Considering ditching cable...

[kalrith]

+ the convenience of just flipping through channels and not wasting 10+ hours a week with torrents/unrarring/tracking down things not on torrents = priceless

How much tv do you watch? Do you only watch particular shows or do you like channel surfing?

People spend 10+ hours a week with torrents? I spend about 20 minutes a week on that. I also have dryloop DSL for $34/month, so the bundling was a non-issue for me. I dropped my total communications/TV cost from $2088/year to $600/year by switching from DirecTV and a $60/month cell-phone plan to free OTA and about $16/month for T-Mobile Prepaid. Both prices include my $34/month 3MBps dryloop DSL, which I'll probably upgrade to 6MBps in the near future. I can't believe how much money I wasted over the last 7 years on cell phones and satellite.

 

[Shadowknight]

I use OTA and have access to two different PBS stations, ABC, Fox, and a local independent station. You get used to less choice, and I watch The Venture Brothers on Cartoon network, and maybe an hour of programming on HULU each month. For the most part, I just play games in my spare time. I haven't had cable in 11 years and don't miss it. Once you get rid of it, in two months you won't even miss it.

 

[Kadarin]

So is there currently a better choice than the Mac Mini for an HTPC? In this configuration, it could run Boxee software along with iTunes, to cover both free and paid content. A quick test of Boxee shows it to be somewhat buggy (Apple movie trailers didn't play, and it found some porn on my PC that I can't find when I search for it lol), but Hulu worked quite nicely on it. Are there any issues with the Mac Mini not having enough processing horsepower (or video decoding in hardware on the 9400M or whatever) to effectively display high resolution video? I would also, it looks like, have to get a mini-DVI to HDMI adapter, and simultaneously use an optical out for audio. Any issues with sound quality?

The Dell Zino looks nice, but I haven't seen any reviews discussing how loud it is. Otherwise, on paper it looks pretty nice too.

 

[Muadib]

Are you single? Because I could have dealt with all the shady/illegal/tricky torrenting.. My wife? She just wants to watch tv, not wait an hour to unRAR the latest episode of Gossip Girl. She was rightfully annoyed at all the jumping through hoops to save, what? less than 2 bucks a day.

😀 well said.

 

[Blazer]

^^ What is "bd subscription"? Also, for your vod and netflix, are you doing this on the htpc, and if so, how's the resolution?

bd [blu ray] subscription is from netflix, i use there vod for non bd which is very acceptable for me, dsl 6.0 internet provides enough for vod from netflix @ 2.9 miles from thier box, i also get bd titles sent by mail, using a htpc with bd player and optical sound out from mobo, i am very happy to have left the satellite arena, it all took awhile to get all the peices inplace but so far so good, the wife has a little learning curve but she is picking it up quickly.

 

[slackerinabox]

People spend 10+ hours a week with torrents? I spend about 20 minutes a week on that. I also have dryloop DSL for $34/month, so the bundling was a non-issue for me. I dropped my total communications/TV cost from $2088/year to $600/year by switching from DirecTV and a $60/month cell-phone plan to free OTA and about $16/month for T-Mobile Prepaid. Both prices include my $34/month 3MBps dryloop DSL, which I'll probably upgrade to 6MBps in the near future. I can't believe how much money I wasted over the last 7 years on cell phones and satellite.

OK, I use usenet so there's more unrarring/par checking than torrents..My computer basically was on 24/7 when I pirated tv, downloading, unzipping, re-encoding if necessary.. Bah, humbug!

And Hulu's so temperamental in full screen - I'd hate to depend on it for shows that I watch..

And people who pay $15+ to Netflix and say "yeah, i don't need to pay the cable company, netflix has everything I want" - yeah, if you're ok waiting 6 months for your favorite show to be available on dvd/bluray...And, what, you save $15 a month for the privilege? That's 50 cents a day in cold, hard cash!

Pirating tv is way too active of a task.. Any perceived savings in $$ is lost in time and electricity use.. It also really messed with my bandwidth. I know I can throttle it, but then I'm watching Wednesday's Top Chef on Friday or Saturday, when people at my work are already done talking about it, and all the news site spoil the episode for me.

It's stupid.. Pay for tv or just use rabbit ears. Building a fancy HTPC rig to "save money" by also inconveniencing yourself is false economy.. Unless it's a hobby, which is how I justify it..

