Yeah, we know.... there are a lot of you out there that already do this. But if you gasped at the thought of living life without cable television (or satellite TV, if that's your persuasion), we're setting out to prove to you that there is life after cable.
We're not talking about turning off your TV and setting it on the curb. There are plenty of media alternatives to the cable box and we're ditching ours. We think we'll survive, all without missing a single episode of Grey's Anatomy. Step one of this process, figuring out your current media setup and what you may need to augment your system.
This is the first in a series of three posts dedicated to life without cable television. Check out Part 2 and Part 3.
The first question you may want to ask yourself is, what can my TV do without cable? Of course, you can always use an antenna to pick up local channels. (Find out how good the signal is in your neighborhood at TV Fool.) If you've got a clunky, old analog television, it's not going to work much longer, and you're going to have to do something about this anyways. So, without cable, you may have to get yourself a digital or HD tuner in order to get the local programming you want.
But, if you're not interested in having a TV (like us), a second consideration is watching television via your computer. However, this scenario requires a bit more planning, and probably buying some new gear. Your system will depend on your needs, but we'll walk you through some of the questions that you need to ask yourself before you consider unplugging the television. Here's what questions first popped into our minds when we considered it:
Can my computer handle it?
Think about how your computer handles online media, such as YouTube and flash websites, if you're struggling to watch something simple, then there's no way you can sit through a streaming television show. Our rule of thumb is that if it's older than two years, or has less than 512MB of RAM, you're going to have to do some upgrading.
Is my display pretty enough?
This isn't as crucial as one might think, watching television on an old LCD monitor wont feel much different than watching your old analog TV. If quality is important to you, consider buying yourself a newer LCD monitor (Dell, Apple, and Samsung all offer good options). If you do enough thinking ahead of time, you could have a nice display share work and play roles. However, even the most expensive display won't make a Youtube video look like a DVD.
Oh great, another Windows-only service.
Other factors to keep in mind are your operating system and internet speed. Neither of these will keep you from watching, but they may limit your options. We'll talk about this more when we discuss the actual Internet-based TV options.
I don't know if I can do this.
If you're not willing to cut the cord completely, there are a plethora of third-party devices that will bridge the gap between the computer and your TV. From the Slingbox to the Apple TV, there are plenty of ways to modernize your media watching.
Thanks to Marco Wessel, jGregor, Andrew Coulter Enright, and Gerard Yates for the photo.
What's wrong with cable? I think this series needs an introduction explaining why we should consider not having it.
Otherwise, very interesting.
view shani-o's profile
Or you know, you just download the shows you want using bittorrent. Just putting the option out there.
view Jabber's profile
You can also get a cable that goes from the computer to the TV and just watch whatever on the TV.
Also, Joost is out of beta now.
view jennifer in sf's profile
If you like sports, going without cable or satellite is not an option, unless you want to live at a sports bar all the time.
view EastVillageAmy's profile
In regard to what's wrong with cable, where I live, basic cable runs around $60.00 a month. Screw that! I'll stick with my computer and a Netflix subscription.
view spinsLPs's profile
EVAmy, these days most sports are streamed online (for a fee). We live in Australia and my partner is the biggest Red Sox fan on the planet. We don't have cable, but even if we did, we wouldn't be able to get baseball anyway. So for $90 something per year, he can get every MLB game streamed live. He hooks the computer up to the TV and watches every game he can. The quality isn't the best, but it's pretty good, considering.
As for TV shows, we buy or borrow DVDs of shows and watch them in our free time. The past few months we watched the first 6 seasons of the Sopranos. Much better than watching one episode a week for 6 years!
There is so much junk on cable TV I figure, why bother? I've actually never had cable in my entire life. There are ways of selectively watching what you want to watch when you want to watch it. One of my co-workers downloads everything he wants to watch and loads it onto his apple TV. The only thing he watches live is sports.
view stoat's profile
Another vote for an explanation of why it's so important to not have cable when you want television shows in the first place, please!
