trying to cut the cable

vanity ^ | 3/13/21 | Dad was my hero

[Dad was my hero]

I'm considering dropping cable, cutting the cord so to speak. My cable provider (Spectrum) has been to my house 3 times over the issue of dropped audio and pixelation. The issues have been so pronounced that it can make some shows almost unwatchable. They are coming again today but I spoke with a neighbor that also has Spectrum and he said they have the same issue, so I am sure it is somewhere in their lines feeding my development.

I'm not much interested in going to a satellite dish, I've had both dish and direct TV before. I dropped dish eventually because of loss of signal and they wanted to charge me to fix it. It later turned out the issue was the base mounting came loose d/t poor installation. But I went to Direct and had the pixelation issue with them and any storms. Being in FL, we have a lot of storms during the afternoon and I don't want to have shows I'm watching interrupted with pixelation again.

I have 3 TVs and 3 DVRs (probably only need one DVR now). What I am looking to replace is the channel lineup AND the recording function I had with the DVRs. I bought a Roku streaming stick plus and got that functioning last night. It appears that I can get almost all of the channel lineup if I download the AT&T app within Roku. My questions are:

Can I record (to a cloud maybe) shows I want to see? How? Can I record one show while watching a second or record two shows while watching something else I recorded or a third show live? How?

I still having 3 TVs, do I need to get two more Rokus to use the other TVs? Only one TV in the house is a "smart" TV, the other two are older flat screens but not "smart". The Roku is currently on the smart TV. Do I need to buy two more Roku sticks to use on those TVs? Do I also need to get two more AT&T subscriptions?

So how does this work, I'm not a highly technical person.

[Dad was my hero]

I do have some recorded shows that I’ve had on my DVR longer than that. Like the Maltese Falcon and Casablanca and Passengers to name three. I’d have to give that some thought if that would make a difference. If, however, I could watch them anyway again then that might not be an issue.

[Dad was my hero]

I thought about the spectrum app but haven’t looked it up yet.

[CodeToad]

No need to record shows. They are not played live in 99.99% of cases. You select when to watch a show.

There is no correlation between live channels on cable and what is available outside cable. You don't channel surf.

There is probably 1,000 times more outside cable than on cable.

Here is Amazon's FireTV home page. Notice the boxes are providers that have menus and more content to show. At the top are Movies. Click that and a bunch of movies are shown from all kinds of providers. Click TV Shows, same thing, lots of shows from all kinds of providers. So, you can browse by provider or by movies or TV shows, etc.

[CA_soon_gone]

I dropped Dish two years ago. Some answers to your questions. You need a Roku for every tv. It might be built into a smart tv or an external device for a dumb tv. Whatever services you subscribe to will work on all your Rokus, only one subscription.

I started with YoutubeTV but the price soared so I switched to Sling. You need to change your mindset about DVRs. Sling has a DVR function, so did YoutubeTV. With streaming you have access to a large library of shows that you can watch on demand so the DVR is of far less value than before. When the only way material was available was a linear broadcast at a time not of your choosing then DVRs made sense. You still need a subscription to enable access to the on demand library. I found Sling was the best deal.

These days we spend 90% of viewing on plain Youtube. Get the Premium package to cut out all commercials. Our Sling usage barely justifies the price but it is still useful.

[dfwgator]

I use fubo.tv.

[Jolla]

No cable for over two years, pick up a lot with an antenna, ME TV has a lot of good old stuff from the 60s and 70s, youtube you can pick up good old movies, add in MLB for my baseball games (watch the west coast games the next day) for $10 per month.

[Dad was my hero]

well, my current cable/internet bill is about 260 a month. It has been creeping up steadily over the past 9 months. They charge me extra for each dvr too. From what I can tell I might be able to cut that roughly in half but I’m not sure yet. My thought is that if I don’t stick with spectrum for internet I will go back to FIOS and they offer 500/500 internet speeds instead of spectrum’s 200/200, which I assume is better for streaming. BUT they no longer offer TV, that is where the Roku comes in.

[SamAdams76]

And please, if you don't have TV because you've gotten rid of that, please move on, don't need to hear from you. I spend a lot of my time at home taking care of my wife who has Alzheimer's and so apart from the internet and little jobs around the house I don't have much else I can do except watch TV.

Actually there's a lot more to do around the house besides watch TV. I just returned from the library with four books to read. I also have several hobbies that don't involve the boob tube.

