Dumping Cable for Streaming

[jbell1981]

Any one else do it?  We have had cable and Netflix for quite some time now but find we watch Netflix way more than cable. We have been doing the free trials for amazon video and hulu and think we can get by without cable. The only weekly show we really watch is the walking dead which we could wait a season until it is on Netflix or buy it weekly/season on amazon to stay caught up. The other stuff we watch (mainly History and HGTV shows and some espn/nfl network) we could do without. 

By dumping cable and adding hulu and amazon we would be over $1300 ahead annually. My biggest concern is not being able to watch live sports. We would get a good HD attena and hopefully with that we would get the vikes and other major things but would still be missing a lot. 

So how many others have done this? Are you glad you did or are you thinking about going back? 

[rundrave]

I just did it about a month ago. We have an amazon firestick and it works fine for us. Lots of apps and we also do netflix as well.  We may have borrowed or used a relatives login and account# for some of the other apps....hehe. I dont watch much TV but the most difficult thing has been sports for me as well and no DVR for the few shows I did watch.

For march madness we just used the NCAA app and again a relatives login and it worked great. The other weekly thing for me is AMA Supercross and I am able to watch that via the FOX Sports app but wish I could DVR it as west coast races get pretty late so it was always nice to be able to record it and watch it when time permits.

We will see how I do once the Twins season starts.

I bought a $50 HD Antenna from Menards and a cheap 4 channel signal booster and OTA channels work great on 4 tv's. We dont watch any network tv but its nice to have the local news and will be great for football in the fall.

I miss cable but not for the $$$ we were paying for it. We just dont watch alot of TV and alot of the shows I did watch are recently no longer on the air so it was easy for me.

[Moon Lake Refuge]

My issue is when I cancelled cable tv my cost for internet went up.  I still have dish because I cant get rid of it.  Not because of a contract but because every time I call to quite they lower the price and add channels.  I'm currently paying 25 for 250 channels plus HBO and one other movie channel in my living room only.  Bedroom has a 15$ antenna that gets me fox, channel 11 and about 20 other channels that run infomercials 24/7.

also look up Kodi for managing your apps.  There are some questionably illegal addons out there where you can stream every tv show or movie made.  Some the same day they are released but some of the approved addons are great for on demand movies and tv shows and you can house your amazon, netflix and hulu apps all in one place.  Its free and easy to use.

 

[jbell1981]

Thanks for the info. I called the cable company and asked what my price for internet would if I no longer included the cable with it. The price quoted was what I am currently paying so I don't have to worry there unless they try to jack me around once I do cut bait. They have me by the balls on the internet though. There are not any other (realistic) options where I live for that. 

[Moon Lake Refuge]

2 minutes ago, jbell1981 said:

Thanks for the info. I called the cable company and asked what my price for internet would if I no longer included the cable with it. The price quoted was what I am currently paying so I don't have to worry there unless they try to jack me around once I do cut bait. They have me by the balls on the internet though. There are not any other (realistic) options where I live for that. 

Yeah its a pain... I keep thinking about trying DSL again but I just know it'll be garbage.  I cant wait until fiber optic gets more wide spread.  100+ meg for half the price as cable.

[mrklean]

Got rid of cable little over a year ago and don't miss it have Amazon Fire and pay for Hulu gets me everything I need also plenty of "websites" where you can find newer content to watch.

[Getanet]

Cut the cord for a while and did Netflix/Amazon + antenna for about a year, but went back. Live sports was the big issue. If you like local sports, Vikings will the be only thing you'll get with the antenna. Take your pick...Twins, Wolves, Wild, Gopher Sports...all on FSN or Big 10 Network. You might get 1 or 2 games Twins games a year if they're the Fox game of the week or something.  Of course, once they make their World Series run this year you'll be able to watch those 4 game on Fox (certain we'll sweep)!

Edited March 28, 2016 by Getanet

[nofishfisherman]

I haven't had cable for 5-6 years and don't see any reason to ever go back.  I have my internet through comcast and also paid a couple bucks a month for what amounts to the local channels.  Its an alternative to going with an antenna and it insures reception 100% of the time.  That allows me to watch the vikings on Sunday and also Sunday night football but I lose out on Monday night football and most Twin games.

