So last weekend, I got fed up with my $86 TV bill from the big cable company. I called them up, and threatened to disconnect the service if they won't reduce my bill. They didn't, and since I was not bluffing, I made the decision to enter the big/wide/scary world that is off-the-grid. Now I still love my weekly dose of Fareed Zakaria GPS on CNN, and shows on Science Channel/Nat Geo/Discovery, etc. So I wanted to open this thread on discussing ways of getting the channels in unconventional ways.
First thing I tried was to just hook-up the cable connection (from the cable company) directly to my TV's behind, and lo and behold I am getting basic cable. Fox, ABC etc. But no CNN yet. There is a crappy Discovery TV. Also its not HD. Any more ideas?
Second thing is I'm thinking of probably going the old fashioned way of using an antennae. Has anyone done that successfully? Any tips you can share?
Third is gadget world. Is anyone using Roku/Apple TV/Hulu etc, to get their daily dose of entertainment? If yes, please share your experiences.
If I'm not successful in next couple of weeks, then I might suck it up and pay the dishtv folks this time.
How to get off the Grid (Cable TV to be precise)?
How to get off the Grid (Cable TV to be precise)?
[LIST=1]
Go to the local Wal-Mart,
[/LIST]they have many newly designed sophisticated outdoor digital antennas available
( Not the indoor rabbit ears ) ( Not bad looking, or do not need to mount on top of roofs, spoiling the house appearance ) but can be placed anywhere on the house wall at low heights.
They have always 90 days return policy, so give it a try, see if it’s working out for you , for most of the local channels free legally, with no bills or taxes at all.
Govt. sends unbelievable quality of sharp digital signals now-a-days
2.
Also give a call to 1-800-229-2901 ( Heartland America ) ask for free flyers/brochures and visit their on-line web site, as they have many small size nice looking digital antennas ( very small, compact and advanced designs ) for outdoor installation.
Govt. sends unbelievable quality of sharp digital signals now-a-days
3.
Also if you have PC internet connection already, and have a good big size PC monitor, to watch the TV on it,
Try this piece from local RadioShack ( 30 days return policy ) if it’s working out for you, it can pull many channels, with a 100% digital picture. If it works, you can always buy from E-bay at a lower price and return that expensive one.
Read my posts here ( Post No. 1 ) ------>
http://www.r2iclubforums.com/forums/showthread.php/14833-Hauppauge-WIN-Tv-HVR-950Q-A-piece-one-must-buy-!!
.............
Go to the local Wal-Mart,
[/LIST]they have many newly designed sophisticated outdoor digital antennas available
( Not the indoor rabbit ears ) ( Not bad looking, or do not need to mount on top of roofs, spoiling the house appearance ) but can be placed anywhere on the house wall at low heights.
They have always 90 days return policy, so give it a try, see if it’s working out for you , for most of the local channels free legally, with no bills or taxes at all.
Govt. sends unbelievable quality of sharp digital signals now-a-days
2.
Also give a call to 1-800-229-2901 ( Heartland America ) ask for free flyers/brochures and visit their on-line web site, as they have many small size nice looking digital antennas ( very small, compact and advanced designs ) for outdoor installation.
Govt. sends unbelievable quality of sharp digital signals now-a-days
3.
Also if you have PC internet connection already, and have a good big size PC monitor, to watch the TV on it,
Try this piece from local RadioShack ( 30 days return policy ) if it’s working out for you, it can pull many channels, with a 100% digital picture. If it works, you can always buy from E-bay at a lower price and return that expensive one.
Read my posts here ( Post No. 1 ) ------>
http://www.r2iclubforums.com/forums/showthread.php/14833-Hauppauge-WIN-Tv-HVR-950Q-A-piece-one-must-buy-!!
.............
How to get off the Grid (Cable TV to be precise)?
Jani ji... tussi great ho.
How to get off the Grid (Cable TV to be precise)?
^^ Right now,
Comcast Internet services has an offer for 19.99 ( before tax ) for the internet service for one month of charge.
1-800-comcast or 1-888-comcast, call them .
I pay 19.99 per month,...
and using
1. unlimited fastest speed of internet from Comcast. Last full year I used for 119.99 and now they gave me another 6 mos extension on same rate.
2. I’m using 2 ooma phone lines, one magic jack , one TK6000, total 4 phone lines ( local and long distance US Canada free unlimited ) absolutely free - no bills no taxes for phone lines. - all running in that above internet modem and router.
