apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

I've gone without cable for over 10 years now, just using a cheapie antenna which gets PBS fine. Netflix and Library DVD's keep me occupied, and I can always rent or buy many of my favorite shows on DVD. I would consider cable if I could menu select HGTV, and not have to pay for all the other crap channels. Is there anything like Joost for non-intel based macs?

I've never had cable, unless you count when I stay in hotel rooms.

As etslee said- netflix and the library provide you with all the movies and television show episodes you could ever want, and then some.

Good-ol' rabbit ear antennae work fine for getting network broadcasts. I've rarely found myself wishing I had cable. There is the odd broadcast which I do wish to watch at airtime, but usually there is an accomidating bar which will put it on, or I can go online and watch it there.

I've never really understood paying extra money for all those channels, most of which you don't watch, and which still are full of commericals. If it were commerial free, perhaps.

Has anyone had any luck with sports packages? We really only have cable right now so we can be sure to watch our favorite basketball team (Go, Spurs, Go) while we live in Chicago. Even though comcast's sports package includes the games over a feed on the internet, you still have to have cable in order to access those games. Any ideas?

You can enjoy tv without the subscription, you know. You can buy a box to get Free to Air channels from all over. Of course, there's always hacks to get other channels, but that's illegal.

I must strongly beg to differ with you guys about "Joost". I had it for about an hour before I dumped it off my computer in disgust. I saw an unending steady stream of profanity, sacrilege, blood, and even more commercials than on mainstream TV. What a disappointment. A real bust. Frankly, who needs it?!?

If this represents our society - we are truly mired in deep do-do.

Windwolf

Good-ol' rabbit ear antennae work fine for getting network broadcasts.

I'm trying to remember the last time I lived somewhere that rabbit ears provided better than a colorful, flickering blur. I'm sure there are regions where they're great, but even growing up in the flat Central Valley, life before cable required a big tall antenna on the roof, plus a rotor to adjust the antenna to catch the broadcasts.

We've tried rabbit ears sporadically in most places we've lived, and the results have been acceptable only if you're going low-tech to make an ideological point.

I'm at my wits end with Time Warner, but I've got tons of questions about making the switch! If you aren't getting internet access through your cable provider, who else provides fast enough internet access to allow for video streaming?

Living on the first floor of a NYC walk-up, what are my options as far as digital antennas or a dish? Do these always have to go on the roof? Do they have to wire them down to each apartment? I'm clueless when it comes to all of this stuff!

Darlyn -- Start by talking with your phone company. Phone and cable companies increasingly compete by bundling the same services, so it's possible that your phone company will not only offer internet access (you'll need DSL for adequate speed) but also some form of TV. Out here, Qwest has an agreement to bundle DirecTV (satellite).

Most ISPs offer DSL these days, so you can Google for ones in your area and get all sorts of choices.

For satellite placement, you need to ask the satellite company what they recommend for NYC. Where I live, it works fine to just put the satellite on the patio -- and even in San Francisco, you commonly saw satellite dishes clamped to balconies. But some Manhattan neighborhoods have much higher buildings at greater density than was the case in SF.

Thanks Wende! I actually don't have a home phone, but I'll look to see who the local provider is.

Cable was one of the first things to go when I had to cut living expenses last fall while closing a business and job hunting. I had HBO, digital cable with lots of "On Demand" programming, DVR and quite a few of the extra channels. I discovered that I could keep up with most of my favorite shows with internet video streaming, and accepted that the ones that weren't available online would eventually be available on DVD.

I did keep basic cable--not what most cable companies call "basic" cable, which tends to still offer 40-60 channels and cost $40 a month, but the truly basic cable that essentially allows you to watch network channels and maybe CNN for around $13 a month. I find, however, that I watch almost everything online. Since quite a few of my favorite shows last season were cancelled but available for streaming, that worked out fine. I wouldn't even bother with cable except that my internet service is through my cable provider, and the combo is still the best deal financially.

