astro box auto refreshes the channel list when it gets the chance (i.e. you're not watching the particular channel, or put it to standby mode or you reboot the Astro box), then the CH344/346/375 will then appear as closing slide.

I have to say, Astro broadcast tech guys is genius la...     I can see that they are trying very best to make the transition as smooth as possible, and as "less disruptive" as possible.
But well, some people just got no chill..... People out there are clueless and not properly informed about this transition
   
Imagine they've already memorised the SD channel numbers, now suddenly they're forced to memorise the HD channels numbers... 

Source from ContentAsia mailing list:
Other than this sentence above, nothing much are revealed.

So it seems that the upcoming SOTT (subscription over-the-top) service to be launch by Astro would be called Sooka?    What you guys think about that name?
If you ask me, I still prefer Astro branding instead of Sooka 🤣😂 simply because Astro sounds better to pronounce (although I do know there are people out there that still hates Astro  ).

Even ContentAsia article editor also finds that Astro is a very "tight-lipped" company. I almost thought I'm the only one that thinks that way 
Astro got too many secrets to keep 🤫

Not just you... It appears to me that there is a partial service outage on its cloud streaming service earlier, for about 2 hours.


This is what you'll see when you select Play From Start on your Ulti / Ultra Box. It applies on ALL channels.


Mhmm, even their so-called "Live Pause" function doesn't work too. It applies on ALL channels.


This is what you see when you click "Play from Start" when Astro Go on computer. It shows black screen first, and then the "Playback failed due to internal error ( Err-7000 )" message appears.

I also tried Astro Go app on my phone, same thing also. Once I tap Play from Start, loading icon keep blinking, and then message appears "A problem occurred during playback please try later. (ERR-1401)".

But then, it's midnight now. So every Astro customer service agents is sleeping now, so there's no way you can make a complaint right at this point and expect immediate answers.
But I would to guess, it is very likely to me that they are doing some maintenance / repairing / upgrading works during off-peak hours, yet they choose to keep their mouth shut to the public? 

As of around 1:05 am, which I am about to finish typing this lengthy post, then I realise that the Play From Start function and "Live Pause" is now working as usual... 🤣😂
But it is still midnight now, who knows service outage occur again later on? 

Lesson learnt:
- Astro cloud streaming services is susceptible to a degree of service outage due to potential/possibly maintenance works especially midnight.
- Even if it happens, no public announcement is made, because it seems to me that they feel so "shameful" to make such announcement notice.
- Probably because they think that the service outage is probably just a few minutes or hours, so no need to make announcement to let unnoticed customers to be aware about this, which could affect its overall impression over Astro.
- Like I said before, don't expect 24/7 or even 99% service uptime from Astro cloud streaming service.
- In conclusion, please expect intermittent service outage from Astro cloud streaming services from time to time.

I don't think AWS CloudFront CDN itself is the culprit... I think it's something got to do with their storage server.

Anyhow, at the end of the day, it is just whether they willing to spend more money than it is, to upgrade their servers here and there, to make its cloud streaming service to be more robust and resilient.

Could you briefly explain what's that S3 and EC2 you're referring to? Not everyone knows what is that

Woaaahhhh..... A dedicated Netflix button somemore...
Nice one la Astro 👍👍👍👍

Btw where did you get these leaked images?
Please leak more here... I want to see 😂😂😂😂😂