I have one flat screen TV in the house connected to Internet via Roku and I'll use it for the occasional movie or I might stream a documentary here and there. YouTube is a great resource for that if you don't want to pay for a Hulu or Amazon Prime subscription. But I haven't had cable TV in the house for several years and don't miss it at all.

I feel much healthier both physically and mentally not having that constant noise in the house. Even worse than the loud shows with the obnoxious commercials were those "news" stations with the whiz-bang graphics and all that crap streaming on the bottom of the screen. Not good for my blood pressure!

[Fai Mao]

I have found that some of the FREE streaming services like Pluto, and Favsome, and Crackle have a lot of good programming on them. Despite the censorship issues there is a lot of worthwhile programming on YouTube. My Chinese wife watches Ratuken a lot because most things are in Chinese. Also the Roku will link (At least in Houston) to local channels digital feed so if you want to watch local news you can.

We have the basic cable/Internet package because it is .13 cents cheaper than just Internet alone. But, we almost never watch anything on on the cable channels.

[CaptainPhilFan]

Hello! Are there particular shows or channels you like to watch?

CBS for example, has its own streaming app for their own shows - Peacock is another one.

Some services have “live” TV for some channels. Youtube and Philo are 2 services that have Live TV and they allow you to record anything they show. I know from experience Philo is very generous about it.

At $20 a month, Philo is a great choice. Here’s the link to read about it.

https://www.philo.com/login/subscribe

If you need help navigating this experience feel free to reach out.
God bless you, God bless the Mrs.

[nevergore]

Dump cable and stream your services.....you can pick and choose, they are month to month and it allows service across all your devices not just TVs

[Dad was my hero]

this is what I think I’m finding, but the DVR portion is what is confounding me. Though others in this thread have offered some ideas about that like hulu.

[Mr. K]

I have no premium services at all.

Only Internet and a magicJack to keep my phone number I had for 30 years.

There is so much free content online. I learned how to do concrete how to repair my pool, my car, how to put a dormer on my roof, and more...

[luckystarmom]

I don’t think you’ll need Roku for your smart TV.

The good thing about streaming is you can try it the different services typically for free for a week.

You never have to sign up for contracts it’s all month to month.

We’ve tried Hulu Live, Youtube TV, Direct TV now, sling.

Also, you can easily add or take off stations. I add ESPN during college football season

We had HBO when we watched Game of Thrones.

It’s a little harder to navigate. My mom can’t understand it when she visits, but that doesn’t happen often.

We just moved out of California, and are currently renting

When we buy our house, I’ll probably get an antenna for local stations and drop the Hulu Live.

[Starboard]

Informative post. I don’t have those problems but nevertheless appreciated your clear explanation and advice. :)

[redshawk]

First try the Roku on the not smart TVs. You need a HDMI port on them. Else pick up a couple of new TVs to run Roku. Second you need one Roku per TV. Third the spectrum app work’s good but you must subscribe to spectrum else it won’t work. Fourth the Roku stick overheats frequently and thus shuts down. Been there done that.

Now I run Amazon fire stick. The more expensive one works great. You might need internet boosters to get faster and better signals to the remote TVs. The Pluto TV app plus hundreds more on fire stick get me everything I need.
So without a good and reliable high speed internet fire or Roku will both disappoint. Go with fire. About DVR.... I know nothing.

[Dad was my hero]

Well last night I went between spectrum and roku, roku was clear as I watched newsmax, one time very briefly I thought I might have seen a little pixelation but when I switched it back to spectrum cable, it was horrible, lots of dropped audio and pixelation during the tucker carlson show.

[Major Matt Mason]

Plot your course carefully with all of these streaming services because before you know it you will be spending more than you did for cable.

True statement, but cutting the cord is also about defunding the liberal networks on cable TV that get funding regardless of whether people watch them or not. This includes the worthless news networks, etc. If I'm spending a little more per month on the apps but only getting what I want, I still see that as a win.

[Big Red Badger]

Used DVD’S are my choice
as they have a Lot
Of other Related info.
Interviews and
Special Features are Great
and Not otherwise available

[Starboard]

I learned how to do concrete how to repair my pool, my car, how to put a dormer on my roof, and more...

*************

You’re right, the instructional stuff out there is amazing. I helped someone quickly and cheaply repair a car not long ago thanks to an informative online video.