Cutting the cord

[Stagman]

I can only get Dish, Direct, or Cable Options in my subdivision, no mediacom. Cable Options is cheap, but if I want a DVR then I have to buy one and Tivo charges a monthly subscription fee to record your shows. WTF!

 

[Ross7]

While I'm not ready to cut the cord I am gonna start downsizing it. I have Amazon Prime and was in fact ready to order an Amazon Fire Stick today and get rid of my Cox cable box to save some money. The only channels I ever seem to watch out of all the extra ones I get with the box are AHC (formerly The Military Channel) and Nat Geo, and as much as I would miss them I can live without them.

However this morning while further researching the it I saw on CNET that the $39.99 Fire Stick will be on sale at Amazon on Black Friday Weekend for $24.99, so I shall wait and live with the box for a while longer.

And FWIW that 7-inch Amazon Fire tablet that recently came out, normally $49.99, will be $34.99. I might get one of those too.

 

[MrFish]

I can only get Dish, Direct, or Cable Options in my subdivision, no mediacom. Cable Options is cheap, but if I want a DVR then I have to buy one and Tivo charges a monthly subscription fee to record your shows. WTF!

I just had to get rid of DirecTv after 12 years. I have had Mediacom for 2 weeks now. It sucks! The picture goes out twice a day. The sound goes out just about as often. My internet goes down every 4 days or so. The DVR memory is a joke with this! I could record up to 5 shows at a time with DirecTv and store tons of shows. Now I get 6 movies and it's almost full. Mediacom is the absolute worst I have ever seen!

 

[Ryan]

lol I have mediacom in Daphne. Every 5 weeks they have to come out and adjust for the db loss on the line so I can get above 1mb. They won't compensate the bill for when I basically don't have service but they probably don't care since they are all that I can get for internet where I live.

 

[RackinRay]

For those suffering Mediacom, check with AT&T for Uverse availability. Sister got it rather than Mediacom and she is happy with it. I am pretty she uses it for internet only and has gone to HD over the air antenna for regular TV.

 

[RackinRay]

Dish Network just went up from $72 a month to $112 a month so they are getting the boot, I just can't decide if I want to go to Direct or cut the cord all together. The big question I have is how do you watch The Walking Dead without cable or satellite?

NETFLIX has past seasons, and the network streams past shows current season streaming online. That is how I did it until it got old.

 

[Viking1204]

I just went from paying $120 a month for Cable TV through Cox to paying $67 a month for Direct TV and now heavy HD programming on all 4 TV's. With Cox I only had the main TV that had HD service. The Direct TV goes up to $90 the second year but I'll still be paying less than Cable and have better all around HD programming.

Cool thing is I just upgraded my main TV to a 65" Vizio and it's a Smart TV with buttons on the remote that take you directly to Amazon, Netflix and iheart radio! I don't need the Amazon Prime Box on that TV anymore since you can connect to it directly with the TV!

 

[pcola4]

I just dumped direct tv. Threatening to do it for years. We lost our signal and they wanted me to pay for a technician to come out 7 days later. They were not willing to work with us on new equipment, upgrades or anything without a contract. Td them they can keep it. Always thought it would be tough to do without but it's only been a little ov er s week and I'm doing fine. We use netflix and hulu. Honestly I could do without that too but my bride is a stay at home and she likes her netflix.

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

 

[Famine]

Had Mediacom when I lived in Santa Rosa and hated it - customer service is non-existent and they are only available during business hours. Moved to Escambia county and picked up Cox - great service/customer service - price was a little high but a great value as compared to Mediacom. Just switched to Direct - the carrot was much lower prices for TV than Cox - but more important - I bought a dish and receiver and put it up at my deer camp in my trailer - so now between hunts and in the evening I can watch football, movies or the news. I was able to adjust the dish to get a 95% signal with some patience and all is good.

 

[Viking1204]

Famine, are you paying a monthly bill for your hunting camp too or is that covered under your home setup?

 

[Famine]

Interesting question - when I called and told them what I wanted to do -they said no, no, no - that I had to have a tech come out and set it up and charge me for a separate location. They set me up in the house with their Genie system and unfortunately three slave off the main receiver - otherwise I could have just purchased a dish and taken a receiver with me. Instead I went on eBay, bought an owned receiver - you can confirm it is owned by giving Direct a call and confirming from the serial number it is not a leased unit. You will have to pay $20 to direct for a new access card (holds what your entitled to) and $7/month for the additional set - which is what I told them - I was adding a tv to the house. If you are using a trailer and want to run the cable from the Dish to your external Cable connection you will probably need to swap out the exiting internal Winegard amplified plate inside the trailer for one that is set up for Satellite. Those Winegard amplified plates run the cables thru a circuit board - power on is 12v for the over the air antennae power off is for a normal cable connection at an RV park. Satellite dishes need 20vs from the receiver or separate power supply to the dish and the old Winegards will not pass the required voltage. I modified the plate to jumper around the circuit board for Direct and it works but I spent more money for the necessary tools and materials (compression fittings, cat 6 cable, etc) then I would have if I had found this first Winegard Company Wall Plate TV/Satellite RV-7542 $21.There are smart phone apps that will give you the heading and elevation for your dish where you want to locate it. Make sure you have a clear line of sight to the Satellite for Direct it is the 101 Sat. Easier to have two folks working to fine tune aiming the dish. I used the app to locate in the sky where I needed to point the dish (mine also gives the heading, elevation and dish angle. It is important to insure what you mount the dish to is level in all directions. once connected power up the receiver and TV and get to the signal strength option. With one person turning the dish 1/2 in at a time and waiting 5 or 10 seconds move the dish left then right until you get the max signal strength that's the job of the second person - feedback on signal strength. Lock down the dish and done...took me a couple of hours from start to finish but then it was my first time.

