OT-Getting rid of cable tv

Submitted by HELLE on

After reading multiple articles the last few weeks and an mgo.licio.us post regarding cutting the cord on cable tv subscriptions, I think I am finally ready to pull the trigger. I would save $1200 per year and can easily stream these programs from the internet. I just would like to hear some success stories (or failures) from people have (or tried to) cut the cord.

Here's the link to the article that put me over the edge.

S FL Wolverine

June 27th, 2013 at 2:10 PM ^

The other thing I noticed is that any event that is broadcast on one of the ESPN cable channels (or ABC) is blacked out via streaming.  A couple of years ago, this was not the case.  Now on football Saturdays, pretty much the only streaming content you can get is games that are exclusively on ESPN3.  I'm sure this is because local advertisers were complaining that they were losing customers to streaming, and those streaming customers were not seeing their ads.

S FL Wolverine

June 27th, 2013 at 1:39 PM ^

Not sure if this has been covered.  There are too many posts to read through.

I have not cut the cord.  I still have cable.  However, I also have lots of experience with streaming.  I have a PC hooked up to my TV.  I also recently bought a Sony Blu-Ray player (which I absolutely love) that has streaming capabilities built in.  The interface, FYI, is very similar to the PS3 interface.

Anyhow, what I figured out was the first time I hooked up my Blu-Ray player to my TV and watched Netflix the picture was MUCH clearer with the Blu-Ray player than on my PC.  I researched the difference, and from what I found, web streaming of video content on Netflix is 720p.  I think it's similar for Amazon prime and some other services out there.  However, Netflix via the Sony Blu-Ray player streams at 1080p.  Not sure why the difference, but I imagine the webstie streams over HTTP and the player streams over another procotol which can carry data more efficiently, thus more bandwidth.  The Blu-Ray player has lots of cool streaming apps, probably 40 or so.  Some of them are sports apps, but I don't think it has ESPN, ABC, or the major sports networks.  However, for streaming movies and TV, you'll find the Blu-Ray player is far superior to a PC.

Now one other item.  I've noticed that even streaming sources that claim 1080p are often not as good as the 720p I get when watching cable.  This is because the number of "dots" (represented by "1080p" for example) is not the final arbitor of the quality of the image.  The "bitrate" is what really matters, as this determines the amount of data in each "dot".  Streaming video sources do lots of data compression and this degrades image quality.  For example, you'll get maybe 1mb/sec bitrate out of Netflix over the web.  This may increase slightly for some better quality HD sources.  It must be that the Blu-Ray player exceeds this 1mb transfer rate, giving a better image.  However, if you watch a Blu-Ray disc, you'll get like 40mbps+ bitrate.  This is why sound and picture quality is so much better with Blu-Ray disc.  I don't have the stats on the bitrates for cable, but I imagine they're relatively uncompressed on the major networks, given the quality of sound and picture.  I can tell you the picture I get from watching ESPN over cable (720p) is much better than the picture I get watching ESPN3 streaming, even though the streaming has 720p resolution as well.  I notice an audio quality difference as well.  This is due to data compression.  If image and audio quality are important to you, then this advice will help.  

 

 

ClearEyesFullHart

June 27th, 2013 at 1:48 PM ^

But my wife just isn't willing to jump through the hoops to stream tv.  We're DVR dependent.  I do stream a lot of content through losmovies and tvmuse.com, but there's no way my wife is going to give up her broadcast cable(well...satellite as it were).

voraciousness

June 27th, 2013 at 2:11 PM ^

I didn't have cable for about 5 years or so. I was the stream king. However, it seemed the streams would always crap out at important junctures of the game. I missed one of the first TD's of UTL because of this. I had a great setup, too. Was streaming games from my Mac Pro to an expensive projector and screen. But I'd finally had enough. I was having to go to bars to watch important games and quickly discovered spending 3+ hours at a bar every Saturday was much more expensive than paying the $80-$100 for cable a month. Time Warner, at least in Austin, allows you to cancel at any time w/out a fee. I figured I'd cancel it during the summer/slow sports months and hook it up for football/basketball season.

Streams are getting better every year, but they still crap out. If you don't mind missing 10+ plays a game go with streaming. Otherwise, watch at a bar or stick with cable.

Sllepy81

June 27th, 2013 at 2:33 PM ^

Apple tv, hulu+ and my parents Comcast login online to view the big ten. I got hulu+, ESPN, locals, hbogo, Comcast online. my internet bill plus locals is $60 a month. You can plug a laptop into most modern tvs if they both do hdmi.

Stashamo

June 27th, 2013 at 3:00 PM ^

The cord is getting cut next month here after too long of talking about it.



