OT: What is your preferred option for t.v providers?
Good Afternoon MgoBoard,
I have recently moved into a new home and I'm trying to tackle what my best option is for my television provider. I figured coming to you guys would be a lot easier than seaching the internet for hours to get opinions.
So what do you recommend? Comcast, Dish Network, Direct T.V, some sort of streaming to watch t.v and sports? Please share with me what you have found to be most cost effective and reliable.
Some things I need to watch football in the Fall: ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, NFL Network, Big Ten Network (I live in Michigan, so I'm in the BIG Network footprint), Fox Sports Network 1. These usually get me all the games I need to see and would like to be able to always watch them.
If anyone has any experience with some of the online streaming I would love to hear about that. I don't have any experience at all with a lot of the online stuff, except for netflix. I know there are options out there though.
I have always had Dish Network and pay over $100 for a 4 bedroom hook-up, I will probably go this route unless someone here can show me something better to go with.
So, please help me out fellow bloggers. All input will be greatly appreciated. Thanks and Go Blue!!
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If you had to choose between Brighthouse for cable and AT&T for internet or Brighthouse for both, what would you choose? I'm looking at that situation because AT&T is really weird with their coverage and I can't get Uverse TV but can get their internet. I feel like bundling with Brighthouse is better but I'm open to suggestions/input. If I had AT&T possible I'd probably go with them for both.
I'm in Michigan and I love Brighthouse... (note: the last cable provider I had was Comcast. Never go with Comcast)
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WOW is having problems right now every single weekend, which is annoying, but I've been happy with $27/mo internet from WOW and having DirecTV.
DirecTV.
It's the only provider that offers Sunday Ticket. We got Sunday Ticket for free this year because we moved to a new location.
I have augmented this with HBO NOW and Netflix.
DirecTV...In addition to my unsatiable college sports adiction, I like the NFL on Sundays and with the NFL Sunday package available only on DirecTV I get to see my Patriots play every week. I have a couple of large (65") TV's and picture quality makes a difference. DirecTV quality is pretty good.
FIOS is very good, but unless things have changed this fall, they don't carry the NFL Sunday package.
I'm with this guy. Let's call it the ABCs ("anything but Comcast") of cable strategy.
You can get Sunday Ticket if you'd like (in my first year they gave it to me for free). Plus, they don't seem to engage in drawn out channel negotiations. The last year I had Dish Network, I missed out on the last month of the Tigers' season while they argued with Fox.
Put me down for Direct TV as well. Expensive but worth it.
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I have DirecTV but like all other providers they jack up my bill every so often. Although that seems to be the trend throughout the entire industry.
When I call to complain of how I have been a customer for many years, I have to talk to some guy named Rahji who I cannot understand and go through a bunch of other operators until I get to someone's boss and complain about price hikes. In the end, I still end up paying more; however one time I told them I was going to pull the plug and sign back up in three months as a new customer to get the new customer discount and they kept me at the same rate.
DirecTV is second to none. However, it can be pricey.
Since a good number of Michigan games are available on network TV, I vote antenna and a sports bar for the games that are not free. $1200+ spent over the year can but a lot of beer and wings. Similar with NFL if you root for the local team. Otherwise it is still only 16 regular season games.
However we have been innundated with heavy rainfall this year and the signal has suffered during the storms. I've had them since 1997 and this is the first year I've really had trouble. When I lived out in Seattle and LA they were perfect as it never rained hard enough to matter.
Outside of the rain issue and occasional glitches with the hard drives in my DVRs they are pretty much trouble free TV.
but I have Charter cable/phone/internet, and love it. I think the bundle is around $150/month, but it's stable, the internet is sick fast, and in the trade I'm in I deal with some huge file sizes, and have never not received a file.
Their cable service is fine, never a glitch, never a service interruption. I hate utility monopolies, but in this case, without another alternative, we are very happy.
I have Comcast and pay $120 a month for the TV/Internet bundle (includes HBO and the sports package). My biggest complaint is the fact that they don't carry beIN sport in HD.
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I swear.
I work from home most of the time and handle lots of data transfers so I need high speed internet and a stable connection. FIOS is it for me, light years beyond cable. I pay $155 here in NY for 150/150 plus their second highest TV package, and they give me HBO with that.
If you can get it do FIOS build your own package and do the sports packages, that is what I do. If not anything but comcast is the way to go.
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I've had Comcast, Dish, and Directv and easily liked Directv the most. And it has Sunday Ticket.
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Directv is by far the best ive had. From a sports perspective they have everything except the pac12 network (who cares). People say its expensive, but if you negotiate a little bit its right in line with any other provider. New customers get the sunday ticket for free, which is nice.
I had Fios when I lived in NY and I loved them. Relatively cheap and excellent service.
AT&T is okay but the internet is pretty meh.
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the only exception is of course during college football season - then we get a month-to-month deal with direcTV. when the college football playoff is over, so is the TV. we unplug.
did this deal with DISH for a few years but they were a nightmare of bad service. direcTV has been doing just fine.
If you check this thread again, would you mind sharing a few details (how much, what you get, etc.)? That sounds intriguing.
over the ~ 10 years the cost has gone from i think $44.99/mo to $64.99/mo. something tells me it will be another $5/mo tacked on this year.
we get either 120 or 150 stations, most important of which are the espn stations, BTN, and fox sports. i know we get some of the other movie stuff (but not the premium ones), and the other garbage that nobody ever watches. we get the local ABC/NBC/CBS/Fox affilates too.
this started about 10 yrs ago with DISH. that worked for about 5 years unitl they got real hinky about pulling the plug one year and wanted to charge us extra months, extra money, etc. fortunately i kept very good notes and eventually i just had them come and pick their crud up.
direcTV has done fine. the trick is that i paid for the 'box' they use, so we own it. i signed up when it was a free install offer, paid the $150-200 to own the box (one time fee) and now we just pay a few months of bills/year, all done after that.
you have to know what you are asking for as they will try to steer you into the regular monthly programs. and you have to be able to walk away from the TV. i will tell you it is a blessing to not have it, but i also understand that not everybody is in the same boat.
Very helpful. I appreciate it.
As I said above, the power would go out before DirecTV in Miami. But this was a few years back, before everything was in HD, so maybe it's due to what someone else said about SD signal lasting even when the HD signal goes out.
I've certainly experienced fewer DirecTV outages than I ever did with cable companies.