I've been forced by circumstance to evaluate my usage of, and payment for, Cable/Satellite TV. What follows is an overview of my attempt to find free or low cost alternatives to the bloated cost of Cable/Satellite.
The first thing I wanted to do was evaluate how much TV we actually watched. Most of our live viewing happened in the morning, catching up on local news. Almost everything else was watched from the DVR (digital video recorder). My biggest hurdle was finding a way to watch free local TV.
Finding the local channels turned out to be easier than I originally thought. I had been so programmed to watch TV via Cable/Stallite, I completely forgot TV is broadcast through the air. I spent days trying to figure out how to get to streaming news from local channels. TO no avail (which is a fail in my view, TV stations need to get their content on line or stream it live).
Thanks to
Noah Sparks, who reminded me you can get HD channels over the air, with an antenna. I made my way to the local tech store, got an antenna, hooked it up, and voila, free local channels, so now we can get the news when we want it.
The next difficult hurdle was figuring out how to watch shows that I couldn't record to a DVR. There are several open source and commercial products that let you record TV and store it on a local hard drive, but I would have to invest in more hardware, and setup is time consuming. I wanted something easy. Several services came to mind,
Netflix,
Hulu+,
Amazon Video on Demand, and
Apple TV.
Netflix
Netflix is a no brainer. The setup was easy (built in to my Blu-ray player), and gives me the ability to stream movies and TV shows, or order a DVD. My only wish for Netflix was they make current seasons available the next day. But I can live without that for now.
The other big draw to Netflix for me is the absence of ads. I'm paying for the individual content, I don't want to see ads. Ever.
Web Shows
Next I went through our current DVR to see what was being recorded, and then tried to find the corresponding show on the channels web site. Typically these sites make shows available soon after they have aired live. In most cases I was able to find the show, both current episodes, and past episodes. All include advertising, before during and after. But for free, can't complain.
Hulu+
This is a complete failure. Not only does Hulu+ charge a monthly fee, they also run ads during a show. Seriously? They also struggled to deliver streaming content without buffering. I watched shows from several services all on the same night, and Hulu+ was the only one that had to buffer. In fact, it took me nearly 1 hour to watch the last 15 minutes of a show because of buffering every 30 seconds. I just wasn't impressed, but was glad I had a 7 day trial.
Apple TV
The last piece of the puzzle for me is Apple TV. Using this device gives me the ability to rent movies and TV shows, for a reasonable price, on demand. I can also connect my own content to one my Mac's, and stream content through the TV. Big win in my mind. This product will only get better, including giving me the ability to stream content to my iPad or iPhone. Very cool.
One service I tried was Amazon Video on Demand, but the cost was too high, and I didn't want to buy content, just rent it. Average price for an HD show as $3 or more. I think between Netflix, the Web, over the air Digital TV, and Apple TV, I should just about be able to cut the bloat of Cable/Satellite, and put my money into content I want to watch instead of paying for content I will never watch.
One final thought, and that is sports. I'm not a huge sports fan, except for NASCAR and College football. I can watch most of the college sports on local channels, and possibly ESPN3 (which I'll write about later as I take time to explore it more). NASCAR doesn't have a streaming system, yet. I really want them too get on board with that. I need to check and see what is available for mobile consumption, but I'm looking for whats on TV.
