ITV HD can now be viewed on Sky+ HD boxes, thanks to Sky's new EPG and operating system, currently in the process of being rolled out to Thomson, Pace, Samsung and Amstrad HD boxes.

The channel has to be added manually, so check out our Step-by-Step Guide to adding ITV HD to your Sky+ HD box.

There aren't many programmes – let's face it, the channel is a complete waste of bandwidth most of the time – but with Champions League, FA Cup and England's World Cup qualifying matches, plus the likes of Law and Order, Lewis and Moving Wallpaper (OK, forget I mentioned that last one) it's certainly worth making the effort.

The latest stupid decision from the powers that be at ITV is to limit their upcoming HD channel to the recently launched Freesat platform.

Freesat is the free, satellite offering (hence the name) from ITV and the BBC that aims to provide digital television to those unable to obtain reliable Freeview reception.  For a "one off" payment and the cost of the hardware - £200 receiver, dish installation, HD-ready TV - they're going to offer eighty free-to-air SD channels and coming soon, two HD channels, BBC HD and ITV HD.

Most of the "free" channels are already available via Sky without a subscription, the likes of BBC Three, QVC, Bid-TV, Teacher's TV and Al Jazeera, so there's no reason to get excited about any of that.  But what about the HD? 

BBC HD broadcasts for just a few hours a day, as will ITV, but in addition ITV will be a "Red Button" only service and now that trials have begun, appears to be broadcast using non-standard H.264 within a H.222 transport stream, which makes it totally incompatible with most other HD receivers, including the 550,000 Sky HD boxes that are already installed.  Michael Grade claims he wants HD to become as widespread and as accessible as possible, meaning this decision makes even less sense.

A climb-down is inevitable when ITV realise they're losing out on a considerable amount of advertising revenue and Grade is already laying the groundwork by not ruling out negotiations with Sky. "We are a commercial organisation and won't give it to Sky for nothing."

Well Mr. Grade, Sky probably don't consider your programming worth paying for and what's more, if ITV used a standard HD broadcast method, every Sky HD owner could watch the channel completely free of charge without ITV having to involve Sky at all. 

So the question is; why bother with Freesat?  If you're going to the trouble of installing a satellite dish, then Sky is the obvious choice, depending on the package the hardware and installation costs less (£150), there are more free channels both SD and HD (BBC HD, Channel 4 HD, Luxe TV), the possibility of upgrading to the premium services and a whole host of HD sports, movies and documentary channels just a telephone call away.