 

[Viking1204]

I know this thread is old but probably a lot of new update information out there these days we can talk about. I switched from DirecTV to Cox after they lied and increased my prices in the 2nd year $40 higher than the guy who signed me up promised. Well now Cox is doing what they always do, sign you up cheap and then slowly increase you every few months. I'm seriously ready to ditch cable but the first problem I want to tackle is the antenna setup for the local over the air channels. I can get a 40' telescoping antenna mast from Channel Master for $179 which would put my antenna up about 45' in the air. I hate buying things like this over the internet before seeing if I can get the item locally or at least see what the local guys have to offer. The only problem is I don't know anywhere locally that sells antenna masts and mounting hardware. Anybody know where I can find this stuff locally?

 

[FrankT]

I have seen indoor digital antennas say they work for 80 miles with no outdoor antenna, then a firestick and Kodi will do you.

 

[Stagman]

I'm thinking about trying sling tv.

 

[Droshki]

I know this thread is old but probably a lot of new update information out there these days we can talk about. I switched from DirecTV to Cox after they lied and increased my prices in the 2nd year $40 higher than the guy who signed me up promised. Well now Cox is doing what they always do, sign you up cheap and then slowly increase you every few months. I'm seriously ready to ditch cable but the first problem I want to tackle is the antenna setup for the local over the air channels. I can get a 40' telescoping antenna mast from Channel Master for $179 which would put my antenna up about 45' in the air. I hate buying things like this over the internet before seeing if I can get the item locally or at least see what the local guys have to offer. The only problem is I don't know anywhere locally that sells antenna masts and mounting hardware. Anybody know where I can find this stuff locally?

I would suggest just getting a good quality indoor antenna with a LNA on it, before you go through all that trouble. Back in about 08, when I was still working on yachts and HD OTA was just coming out, we would get 10-12 channels solid, from as far out as Dothan. Im sure things have improved since then and so you may not even need all the hoopla. The antennas were no higher then 15-30 feet off the water and in crowded marinas. If you really feel you need to go external, even sticking a 6 foot mast on your house would probably get great LOS. But again, get one with a LNA on it.

 

[Viking1204]

My house is a one story house sandwiched in between two 2 story houses so I don't think an indoor antenna in my attic would do too well. I have to get the signal to the front of my house so I can get some relief from the 2 story houses I'm sandwiched in between. I looked yesterday when I got home and I think there is any area of my roof where I can probably do a 15' - 20' antenna and get up high enough to receive some good signals. The prices for antenna masts once you get 20' or below are considerably lower. Thanks for the suggestions guys, I plan to research everything good before deciding which way to go.

 

[Droshki]

Yea, living in a valley like that might be problematic.

Honestly I don't see the advantage of OTA broadcast anyway, because you'd still need a standalone DVR unless you are going to watch "appointment TV", which doesn't work for me. And even though my cable is super cheap because the basic part of it is built into the HOA fees, over half my watching is via torrent. Even shows that are on the cable I pay for are preferable that way, because they are easy to store, watch anywhere in the house, and there's no commercial breaks. I run a simple setup because I really don't watch that much TV, but an industrious (IT type) person can run apps like sickbeard and couch potato (among many) and automatically download your shows.

 

[Viking1204]

There are a lot of over the air DVR's out there now that don't have any monthly service fee. You just buy the equipment and it comes with a nice guide and record what you want without ever paying anymore. Most of the online OTA antenna sites have one they offer.

 

[Viking1204]

Well Cox just raised my damn bill $20, time to get more serious about finally cutting the cord. I guess I'll take it one step at a time, first step is figure out how to get all the local channels via digital antenna. Enough talk with no action on my part, enough is enough!

Question for those of you out there who have already cut the cord. I'm looking for advice on a good Outdoor antenna? I know based on my location I'm going to need a good outdoor antenna and when I try and search for reviews online what I'm finding out is the reviews seem to be different depending on the website. I'm finding it hard to find legit websites with impartial views, everyone seems to have their favorite.

 

[wildrider666]

FWIW: I was having crappy buffering problems with Amazon Prime and Netflix. Modem was constantly failing (green to orange lights).
Service provider: WOW.
Short answer: Disconect unused unconnected cables: a. At he house mounted box. 2. Where the splitter connection is and replace with straight connector.
Tech said unused unconnected cables still carry signal and draw down signal strength. I never heard that before but it fixed the problem. Download programs only buffer momentarily on start/play.

Long version: I'm on the lowest band speed but its above the programs requirements and this was with all other signal draw down sources (phones, Ipads, computers) shut down. Phone contact customer service tried to trouble shoot but found nothing after total reset ans signal was correct at house connection. I told the to send a Tech the next day or id cancel in the afternoon. They said it would be a $50 service charge if no problems are found AND connection to house was their responsibility, all other wiring around the house to connection points was "users responsibility" then their responsible for the black boxes AND repairs to user responsibility wiring would be at owners expense! Hell, they installed it so its their crap. I had swapped out their modem once at their recommendation and a Tech replaced it again on another service call: it didn't help. Finally got a knowledgeable tech who fixed the problem, see short answer above.