 

[kalrith]

I hardly pirate any TV. Actually I hardly watch any TV. Even when I watched a lot, it was about an hour a day with most of that being network TV. If I went with Netflix, it would just be their $5-10/month plan for getting movies since almost all the TV I want to watch is available for free via OTA or the internet (streaming, not pirating).

I'm not saying that what I'm doing applies to everyone, but it works great for me. My HTPC is hardly an inconvenience. If I wanted to watch a ton of TV that I would have to pirate, then I could see it as being a big inconvenience. However, I now use it just as easily as our DVR other than having to go to websites to stream content or downloading at most two shows per week via torrents.

Edit: Another thing that makes it very easy to not watch much TV is having an 8mo boy. We don't let him watch any TV, so if he's awake, the TV's off. If he's awake, I'd rather be interacting with him than watching TV anyways.

 

[slackerinabox]

I hardly pirate any TV. Actually I hardly watch any TV. Even when I watched a lot, it was about an hour a day with most of that being network TV. If I went with Netflix, it would just be their $5-10/month plan for getting movies since almost all the TV I want to watch is available for free via OTA or the internet (streaming, not pirating).

I'm not saying that what I'm doing applies to everyone, but it works great for me. My HTPC is hardly an inconvenience. If I wanted to watch a ton of TV that I would have to pirate, then I could see it as being a big inconvenience. However, I now use it just as easily as our DVR other than having to go to websites to stream content or downloading at most two shows per week via torrents.

Edit: Another thing that makes it very easy to not watch much TV is having an 8mo boy. We don't let him watch any TV, so if he's awake, the TV's off. If he's awake, I'd rather be interacting with him than watching TV anyways.

So you're not saying that an HTPC /TV Tuner/ hULU/ Netflix is an adequate replacement to Cable TV subscription (thread title - 'Thinking of ditching cable tv"). You're saying having a baby is an adequate replacement to cable tv.

I probably agree with you. Since I do not have a baby and the wife and I do enjoy watching tv (about 2 hours a day during the weekdays, less on the weekend), a computer hooked up to my tv was a really shitty replacement for cable tv.

 

[Falloutboy]

I have internet only, granted I get basic locals with that but the only time I watch honest to god actual tv is sports. otherwise i just get my shows from the intertube. tvnzb.com + usenet account is way better than cable

 

[kalrith]

So you're not saying that an HTPC /TV Tuner/ hULU/ Netflix is an adequate replacement to Cable TV subscription (thread title - 'Thinking of ditching cable tv"). You're saying having a baby is an adequate replacement to cable tv.

I probably agree with you. Since I do not have a baby and the wife and I do enjoy watching tv (about 2 hours a day during the weekdays, less on the weekend), a computer hooked up to my tv was a really shitty replacement for cable tv.

I'm saying that the baby contributes to not watching as much TV. Even when I watched a ton of TV, about 70% of it was network TV. So, I was paying almost $1000/year for 30% of what I watched, and 90% of that 30% is available for free online without pirating.

What I was really trying to say is that not everyone has the same viewing habits. Some people watch a lot of content that can't be had for free without extensive pirating. If that content is important enough to those people to warrant the cost of cable, then they probably shouldn't go the route that I did. For my wife and me, the only content we can't get is What Not to Wear on TLC (my wife's show, not mine) and FSN (we would watch about 3 games per year on that channel). Everything else that we watched while paying a lot for DirecTV we can still watch via OTA, internet streaming, or the occasional torrent download.

 

[slackerinabox]

I'm saying that the baby contributes to not watching as much TV. Even when I watched a ton of TV, about 70% of it was network TV. So, I was paying almost $1000/year for 30% of what I watched, and 90% of that 30% is available for free online without pirating.

What I was really trying to say is that not everyone has the same viewing habits. Some people watch a lot of content that can't be had for free without extensive pirating. If that content is important enough to those people to warrant the cost of cable, then they probably shouldn't go the route that I did. For my wife and me, the only content we can't get is What Not to Wear on TLC (my wife's show, not mine) and FSN (we would watch about 3 games per year on that channel). Everything else that we watched while paying a lot for DirecTV we can still watch via OTA, internet streaming, or the occasional torrent download.

