Posted on 09/13/2017 6:08:26 AM PDT by george76
Tried that. Even the digital "over the air" signal has dropouts during bad weather. Thus far, I haven't found any combination better than Comcast where I am (across the Sound from Tacoma). Built my own HTPC in hopes of "cord cutting". Available software for that sucks.
Still looking.
I change bands too. But not much difference. I use only one device at a time so?. Have heard aluminum foil on big piece of cardboard behind modem boosts it.
We have a boat in Ventura Harbor and use an antenna for the tv. We get tons of stations but like you said, most are foreign language. Lots of Spanish, Chinese, and even Arab stations. We get a few that are watchable. We watch the news on channel 5 and a ton of ION. lol
Luckily I always have my ipad I can hook to the tv and stream movies, etc.
Comcast at the first of the year levied a $25 monthly increase on our non negotiable package.
Then, they announced another increase, a little over $25/month which would have made our monthly bill a little over $255/month starting with this July’s bill.
As senior citizens, they used to allow us to negotiate the prices because we didn’t use most of their junk channels. That negotiation stopped last year.
We never watched any of the Follyweird Movie Channels, and I believe that 6 were in our non negotiable package.
So we messed around with Roku, and my wife kept track of the channels we watched. We have not watched fake news from ABCNNBCBS for over a decade. We pulled the plug on Faux News last January. Thanks to the anti America Former Niners, we/I stopped watching ESPN and any NFL shows.
She discovered, what I knew already was: We never watched NBC, one show on ABC and a handful CBS shows.
We had started watching Amazon Prime via our Roku and semi smart tv set about a year ago. A $5 monthly charge for Acorn opened the door to hundreds of great Brit tv series and shows. Another small monthly charge allowed us to go to the concert site on Acorn.
The Roku seemed to be not that great, so when Amazon Prime came out with their Fire Tv system. I ordered it and we really liked it.
Thanks to Code Toad’s recommendation to go to Comcast Business. We now have a very fast internet and two phones for $105/month. That fast internet lets me stream the tv shows we want to watch.
I added the Sling #2 package to get ABC for the one show my wife watched and to watch our going underwater SF Giants.
We will probably pull the plug on Sling and ABC after the baseball season is over. The show, my wife used to watch was the Kelly and ?? in the morning. She doesn’t care for Kelly’s new co host and stopped watching because all Kelly has on as guests are liberal Follywood people, liberal Broadway people and liberals hosts like Anderson Cooper from CNN. That will save us about another $35/month.
I am averaging at least one person/family per week asking me how to cut their cable due to the high prices and crap never watched and being charged for that crap.
A younger relative couple, still addicted to Faux news and Faux’s business channel, opted for the YouTube tv package in their area. They get a lot of channels for $35/month. They live in an area with “free” live tv. They bought an indoor tv antenna, and they were on Comcast business internet to stream the YouTube channels. Instead of over $200/month going to Comcast, they are now paying $35 for the YouTube. They will use their savings to buy a new Amazon 4K tv and enjoy Prime TV on it and their YouTube package.
I have comcast too for internet. You can keep bugging them for a promo price. I’m getting the promo price for 2 years this go around, instead of the usual 12 months. Their blast service current costs me $50/month which is about $20 off the normal price here. It’s plenty fast to stream something and still use the PC like normal. I only suggested the HTPC angle to have the DVR function. You can simply watch over the air with the tuner in your TV. But if you want an electronic guide and have it set to record your shows/games, then the HTPC is a good solution for cord cutters. You can also watch the game 1 hour after it starts. My turner card came with a remote to skip 30 seconds ahead like I used to have with paid tv. I can usually finish the 3 hour game in 2 hours that way.
You’ll also notice the games look better over the air. The signal is compressed and loses quality when it’s done over dish/cable. But you are getting the original signal with an antenna.
Call up Comcast Business and see if they will offer you their internet and phone package.
The cable TV monopoly id dying on the vine. People have demanded reasonably priced ala carte programming and cable and satellite have not complied as that’s not how they negotiate pricing.
SO, people are taking things into their own hands, they now really only need good internet. Seriously, I don’t watch CNN or NBC or MSNBC and many other fake news stations, so why in the world must I pay. Well, technology is now allowing me to cut our both cable and now I use over the air and internet and fire tv etc and soon I will make drastic changes to how I consume TV.
With demand going down you’d think the price would go down.
Yep..... FBN, that too
It’s my only option for internet until my old brain figures out how to cast my cell phone to the TV. And I’m working on it.
Free tv offers more than I need. And I’ve noticed that this year more college football games are on free tv. Maybe the colleges are losing donors because they can’t watch their favorite teams unless they pay for cable and ESPN.
Are you in Gig Harbor? And only Comcast works there? I’ve been looking for a place there. In Portland now.
Last night I ordered Amazon Fire Sticks and subscribed to a free trial of VUE - plus ordered 2 digital antennas. So sick of paying Comcast to watch the few channels I like. I have Century Link internet which works well here. Also hava a Magic Jack land line that is almost free.
I can receive about 30, around half of which are intermittent depending upon weather with the others being strong enough/close enough that there’s never any issue, the signal on the weaker ones just drops rather than getting static like the old analog. Interesting variety above and beyond the usual NBC, ABC, CBS, FOX, PBS. A channel that shows nothing but old sitcoms, a local interest channel, a food channel, a comedy channel. A couple in Spanish. Three PBS channels, PBS-1, PBS-2 and PBS-3. Several of the network channels have multiples like that, -1, -2, etc.
Bookmark.
Been also thinking of dropping cable and there is good info here.
I wish I had them... all I can get here is crappy ATT that goes out all the time, despite numerous attempts to “fix” it...
...
Comcast was the first to go down during the hurricane. The neighbor’s ATT was up the whole time. Comcast stayed down for three days.
Bonded pair U-Verse?
I would consider it, but there are few alternatives where I live.
Mobile internet is way too expensive compared to cable. Mobile is deceptive with their ‘unlimited’ plans. Cable internet is significantly the better value. But, cable here requires the basic tier of cableTV to get cableInternet.
DSL is only marginally available, as the phone company doesn’t want to invest in equipment or connections.
OTA TV is almost non-extent — 2, possibly 3, channels are all that can be picked up on those flat indoor antennas. Outside antennas are out of the question, since I live in an apartment complex.
Streaming services are popping up all over the internet, but the ones that I have looked at are doing the same thing the cable/satellite providers do — sell their TV channels in groups/tiers. Those tiers may run a few $$$ less, but the quality is usually significantly less, too.
The company that finally comes out with true ala-carte channel selecting could dominate the market in a few years.
I wish I was back home for sure... :( My family is still in Casper.
yeah U verse or whatever its called...
i just wish it would WORK...
DirectTV is cheaper for a while, then the rates start creeping up and you face the $20 per month penalty.
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