Really the only major downside is access to sports but its not a huge issue for me.  After awhile I found that I appreciated having the extra free time that I use to devote to watching TV.  I still watch netflix often enough but I'm not in front of the TV nearly as much as I was when we had cable and most of that time in front of the TV with cable was spent channel surfing until I found something moderately interesting.  I don't think i could ever go back to following a tv show week by week.  I've tried with a few on the major networks but I just can't do it any more.  I'd rather be out doing other stuff most nights and then catch up on a bunch of episodes all at once on one lazy night.

 

 

[pikestabber]

I'm all in on a cable package and it's ridiculously expensive, but live sports, as others have mentioned, is my Achilles heel. They just jacked my rate again so it's almost $200 a month for cable and internet (no phone), with HD everything and DVR, no premium/movie channels. That's crazy, and I am embarrassed with myself every time I pay it, but sports make up about 75% of my viewing so it's so hard to just dump them. Also, the internet they have is very reliable and fast, so that's a money saver in terms of keeping our cell phones at the bare minimum in terms of data. Pick your poison, I guess, but if I was just a Vike's fan and not a big fan of the Wild, Twins and Wolves I'd dump cable in a heartbeat and spend my Sundays at the local sports bar. Just not a viable option if you really love your other sports.

[jbell1981]

Our provider is Charter and they don't offer a local channels only package of any sort. We currently have their second tier package and when I asked if they did a small local channel package they said they could downgrade me to tier 1 (about $12/month savings). Not enough to make me stay. 

I did find that dish networks smallest package is 55 channels plus locals for $40/month including tax and fees for 1 tv. If the antenna doesn't work I might consider that. 

[eyeguy 54]

I'm still charter internet at 65 and dish at 70.  been thinking about the streaming at 20 bucks but I dont think I would survive without fox news... lol   contract with dish is up mid april so might have to deal with them and see if they will budge. 

[eyeguy 54]

5 hours ago, Moon Lake Refuge said:

My issue is when I cancelled cable tv my cost for internet went up.  I still have dish because I cant get rid of it.  Not because of a contract but because every time I call to quite they lower the price and add channels.  I'm currently paying 25 for 250 channels plus HBO and one other movie channel in my living room only.  Bedroom has a 15$ antenna that gets me fox, channel 11 and about 20 other channels that run infomercials 24/7.

also look up Kodi for managing your apps.  There are some questionably illegal addons out there where you can stream every tv show or movie made.  Some the same day they are released but some of the approved addons are great for on demand movies and tv shows and you can house your amazon, netflix and hulu apps all in one place.  Its free and easy to use.

 

 

how do you get it for 25???   they knocked mine to 55 for the 120 and that was it. 

[bobbymalone]

I cut the cable several years ago and haven't looked back since.  I'm not really into TV much and don't have "my shows" so i am content to be a year or two behind whatever the hit show is these days and watch it on my own schedule.

As others mentioned the live sports thing can be a pain if that's your thing.  I do pay for MLB so I can watch any game live.  There are ways around the blackouts...  One seasons worth of MLB plus a service to get around the blackouts runs less than a month worth of my old DirecTV bill.  There are similar services for NFL and NHL, but you have to pretty internet/technology savvy to get around blackouts.  It's doable though.  And much cheaper than cable.

[delcecchi]

Check out sling at sling.com   some of the cable stuff for only 20 bucks a month.  I think it has espn among others. 

[bobbymalone]

3 hours ago, nofishfisherman said:

After awhile I found that I appreciated having the extra free time that I use to devote to watching TV.  I still watch netflix often enough but I'm not in front of the TV nearly as much as I was when we had cable and most of that time in front of the TV with cable was spent channel surfing until I found something moderately interesting.  

 

 

+1. I definitely watch less TV and that's probably a good thing. Too much surfing and then watching hours of moderately entertaining stuff that was "the best thing on" but still garbage.

[Bobby Bass]

I dropped cable and do not miss it at all. I did add  Hulu and Netflix along with Prime and that covers my need for watching TV and movies. I did put up an ant for local over the air broadcast so I get my fix of Vikings games. Twins are listen to on the radio as I think that is one sport that lens itself nicely to being heard on the radio. I do miss the Wild games but when it comes play off time I will take in a few games at the local pub and what I saved in cable costs well pays for a few nights outs. I would go for it and cut the cable if I had to do it again.