Yep, if you never watch tv in the first place, sure, an HTPC will fit your TV watching needs.. Why am I the only person who sees the irony with that statement?

To us, tv is like junk food.. Junk food is easily accessible, requires very little actual work, and always there.. Would you travel 20 miles for some twinkies? Not unless I'm in Zombieland... TV to us is best when it's there, easy to use, and requires little thought on our part besides hitting GUIDE or DVR. Sometimes you want to watch a particular show, and torrents/Hulu work ok for that...But sometimes you just want to passively flip through the channels to catch the odd episode of Bridezilla or some goofy VH1 behind the music docu. Ever try just browsing hulu without a set destination? It's frustrating because you end up looking through thousands of shows you've never heard of.. Then you just settle on watching Alf.. Then you wonder why the fuck you're watching Alf, and wish you had real tv...

In fact, after our adventures in HTPC, we've changed our sat boxes label on our harmony to REAL TV..

 

[Kadarin]

^^ Good point, and for you the best investment is cable, satellite, U-Verse, or FIOS. My whole thing is that I only watch about 2 or 3 shows per week, and that's it. I don't flip channels or browse, and all of the tv watching I do now is via Tivo. Therefore, for me it makes logical sense to ditch the cable if I can replace it with a much cheaper a la carte system.

 

[slackerinabox]

^^ Good point, and for you the best investment is cable, satellite, U-Verse, or FIOS. My whole thing is that I only watch about 2 or 3 shows per week, and that's it. I don't flip channels or browse, and all of the tv watching I do now is via Tivo. Therefore, for me it makes logical sense to ditch the cable if I can replace it with a much cheaper a la carte system.

What do you use for broadband? If cable, then get a bundle - $29 per service, and a landline is nice to have. Fios isn't available where I am nor is Cable modem (which is absurd in NYC), so I use DSL (ugh) and Dishnetwork - $40 a moth including showtime, which isn't a bad deal at all.. I'm at their silver tier, but could even ditch that if I didn't watch Bravo as much as I do.

If your cable bill is too much call your cable company. Trim services or threaten to quit and see if they're offer you something.. Don't be a dick about it, just say "I can't really afford this expense, is there anything that can be done to bring down costs?" If that doesn't work, say that Fios looks mighty tempting.

As for having a HTPC for watching Torrented TV. I do that for HBO because paying $$ a month for one show (Curb your enthusiasm) was getting silly.. I suggest setting up one computer that you already have as a server (install playon for netflix streaming and hulu) plus either an xbox 360 or a WD Live (asus o!play is what I have).

If you've got your heart set on an actual PC, sure, a mac mini would work, but you would have to jump through some hoops for live tv. EyeTV works, or you can install windows 7 on there.. Apple TV + Boxee is a good and cheap solution ($150 refurb), but no live tv. The new dell seems pretty well suited, but I'm wairy about those (the mac mini would have the same concern) because I've had awful luck with USB atsc tuners. If you do get the dell, you realllly should get the HD-homerun.. The hd-homerun does technically work with OS X, but you need to do some wacky work arounds and the experience is far from seemless..

My advice would be to go with subscription tv + a set top box for pulling in online content. Keep the pc (any pc) in a place where the wires and noise doesn't really matter.. I upgraded the HTPC in my bedroom with a quad core processor and, with the stock fan, it sounds like a helicopter's hovering above our bed. Sure, I can replace the fan.. But that's the thing with HTPC building - I found myself ALWAYS upgrading something..

 

[Kadarin]

FWIW, tonight I picked up a Denon AVR-890 (to replace the Yamaha RX-V995 that dates back 9 years and doesn't offer HDMI switching) and a Mac Mini. I'll let this thread know how it all turns out.

 

[kalrith]

Yep, if you never watch tv in the first place, sure, an HTPC will fit your TV watching needs.. Why am I the only person who sees the irony with that statement?

To us, tv is like junk food.. Junk food is easily accessible, requires very little actual work, and always there.. Would you travel 20 miles for some twinkies? Not unless I'm in Zombieland... TV to us is best when it's there, easy to use, and requires little thought on our part besides hitting GUIDE or DVR. Sometimes you want to watch a particular show, and torrents/Hulu work ok for that...But sometimes you just want to passively flip through the channels to catch the odd episode of Bridezilla or some goofy VH1 behind the music docu. Ever try just browsing hulu without a set destination? It's frustrating because you end up looking through thousands of shows you've never heard of.. Then you just settle on watching Alf.. Then you wonder why the fuck you're watching Alf, and wish you had real tv...