( More I talk about OOMA, people think that I am a "Paid Promoter guy from ooma" ! Come on folks, wake up and think honest ! )
3. I also have that 950Q piece and Dell's 1200 Pixel, 24+ size of flat monitor
watching 90+ cable channels digital from that same internet service of 19.99. The picture quality that I watch, 90% of most advanced SONY Bravia digital TVs that you buy today, can NOT deliver ! ( It's 1200 PI )
All above three services together costs me 19.99 per month. plus taxes.
…………………..
Comcast Internet services has an offer for 19.99 ( before tax ) for the internet service for one month of charge.
1-800-comcast or 1-888-comcast, call them .
I pay 19.99 per month,...
and using
1. unlimited fastest speed of internet from Comcast. Last full year I used for 119.99 and now they gave me another 6 mos extension on same rate.
2. I’m using 2 ooma phone lines, one magic jack , one TK6000, total 4 phone lines ( local and long distance US Canada free unlimited ) absolutely free - no bills no taxes for phone lines. - all running in that above internet modem and router.
( More I talk about OOMA, people think that I am a "Paid Promoter guy from ooma" ! Come on folks, wake up and think honest ! )
3. I also have that 950Q piece and Dell's 1200 Pixel, 24+ size of flat monitor
watching 90+ cable channels digital from that same internet service of 19.99. The picture quality that I watch, 90% of most advanced SONY Bravia digital TVs that you buy today, can NOT deliver ! ( It's 1200 PI )
All above three services together costs me 19.99 per month. plus taxes.
…………………..
How to get off the Grid (Cable TV to be precise)?
I got rid of comcast cable when I had to pay full price after 6 month promo. I bought RCA Indoor antenna (http://www.google.com/products?q=RCA+ANT1450B+-+TV+antenna&aq=f) from Walmart for $25 or so. This antenna is flat and doesnt occupy whole lot of space. I get around 60 channels including 10 HD channels. Only about 5 or 6 channels like ABC, Fox News etc. are worth watching. Go to http://www.antennaweb.org to see how many channels to get in your location.
I bought assembled small form factor HTPC and connected to TV. I use this most of the times. I watch sitcoms from hulu and youtube. I think it is worth the money I spend.
I bought assembled small form factor HTPC and connected to TV. I use this most of the times. I watch sitcoms from hulu and youtube. I think it is worth the money I spend.
How to get off the Grid (Cable TV to be precise)?
#5 ::
After 6 mos. You need to stay behind it and get the offer extended by calling them many times, at diff times, talking with diff. people all over USA. ( on their toll free nos )
Everybody is diff. and somebody will do it for you for 19.99.
I had also tried those indoor rabbit year new digital antenna with power plug and also remote sometimes, from Radioshack, Lowes, and K-mart,.. etc.
I would rather suggest
those small advanced small and compact kind of
good looking kind of advanced digital outdoor antenna, which you can even mount on the outside wall or even keep in attic , if you disliked it on the roof-top ( though they are very small and good-looking ) but signal capacity/strength will
be lot a better than those stupid, in-door rabbit ear digital antennas.
Also, you may buy those 19 to 29 dollars signal booster ( with elec. Plug ) from RadioShack/ Wal-Mart and see if it helps to strengthen the signals, if not working you can always return them.
I always watch all VDO clips and Indian TV shows on internet ( I prefer dead ( pre-taped ) clips, so you can pause, rewind and postpone watching if tired – as I never like watching anything coming live on the TV and even theater movies, for the same reasons ) and that’s why I bought a good DELL best quality of monitor, as I use PC, 24 hrs a day, so it’s worth the expense.
I enjoyed BIGBOSS3 and now enjoying all star awards, Movies, Comedy shows, Indian Idols,… etc, but do not prefer from any LIVE broadcasting, as I can not schedule my time with them, They will have to adjust my time and hence I prefer recorded clips and that digital recording piece HVR 950Q.
…………………………
After 6 mos. You need to stay behind it and get the offer extended by calling them many times, at diff times, talking with diff. people all over USA. ( on their toll free nos )
Everybody is diff. and somebody will do it for you for 19.99.
I had also tried those indoor rabbit year new digital antenna with power plug and also remote sometimes, from Radioshack, Lowes, and K-mart,.. etc.