I'm setting up a computer w/ tv tuner and HD ears for the main TV.  We'll have to get our fix off of netflix and XBMC and several of the 'plugins' or repositories for that, which includes NFL RedZone.  You can set up XBMC on an xbox, Apple TV, Roku (I believe) even tablets.  I should be able to borrow a password for BTN but if not I'll cough it up.  I also use a VPN so no regional blackouts etc. I also have a comcast login from work.  If we still need tv after that, we need to find a hobby.



For my bedroom I'm setting up a RaspberryPi with XBMC to get the majority of that stuff.

 

 

edventure008

June 27th, 2013 at 4:16 PM ^

download XBMC and get the Navi-X add-on and add the 1channel and icefilms, sports devil add-on.



Navi-X is great for tv channels like TLC, Discovery, CNN ...etc



1channel and icefilms are great for Movies and Tv Shows

 

Sports devil is a compiled list of first row sports and vipbox without ads and such

you can download it on your pc and laptop as well

XM - Mt 1822

June 27th, 2013 at 6:18 PM ^

 and so happy i did.  however, during football season i will get satellite for the 3 1/2 months of the season.  almost didn't do that last fall, but my kids wanted to watch the debates and that was going to take television.   i would've missed football though, no way around that. 

Naked Bootlegger

June 27th, 2013 at 7:23 PM ^

Good idea about only having satellite for football season.   Do you resubscribe every year?   Do you switch between Dish and DirecTV?  

I was contemplating keeping my satellite turned on from football through March Madness, then puttting it in vacation mode.   My parents are snowbirds and successfully do this every year.   Internet streaming would easily fill the non-sports void in the off-season.  

I'm also a sucker for radio broadcasts streaming freely over the internet.   Young ones might not like it, but this option works well for nostalgic-types who grew up with Ernie Harwell, Bruce Martin, and Bob Ufer feeding us our sports.

XM - Mt 1822

June 28th, 2013 at 5:53 AM ^

and i own the satellite box which cost maybe $150 (about a month's worth of connect for those who load up their system).  vacation mode for ~$5/month was also considered but didn't do that.  might make sense for many others though.  i can call up and they flip a switch, bingo, i've got satellite t.v. 

started this with dishtv for years but a couple of years ago when i needed to disconnect they could not have provided worse customer service and they kept billing me for months after we'd unplugged.  took a few phone calls and i kept notes about what was said and when (date/time of call, kept each name as i was passed along, quoted the money quote when needed, "okay mr. quiverfull, we're so sorry, it was our mistake as i see right here in the notes that you cancelled on jan 5th") .   long story short - have been with direct tv and they are just fine.

and i do indeed remember those great voices from the past.   i'm  not sure the detroit/michigan sports market really has any of those right now - maybe mich football (but not branstatter so much), that'd be about it.  ken cal for the wings is a great guy and does a fine job but i don't know that i'd call his voice a classic.

ixcuincle

June 28th, 2013 at 7:30 AM ^

For the last few years, I liked listening online to the radio broadcasts through free streams. I spent many years listening to various school networks online.

I stopped because many of the rights-holders quit streaming online, and I didn't want to go through the hunt of searching through every affiliate just to find an audio stream that wasn't taken down. (Michigan has made it a bit harder to find online streams, I can barely listen to Matt Shepard for UM basketball anymore). Plus, with one click, I could find the game on FRS. 

 

ixcuincle

June 28th, 2013 at 7:56 AM ^

I wish you the best of luck in your endeavor. 

I went without cable for most of my life until I went to undergrad at VT. After that, there were more years sans cable, until I finally got it this year, however it's only set up downstairs, so the setup in my room is basically an antenna. 

The best way to watch without cable is with an antenna , plus internet service. However, the antenna here is very spotty and I frequently get terrible signals, even though I live right outside DC. And the second there's any sign of light wind or rain, the signal breaks up. In addition, the internet here, despite being FiOS, frequently buffers, lags, and the feed looks bad on a 1080p monitor (although these issues are limited largely to FRS). 

I can certainly understand the situation a lot of the young people are going through now with the inability to afford cable. So, again, best of luck to you, and hopefully your antenna signals and internet troubles aren't as bad as they are here. 

Edit: It should be noted that there is a revolution going on right now in terms of sports. This revolution is moving more and more games off network TV. 

Several events which used to be on OTA include the NCAA championship for both basketball* and football, as well as Wimbledon (for tennis fans), and Monday night football.  With the arrival of Fox Sports 1, Fox plans to take most of their Saturday baseball games off free TV too. I think in the future that many major sporting events will end up on cable, and we'll all have to be subjected to the steep prices just to watch these events. 

I don't like the direction that sports are headed in terms of networks, but, unfortunately, this is the way the tide is turning. 

* - NCAA Tournament Final moves to TBS in a few years, and NCAA tournament has largely been moved to cable.