In fact, after our adventures in HTPC, we've changed our sat boxes label on our harmony to REAL TV..

You seemed to not get the point of my previous statement, so I'll point it out again:

Even when I watched a ton of TV, about 70% of it was network TV. So, I was paying almost $1000/year for 30% of what I watched, and 90% of that 30% is available for free online without pirating.

For my wife and me, the only content we can't get is What Not to Wear on TLC (my wife's show, not mine) and FSN (we would watch about 3 games per year on that channel). Everything else that we watched while paying a lot for DirecTV we can still watch via OTA, internet streaming, or the occasional torrent download.

You say I "never watch TV." I don't see where you get that from. I'm really busy at this point in my life, and while I don't watch much TV, I watch some. My wife watches more. 70% of what I watch is network TV that we record on the HTPC. I didn't realize that network TV was not TV. Most of the rest we stream online. I also didn't realize that that wasn't TV. In about a month I'll be done with a project that's taking up 20+ hours per week and watch a lot more TV. Even if I were to watch 20 hours of TV per week, 70% of it would be recorded on my HTPC, 20% would be streamed or downloaded, and 10% (at most) would be unavailable (legally) with my current setup. I don't see how any of that says I "never watch TV." All it says is that 90+% of my TV can be had for free, and I don't want to spend $1,000 per year for the other 10%.

When I had my DirecTV DVR, I would hit Watch TV on my Harmony Remote and hit Guide to be at the guide. With my HTPC, I hit Watch TV on my Harmony Remote and hit Guide to be at the guide. Yes, I see now how much harder that is :awe:.

And even with a bazillion channels on DirecTV, I would go through the guide to set everything to tape, and then only watched taped content later. I hate channel surfing. I do the same thing with my HTPC, other than the little that I stream online, but all of that (except for espn360) is sitting there waiting for when I want to watch it.

What I want is different than what others want. I'm not a TV junky. I don't think, "I want to veg in front of the TV," and then spend an hour torrenting or searching on Hulu (or surfing channels when I had DirecTV) trying to find something to fill the time. I decide what I want to watch in advance, and only watch those things and wait until they're recorded/downloaded to watch them. I know that's different from others, but to make a statement like I "never watch TV" is ignorant of everything I've posted so far.

I understand where you're coming from, and what you want out of TV. Hopefully, at least the other posters in the thread understand where I'm coming from. I'm not trying to preach to anyone or change their minds. I'm just trying to post my situation, and I'd appreciate it if people actually read my posts before making assertations that go contrary to what I post. If you can't do that, then you shouldn't be responding.

 

[slackerinabox]

You seemed to not get the point of my previous statement, so I'll point it out again:



You say I "never watch TV." I don't see where you get that from. I'm really busy at this point in my life, and while I don't watch much TV, I watch some. My wife watches more. 70% of what I watch is network TV that we record on the HTPC. I didn't realize that network TV was not TV. Most of the rest we stream online. I also didn't realize that that wasn't TV. In about a month I'll be done with a project that's taking up 20+ hours per week and watch a lot more TV. Even if I were to watch 20 hours of TV per week, 70% of it would be recorded on my HTPC, 20% would be streamed or downloaded, and 10% (at most) would be unavailable (legally) with my current setup. I don't see how any of that says I "never watch TV." All it says is that 90+% of my TV can be had for free, and I don't want to spend $1,000 per year for the other 10%.

When I had my DirecTV DVR, I would hit Watch TV on my Harmony Remote and hit Guide to be at the guide. With my HTPC, I hit Watch TV on my Harmony Remote and hit Guide to be at the guide. Yes, I see now how much harder that is :awe:.

And even with a bazillion channels on DirecTV, I would go through the guide to set everything to tape, and then only watched taped content later. I hate channel surfing. I do the same thing with my HTPC, other than the little that I stream online, but all of that (except for espn360) is sitting there waiting for when I want to watch it.

What I want is different than what others want. I'm not a TV junky. I don't think, "I want to veg in front of the TV," and then spend an hour torrenting or searching on Hulu (or surfing channels when I had DirecTV) trying to find something to fill the time. I decide what I want to watch in advance, and only watch those things and wait until they're recorded/downloaded to watch them. I know that's different from others, but to make a statement like I "never watch TV" is ignorant of everything I've posted so far.