I would rather suggest
those small advanced small and compact kind of
good looking kind of advanced digital outdoor antenna, which you can even mount on the outside wall or even keep in attic , if you disliked it on the roof-top ( though they are very small and good-looking ) but signal capacity/strength will
be lot a better than those stupid, in-door rabbit ear digital antennas.
Also, you may buy those 19 to 29 dollars signal booster ( with elec. Plug ) from RadioShack/ Wal-Mart and see if it helps to strengthen the signals, if not working you can always return them.
I always watch all VDO clips and Indian TV shows on internet ( I prefer dead ( pre-taped ) clips, so you can pause, rewind and postpone watching if tired – as I never like watching anything coming live on the TV and even theater movies, for the same reasons ) and that’s why I bought a good DELL best quality of monitor, as I use PC, 24 hrs a day, so it’s worth the expense.
I enjoyed BIGBOSS3 and now enjoying all star awards, Movies, Comedy shows, Indian Idols,… etc, but do not prefer from any LIVE broadcasting, as I can not schedule my time with them, They will have to adjust my time and hence I prefer recorded clips and that digital recording piece HVR 950Q.
…………………………
How to get off the Grid (Cable TV to be precise)?
chaks;303951I got rid of comcast cable when I had to pay full price after 6 month promo. I bought RCA Indoor antenna (http://www.google.com/products?q=RCA+ANT1450B+-+TV+antenna&aq=f) from Walmart for $25 or so. This antenna is flat and doesnt occupy whole lot of space. I get around 60 channels including 10 HD channels. Only about 5 or 6 channels like ABC, Fox News etc. are worth watching. Go to http://www.antennaweb.org to see how many channels to get in your location.
I bought assembled small form factor HTPC and connected to TV. I use this most of the times. I watch sitcoms from hulu and youtube. I think it is worth the money I spend.
I too had comcast as my cable provider (which I dumped last week). For past 1 year they were giving me so called "discount rates". This time, they didn't agree.
I looked at the channel list from the link you mentioned. Unfortunately none of the channels I want are in that list. I'm already getting all the basic 20-30 channels with just hooking up the cable wire to my TV.
So looks like I would have to rule out the antennae option.
I browsed over directv packages, and they are giving a good deal. But unfortunately they have a 2 year contract, and the promotional price is only for 1 year. But even then, the average price for 2 year period will be much less than my "discount rate from comcast". Added bonus is that I can get desi channels too.
How to get off the Grid (Cable TV to be precise)?
sid_earth;304064I too had comcast as my cable provider (which I dumped last week). For past 1 year they were giving me so called "discount rates". This time, they didn't agree.
I looked at the channel list from the link you mentioned. Unfortunately none of the channels I want are in that list. I'm already getting all the basic 20-30 channels with just hooking up the cable wire to my TV.
So looks like I would have to rule out the antennae option.
I browsed over directv packages, and they are giving a good deal. But unfortunately they have a 2 year contract, and the promotional price is only for 1 year. But even then, the average price for 2 year period will be much less than my "discount rate from comcast". Added bonus is that I can get desi channels too.
how is this sounds ?
http://finance.yahoo.com/family-home/article/110122/you-dont-have-to-pay-for-cable-tv?mod=series-a-article
How to get off the Grid (Cable TV to be precise)?
^^^ Thanks for reminding me about this thread. An update after 3 weeks: I'm still off the cable, but I'm getting basic cable by just putting in the Comcast cable in the back of my TV. I still have internet from Comcast, so I'm getting the basic TV stations. And frankly, I'm now not missing any of the previous channels.
I have decided to wait until November, when I might buy a new tv during thanksgiving sale, and hopefully it would be clear if Apple is going to come up with a better Apple TV. If not, then I'll probably get Roku, and install a basic computer setup with my new TV, to stream Hulu and other web stations.
But I'm not going to pay 80-90$ to the cable company anymore...
I have decided to wait until November, when I might buy a new tv during thanksgiving sale, and hopefully it would be clear if Apple is going to come up with a better Apple TV. If not, then I'll probably get Roku, and install a basic computer setup with my new TV, to stream Hulu and other web stations.
But I'm not going to pay 80-90$ to the cable company anymore...
How to get off the Grid (Cable TV to be precise)?
