DirectTV is a direct broadcast system that uses satellites to deliver its service to all of its consumers. Currently it broadcasts to North America (with the exception to Mexico) and the Caribbean – the company is owned by DirectTV Group, which is owned by Liberty Media. Direct TV uses a dish that is mounted to the side of your house and pointed at a specific angle and target in the sky, if the direction is not perfectly aligned the signal will not be delivered correctly. Recently DirectTV has been upgrading its infrastructure to include more HD programming and as of 2006 it has 16 million customers in the United States alone. Currently the transmission of encrypted data across the satellites to houses with a dish requires what is called an ‘access card’ to allow decryption of the signal. Every two years the cards are replaced along with the hardware to prevent piracy of their services, only those who currently pay for the service can access it legally, although pirating has happened in the past and continues to the present date.
There are currently 17 HD channels and Direct TV plans to expand this service in 2007 to over 18 additional channels, with another 4 by 2008 which encompass the Disney Network of channels and programming. Many of the HD shows and programming they offer varies from location to location however, so an exact number will depend on where you live and the service you have purchased from them. There are currently seven satellites in orbit and another three are planned for launch in 2007, with additional expansion of capacity and programming scheduled for 2008. With the upgrades in technology requiring a greater throughput of information they are upgrading all of their land and space technologies to accommodate more and more bandwidth intensive programs and offering more HD programming to the demanding consumer market. Since 1994 the service of Direct TV has grown by 1-2 million users a year, with the last two years jumping from 12 million to 15 million. This is projected to continue on and thus expansion is a necessity.