I understand where you're coming from, and what you want out of TV. Hopefully, at least the other posters in the thread understand where I'm coming from. I'm not trying to preach to anyone or change their minds. I'm just trying to post my situation, and I'd appreciate it if people actually read my posts before making assertations that go contrary to what I post. If you can't do that, then you shouldn't be responding.

Wow, you take this shit WAY too fucking seriously...

 

[kalrith]

Wow, you take this shit WAY too fucking seriously...

meh...I've got nothing better to do at work 🙂

 

[slackerinabox]

You seemed to not get the point of my previous statement, so I'll point it out again:



You say I "never watch TV." I don't see where you get that from. I'm really busy at this point in my life, and while I don't watch much TV, I watch some. My wife watches more. 70% of what I watch is network TV that we record on the HTPC. I didn't realize that network TV was not TV. Most of the rest we stream online. I also didn't realize that that wasn't TV. In about a month I'll be done with a project that's taking up 20+ hours per week and watch a lot more TV. Even if I were to watch 20 hours of TV per week, 70% of it would be recorded on my HTPC, 20% would be streamed or downloaded, and 10% (at most) would be unavailable (legally) with my current setup. I don't see how any of that says I "never watch TV." All it says is that 90+% of my TV can be had for free, and I don't want to spend $1,000 per year for the other 10%.

When I had my DirecTV DVR, I would hit Watch TV on my Harmony Remote and hit Guide to be at the guide. With my HTPC, I hit Watch TV on my Harmony Remote and hit Guide to be at the guide. Yes, I see now how much harder that is :awe:.

And even with a bazillion channels on DirecTV, I would go through the guide to set everything to tape, and then only watched taped content later. I hate channel surfing. I do the same thing with my HTPC, other than the little that I stream online, but all of that (except for espn360) is sitting there waiting for when I want to watch it.

What I want is different than what others want. I'm not a TV junky. I don't think, "I want to veg in front of the TV," and then spend an hour torrenting or searching on Hulu (or surfing channels when I had DirecTV) trying to find something to fill the time. I decide what I want to watch in advance, and only watch those things and wait until they're recorded/downloaded to watch them. I know that's different from others, but to make a statement like I "never watch TV" is ignorant of everything I've posted so far.

I understand where you're coming from, and what you want out of TV. Hopefully, at least the other posters in the thread understand where I'm coming from. I'm not trying to preach to anyone or change their minds. I'm just trying to post my situation, and I'd appreciate it if people actually read my posts before making assertations that go contrary to what I post. If you can't do that, then you shouldn't be responding.

meh...I've got nothing better to do at work 🙂

Not everything's a debate, ya know. 😉

 

[kalrith]

Not everything's a debate, ya know. 😉

Oh, yes it is, and I can prove it (goes to spend hours gathering sources for this newly spun debate).

 

[Sheep]

Let me preface this by saying I veg out in front of my OTA, HTPC-enabled HDTV or Xbox 360 ALL THE TIME.

I'm not sure why some of you are trying to justify paying for cable TV when the OP has indicated that he doesn't feel paying for cable content is worth it when 70% of his viewing is broadcast stuff. That's a perfectly reasonable stance.

I ditched cable when I moved across the country and into my own place and haven't missed it at all, much to my surprise. Since I updated my PC to include a Win7 DVR, my Bittorrent use has dropped DRAMATICALLY, now being pretty much limited to BBC shows that won't show up in the U.S. for another year or so, if ever. I don't miss the cable content one bit considering I watch mostly broadcast shows and can still get 9-12 hours of my NFL fix weekly with just CBS, Fox and NBC.

Of all people, I shouldn't be the one to pull out the "Wow, some people's lives really DO revolve around TV" card, but that's the impression I get reading through this thread.

 

[slackerinabox]

Let me preface this by saying I veg out in front of my OTA, HTPC-enabled HDTV or Xbox 360 ALL THE TIME.

I'm not sure why some of you are trying to justify paying for cable TV when the OP has indicated that he doesn't feel paying for cable content is worth it when 70% of his viewing is broadcast stuff. That's a perfectly reasonable stance.