For those of us with cable internet, bundling it with cable TV is usually a better deal than tying ourselves in knots to find a substitute. (And EastVillageAmy is right -- I can't imagine how else we'd get the Tour de France.)
The joy of Slingbox is that you don't need a physical television -- it allows your live cable TV outlet to talk to your computer over your wifi network. No cords to tether you!
view wende in phoenix's profile
I've been trying to sort out this very issue. Ever since I got my HDTV, I realized I now watch almost all of my shows over digital broadcast and only use the cable to tivo. If I could find a way to tivo from digital broadcast, I could drop cable entirely. Some options that have popped up recently: Tivo has just introduced an hd dvr and elgato has some hardware to add an atsc tuner and dvr functionality to your mac.
I think my first effort is going to be to add television functionality to my bedroom mac and use it as my bedroom tv. If that works out, I plan to cut the cable in the livingroom, add a mac mini with dvr functionality, and do away entirely with tivo subscription fees, cable fees, and (as a bonus) add internet to the livingroom via network. Thats the plan, at least. Can't wait to read more in this series.
view RichardinLA's profile
I had an incredible deal on the cadillac of cable for a while - about $20 a month for 6 months, then it went up a little for another 6 months. I had ALL the stations, digital, plus On-Demand. Then, the prices started going up and I kept calling them to get better deals. I finally got tired of all that, the prices were creeping up, and I was watching way too much mindless tv and channel surfing. So, I changed the cable to basic, which was worse than no TV. Finally, I got rid of my TV late last year. I LOVE not having a TV. I get a lot more stuff done that is more meaningful to me--like reading--than mindless channel-surfing. And it freed up a huge amount of space in my apartment. I do a couple of Netflix DVDs a month on my computer now.
Occasionally, I'll hear about a TV show that I'd love to check out, but I've never had a good experience watching whole TV shows on my laptop. I watched something just a week or two ago on NBC and it was horrible - the show was broken up into three chunks with waves of commercials in between and it just didn't work right on my 3-year old Mac Powerbook. It kept freezing and crashing and I finally gave up after the first third of the show.
TV shows are going to all be on the internet soon -- the TV world is finally realizing that they have to do that. I would like the option to watch if I want to and figure out how to get it to work right. So, I very much appreciate this thread!
view Pixie's profile
I have cable for one or two channels - these are the things I watch:
Survivorman
The Food Network - although there are plenty of shows I could do with out, i.e. Rachel Ray, and anything having to do with Paula Deen, y'all - I live in Alabama, and do not talk like that.
MythBusters
Law&ORDER - which I actually don't watch on TV anymore because I've seen them all, and have started to buy the DVDS
Adult Swim - this one is the main reason why I have a hard time cutting of cable. I don't want to buy all my shows - Futurama, Harvey Birdman, The Venture Brothers, but I don't like Family Guy anymore, and I can't stand the Anime they have on there now (yes, I am a fan of Anime, but I own all the ones I like).
So, if someone can tell me a way to still be able to enjoy these shows, for cheaper than $33 a month (bundled with internet, $67.88/mo), and without having to buy a new tv, I would LOVE to know how, because just having all those other channels, I get sucked into crappy Lifetime movies and other HGTV shows I don't need to be watching.
view elizabeth in AL's profile
I cut TV 6 months ago and switched to netflix. Originally it was to cut a cost, and since all the shows I liked on HBO had wrapped up, it didnt seem worth it any more. TV is such a habit. Its on, you sit for a minute to watch whatever junk your roommate/boyfriend/whoever happens to have flicked on and before you know it you've watched 3 shows and 34 commercials, the laundry is still in the basket and that bookmark is still on page 5 of the great book you want to read. I really love not having TV. In the last 6 months I've concieved and executed more home improvements projects than in the last 4 years....
The only think I miss is entourage. I'm seriously behind on that one...but it'll come out on DVD eventually....
view Clairepetrol's profile
RichardinLA: A Tivo HD will record off of broadcast HD.
view Doug in DC's profile