UPDATE: DiGi confirms that Astro Mobile TV is meant to be used with digiwap APN.

DiGi now offers Astro Mobile TV on your 3G Mobile which they are also giving a 7 day free trial to try it out. iPhone users are able to watch it via Astro B.Player which was previously used by Maxis for live World Cup broadcast.

In terms of Live TV, there are 4 Channels – Bloomberg, History, Astro Hitz TV and Awani with 2 more channels (Crime and Investigation & Bio) coming soon. The other contents are looped channels and Video On Demand which are basically replays of selected segments such as Akademi Fantasia, Raja Lawak, Miss Astro 2010 and Vaanavil Super Star 2010.

The playback on 3G was rather smooth but the quality is nothing to shout about as the original video resolution is about 160×120. So don’t expect to read the tiny scrolling text on Bloomberg. Despite that it’s still worth to watch while being stuck in traffic or on the train. Of course, this isn’t as good as DVB-H based Mobile Live TV.

So how much is it to watch? After the 7 days trial period, you have a choice of RM1.50 per channel per week or RM5.00 per channel per month. There are no additional data charge to view the channels so that’s a flat rate without worrying about excess data usage. However DiGi didn’t mention if there’s any specific APN to access. In the previous experience of Facebook Zero, the FREE usage is only applicable if you’re using digiwap APN so this might be the case for Mobile TV too.

For more info, head to DiGi’s Astro Mobile TV promo page. Don’t forget to check out the FAQ for more details.

If you’re reading this from your mobile device on DiGi, click here to get started.

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The 2010 FIFA World Cup is now underway. Although we’ve witness pretty entertaining first matches, we’re not seeing a festival of goals just yet, with two matches producing just two goals.

Here’s hoping will build up as the tournament unfolds.

Ok, so that’s that about the World Cup. We’re pretty sure that many of you would have already tried out the Astro b.Player on your iPhones to catch the first World Cup games live last night.

As far as we can decipher, the b.Player streams live content to your iPhone, so that means you need to have a data subscription to enjoy the privilege. But how much data does it take for you to watch a full 90 min game on the b.Player?

As you know, Maxis offers what it calls an “unlimited” mobile broadband plan. But there’s a catch, you’re allowed full speed (of whatever speed you can get off the network) up to 3GB (total upload and download) after that your speed is throttled until the next billing cycle.

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During our early discovery of the Astro b.Player iPhone app, we mentioned that the only other channel available for live viewing was Hitz.TV. Now, Astro has added two more channels to the player – History Channel and Bloomberg.

Both channels offer the same content as from the normal Astro feed via decoder, all live.

This is interesting because History Channel is parked under that Astro Learning package and Bloomberg is a part of the Astro News package which are all paid channels if you were to view it on a television set.

With the Astro b.Player these channels are offered for FREE!

We did mention that we see the b.Player being something more than just a World Cup one off special. Could Astro and Maxis be on the verge of offering paid mobile TV service?

We have a inkling that it might be.

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We saw this peculliar Astro app on the iPhone App Store Malaysia and thought that it could very well be the app Maxis announced earlier. The one where you can watch all 64 World Cup matches live as part of Maxis’ offering as the official mobile broadcaster of the 2010 FIFA World Cup.

We weren’t sure if it was, so we downloaded the app to give it a try.

Now, we’re very sure that this is the app that football fans will be using to watch World Cup matches live.

Head on over to after the jump to see the full Astro B.player play by play.

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We spotted something very peculiar on the iPhone App Store. It’s an app from Astro (Maxiss sister company) called the Astro B.player.

The description says that its an app that allows users to easily access TV programs direct from the phone.

This is interesting because Maxis announced earlier this year that it will make available all 64 World Cup games live for viewing over mobile phones via specially developed apps for iPhone, Android and Blackberry.

Could this be it?

Download that app yourself via the iTunes link here.

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