I have had basic cable for the past couple of years and recently upgraded to Comcast digital preferred with dvr specifically to watch the world cup soccer, wimbledon etc. After the world cup we realized most shows we watch are on the basic channels and we don't really watch much of other cable channels and it is waste for us. But we liked the DVR and time shifting functionality. So I have been doing some research on the possible options for a week so we can have a dvr with basic cable.
Requirements were
1. DVR functionality for the basic cable
2. hulu, netflix , espn3 for sports
3. You tube for indian shows/movies (connecting laptop to the TV every time we watch something on youtube is a pain),
4. Possibly a way to subscribe to indian channels online if parents etc visit
Looked at set top boxes like Roku, tivo etc but decided in the end a home theater pc (htpc) is a better option for all of the above.
After my research, I purchased last weekend the lenovo Q150 nettop at Frys ($350+tax, Intel Atom D510 , 2 GB RAM, Nvidia ion platform : the ion platform is specifically important for playing HD content) and bought a USB tv tuner (mygica, $20 at meritline) The Q150 is very small (smaller than wii) and comes with a beautiful mini key board+mouse that is good for easily entering text when surfing. Watched a lot of HD shows on hulu and youtube, pretty decent quality. Netflix from windows media center works great. There is a bit of noise and gets slightly hot but its definitely way less than my old ps2 or my laptop and I can live with that. I set up the resolution to 720 p though and I haven't yet tried 1080, flash at 1080 seems to cause the system some problems for some people but 720 is good enough for me.
The tv tuner set up is not perfect. Couple of times Windows media center (WMC) complained that there is no signal. Google search revealed that there are updates to windows 7 media center that might solve this issue so will have to try that. I will have to try other DVR software like mythtv to see if it is WMC problem. DVR functionality and TV guide in WMC is awesome except for the signal loss that occured twice. The lenovo keyboard remote while good for entering text and general browsing, it is not specifically designed for WMC functionality. I think I need to get a windows media center remote as well ($10 or so on Amazon). Finally with one usb tv tuner you can only watch or record one channel. For now, the plan is to split the cable to connect one line directly to my tv and other to the USB tv tuner so I can watch a show on TV while recording other on my htpc dvr. Will have to see if the signal remains strong enough after splitting. Later this year, I will perhaps get a external dual tv tuner like the HDHomerun or a USB dual tv tuner so I can record two shows at once. Hope this helps.
Requirements were
1. DVR functionality for the basic cable
2. hulu, netflix , espn3 for sports
3. You tube for indian shows/movies (connecting laptop to the TV every time we watch something on youtube is a pain),
4. Possibly a way to subscribe to indian channels online if parents etc visit
Looked at set top boxes like Roku, tivo etc but decided in the end a home theater pc (htpc) is a better option for all of the above.
After my research, I purchased last weekend the lenovo Q150 nettop at Frys ($350+tax, Intel Atom D510 , 2 GB RAM, Nvidia ion platform : the ion platform is specifically important for playing HD content) and bought a USB tv tuner (mygica, $20 at meritline) The Q150 is very small (smaller than wii) and comes with a beautiful mini key board+mouse that is good for easily entering text when surfing. Watched a lot of HD shows on hulu and youtube, pretty decent quality. Netflix from windows media center works great. There is a bit of noise and gets slightly hot but its definitely way less than my old ps2 or my laptop and I can live with that. I set up the resolution to 720 p though and I haven't yet tried 1080, flash at 1080 seems to cause the system some problems for some people but 720 is good enough for me.
The tv tuner set up is not perfect. Couple of times Windows media center (WMC) complained that there is no signal. Google search revealed that there are updates to windows 7 media center that might solve this issue so will have to try that. I will have to try other DVR software like mythtv to see if it is WMC problem. DVR functionality and TV guide in WMC is awesome except for the signal loss that occured twice. The lenovo keyboard remote while good for entering text and general browsing, it is not specifically designed for WMC functionality. I think I need to get a windows media center remote as well ($10 or so on Amazon). Finally with one usb tv tuner you can only watch or record one channel. For now, the plan is to split the cable to connect one line directly to my tv and other to the USB tv tuner so I can watch a show on TV while recording other on my htpc dvr. Will have to see if the signal remains strong enough after splitting. Later this year, I will perhaps get a external dual tv tuner like the HDHomerun or a USB dual tv tuner so I can record two shows at once. Hope this helps.