The initial 21 channels are available immediately if you’re signed up for the HD package and have the SD version of the channel in your current programming plan. Here’s the list of what’s live today:

1. A&E (Channel 265)
2. Animal Planet (Channel 282)
3. Big Ten Network (Channel 220)
4. CNN (Channel 202)
5. The Discovery Channel (Channel 278)
6. The History Channel (Channel 269)
7. The Movie Channel East (Channel 544)
8. NFL Network (Channel 212)
9. Showtime West (Channel 540)
10. Showtime too (Channel 538)
11. The Smithsonian Channel (Channel 267)
12. The Science Channel (Channel 284)
13. Starz Comedy (Channel 519)
14. Starz East (Channel 522)
15. Starz West (Channel 540)
16. Starz Edge (Channel 520)
17. Starz Kids and Family (Channel 518)
18. TBS (Channel 247)
19. TLC (Channel 280)
20. Versus / The Golf Channel (Channel 604)
21. The Weather Channel (Channel 362)

To get all the new channels, you’ll need to have an MPEG-4 compatible receiver (such as the H20 or HR20-700 DVR), as well as a 5-LNB dish and the free B-band converters that DirecTV should have told you about by now. If you don’t have this hardware, no worries. You should be able to get them from DirecTV for cheap (if not free with a little negotiation).

If you’re like me, you probably have a custom channel list set up on your receiver. If that’s the case you’ll need to go in and edit your list to add the new channels. Otherwise, you won’t see them. Also, they have the exact same numbers as their standard def counterparts, so you might want to remove the SD ones from your channel list to reduce confusion.

In addition to these 21 HD channels, tons of additional channels are expected to roll out over the next couple of months.

[via Engadget HD]