[mrklean]

17 hours ago, bobbymalone said:

I cut the cable several years ago and haven't looked back since.  I'm not really into TV much and don't have "my shows" so i am content to be a year or two behind whatever the hit show is these days and watch it on my own schedule.

As others mentioned the live sports thing can be a pain if that's your thing.  I do pay for MLB so I can watch any game live.  There are ways around the blackouts...  One seasons worth of MLB plus a service to get around the blackouts runs less than a month worth of my old DirecTV bill.  There are similar services for NFL and NHL, but you have to pretty internet/technology savvy to get around blackouts.  It's doable though.  And much cheaper than cable.

Does this include all Twins games, it was saying every out of market game so I wasn't sure what that exactly meant?

[bobbymalone]

Yes, every twins game.  Because I pay for a service on top of the MLB streaming service.  MLB won't give you access to live twins games, that's correct.

Basically there is a service that masks your actual location so it appears you are out of market.  When I'm watching a twins game, MLB thinks I'm in Colorado or Rio de Janeiro.  The stream doesnt route through Colorado or Rio de Janeiro, so it isn't slowed down.  Just the location is reported as outside the market.

Google "unlocator"

There have been rumors that MLB will remove blackouts from their streaming service but I don't think the lawyers have sorted out a deal.

Using that same service, I may or may not know somebody that purchased a NFL international game pass for 328 Brazilian reals (approx $90 american) and then had access to every NFL game live for the season.    

Setting that up isn't too difficult if you are familiar with the inner workings of network settings in your media devices, computers, and internet routers.  It's fairly seamless too.   The only real problem I run into is occasionally I have to click a link to reupdated my IP address with the unlocator service because my IP address changes every week or so through my ISP.

Edited March 29, 2016 by bobbymalone

[Moon Lake Refuge]

On March 28, 2016 at 3:42 PM, eyeguy 54 said:

how do you get it for 25???   they knocked mine to 55 for the 120 and that was it. 

I had a promo from cable that would get me all those channels for 30 more than I was paying for Internet and they said if they gave them to me for 25 for another year would I stay? Figured why the heck not, not going to beat that.  I actually had every intention of dropping them and will again if price goes up.  So far seems like just quote your price and they try and match it.

[eyeguy 54]

you got the deal of the year

 

[delcecchi]

Bobby, tsk tsk tsk.   Using tricks to evade the law, or the regulations.  Getting those gray market games. 

[bobbymalone]

It's not necessarily illegal...  I suppose MLB could catch on and block it.   Wonder why they don't?  Probably because the lost a bunch of money in subscriptions when they did that several years ago because people wont pay $130 to not see the home team.  Plus computer folks will always be a step behind to circumvent it so it's pointless.  MLB gets to tell the media companies with the licenses they have a system in place to keep the blackouts in effect but yeah, not really.

Those blackout rules are just a vestigial organ from a pre broadband internet era.  Not that there was ever a time they didn't suck from the fans perspective.

 

Besides, blame my wife for wanting the twins game access, I'm a Missouri borne cardinals fan.

Edited March 30, 2016 by bobbymalone

[jjohnson5150]

We dumped cable a number of years ago. I set up an antenna in the garage rafters and used that with DSL internet for a few years. DSL + home phone was roughly $70. Last year I wanted faster internet since we were doing more streaming. I found a deal that gave us cable internet, local cable channels + home phone for the same money. It seems to be the best combo for us. I had to go with their local channels since I couldn't (or don't know how) pull antenna feed through the same coax line as internet. I even set up a home theater PC so I could stream direct from sites to big TV. Bought the PC with savings from dumping cable TV. Inflated cable prices are gross. It's an absolute racket. If you feel they have you by the nards when you call to see about scaling back to internet, act like you are going to follow through with cancelling. They will almost always call back before it happens with an offer to keep you no matter what the services are. 

[fishnowworknever]

Yep we do it.

Haven't had cable for 3 years now and I don't miss it one bit.  Netflix, Hulu, Plex, :cough:torrents:cough:, are plenty for me.

[delcecchi]

hope you have a proxy and a vpn if you are torrenting movies and tv shows.