I ditched cable when I moved across the country and into my own place and haven't missed it at all, much to my surprise. Since I updated my PC to include a Win7 DVR, my Bittorrent use has dropped DRAMATICALLY, now being pretty much limited to BBC shows that won't show up in the U.S. for another year or so, if ever. I don't miss the cable content one bit considering I watch mostly broadcast shows and can still get 9-12 hours of my NFL fix weekly with just CBS, Fox and NBC.

Of all people, I shouldn't be the one to pull out the "Wow,some people's lives really DO revolve around TV" card, but that's the impression I get reading through this thread.

See, if you change your viewing habits (stop watching cable shows and change to watching broadcast shows), it's a breeze. I like Show X but, youre not giving up a thing if you stop watching Show X! That's the problem, you have to compromise somehow.. Then I realized I'm not poor and can afford to pay for tv.

 

[kalrith]

I just realized on Saturday that I can watch pretty much any sports game on Justin TV. The (abysmal) OU-Texas-Tech game was on FSN on Saturday, but we had no problems watching it for free on Justin TV. Sports on cable channels was really the last thing that kept me paying so much for DirecTV with the Sports Pack. It was great to get all those sports channels, but if I can get them all for free, then that's just one more nail in the coffin for paying for TV (for me, at least).

 

[sdifox]

I am off pay tv now. I watch as much tv as before I dropped cable... Almost no tv 🙂

I watch the occational hockey games on OTA, but since the Leafs suck worse than usual, I don't even bother.

 

[Knavish]

So here are my questions:

Has anyone done this and been happy with the results?
How do you get free content (i.e. Hulu, etc.) to display fullscreen in high resolution?
Should I get a separate computer to connect to the tv? (i.e. a Mac Mini, or Dell Zino?)

For the most part I don't watch live sporting events, so that and local programming isn't an issue.

Thoughts?

I ditched cable about ~18 months ago. I'm happy with it. I'm sure if I was a bigger sports fan, it would have been harder. I tend to only watch sports in-person or with friends (like at a sports bar), so it's no big deal to me. I use Netflix & Hulu with a little downloading when absolutely necessary. There really are *very* few shows that I want to watch that aren't available legally. I can't channel-surf just to veg out / waste time anymore, but that's a good thing. I can always surf the net instead. Now I get pretty frustrated with insane amount of commercials whenever I watch broadcast / cable tv.

Hulu should display fine as long as you can connect your computer to your TV. If you want to scale Hulu to a 1080p tv you'll need a fast dual core or a quad core, at least until they come out with hardware accelerated flash.

 

[Kadarin]

I ditched cable about ~18 months ago. I'm happy with it. I'm sure if I was a bigger sports fan, it would have been harder. I tend to only watch sports in-person or with friends (like at a sports bar), so it's no big deal to me. I use Netflix & Hulu with a little downloading when absolutely necessary. There really are *very* few shows that I want to watch that aren't available legally. I can't channel-surf just to veg out / waste time anymore, but that's a good thing. I can always surf the net instead. Now I get pretty frustrated with insane amount of commercials whenever I watch broadcast / cable tv.

Hulu should display fine as long as you can connect your computer to your TV. If you want to scale Hulu to a 1080p tv you'll need a fast dual core or a quad core, at least until they come out with hardware accelerated flash.

It's all hooked up and working now, with the only issue being the tv's weird 1024x1080 native resolution that the Mac Mini doesn't support. The closest is 720p, where the text is clear but the desktop extends past the screen's ability to show it. Otherwise, Boxee on the Mac does a fine job with Hulu feeds, and iTunes content works great. Hulu at this resolution looks like standard def tv, and displays without artifacting or stuttering.

I can VNC into it from my MacBook Pro, so it's just a cosmetic issue. Currently, I have the Mini, a PS3, and a Tivo Series 3 all hooked into the Denon via HDMI, with a single HDMI out to the tv. The Comcast and Tivo subscriptions are going to go away. The Tivo device itself might remain, as even without a subscription I might be able to use it to access Amazon VoD. Then again, I might drop the Tivo in favor of a Roku, if it uses less power.

@freedomsbeat: I'm not poor either, and I'm perfectly capable of paying the cable bill. For me it's a matter of principle in that I don't want to pay Comcast a monthly fee if I don't have to.