I agree, ABC's online content works the best (and I like that it waits for you to click to return to the show after a commercial break so you don't miss anything or have to back track the feed). I eventually got NBC's interface to work, and this summer when nothing new was on, I wound up discovering a couple new shows that I loved that I probably wouldn't have otherwise watched ("Friday Night Lights" and "The Black Donnellys"). FOX's content worked pretty well when on MySpace but its new FOX on Demand still has some bugs. CBS is my least favorite for streaming, though it has improved from last year, when videos would skip ahead a chapter or two after commercial breaks.

I now have resumed my Netflix subscription but I found that with a little patience, I could get almost all TV shows that I wanted to watch on DVD through my local library.

This is a great thread! I've been without cable and internet for 2 1/2 months now and have researched most of what's listed above. Except for I guess the most obvious: an antenna - which might be my solution. I'm looking at this one:

http://www.crutchfield.com/S-ivTEpcQRvrR/App/Product/Item/Main.aspx?g=15920&i=209HDTVI&search=hdtv antenna&tp=3261

Does anyone have experience with it? I'll be connecting it to an Aquos HDTV.

I can't stream through my computer because I canceled my internet - it was bundled through my cable company and I refuse to pay $70 for internet alone. My cable signal was horrible, I had a blue screen more often than a picture!

But like someone said above, I love how much more stuff I've gotten done around the house, including reading, in the past 2 months!

2T--I don't know about that specific antenna, but I've been using a $10 cheapie I found at Ace Hardware for the past nine months and get all of the local OTA analog/digital/HD channels.

My experience with the antenna and HDTV is pretty much that the signal is there or it's not--if you like the aesthetic of that particular antenna, great. If you want to save some money, cheaper ones work just as well. The most important thing is knowing your location relative to the transmitters and how to position your antenna to get the most channels you can.

This website is very helpful for that:
http://antennaweb.org/aw/welcome.aspx

guys - turned off my cable in order to have a landline - we get NO service in our apt and i would hate to have to go OUTSIDE and call 911 if someone was trying to get IN...so now we have internet and phone for the same price as internet and cable (still too much for me) but i'll be getting SO much more done around the house. i just bought the survivorman dvds, as well as the 2nd season of the Venture Brothers, and I already have a couple, oh hundred, episodes of law and order. i'll really miss the food network, though. but i'm excited because i really do just come home and want to turn on the boobtube because i'm so tired. i'll bet i won't be that tired if i could just avoid turning it on "oh while i eat dinner...or fold clothes..." i'm excited, and a little scared at the same time. although, i didn't have a tv period when i was in france, so i don't know what i'm worried about...

I am considering getting rid of cable right now. Actually I am thinking of just getting the basic service that is 14 bucks a month. My main HDTV has a digital tuner and my bedroom TV does not. I don't want to deal with getting a converter box for the bedroom TV so I am going with the cheapest cable plan that is just the broadcast channels HD and standard definition. I do watch a few shows on cable but not that many that I would miss them or not be able to find them using other means. I have a Netflix plan like most suggested here. I also just got the Roku box for streaming the Netflix and it is great, totally worth the 100 bucks to augment your Netflix plan. The selection isn't the best right now, but it is expanding every day. It is small and easy to move around if you have extra sets of AV cables so you don't have to keep unplugging them. I am doing this to save money and pay off debt. Changing my plan to the 15 dollar plan saves me 50 bucks a month on my cable bill that can go to other sources.

Cheaper cable!!! Few people know they can get seasonal rates in many areas.. We do this in NY and MN.. We call the cable company and get VACATION svc for our home in NY from Oct to May when we are in another city (MN) all the same services for $15 a month for cable and internet, VS $95 a month when in season.. We do the same in MN.. WE do it legit as we do travel. but sometimes use our home in the off seasonal period and everything still works as usual. HINT!!! You must have another billing address in another location state for this to happen.

I also watch ALMOST all HGTV shows online free:

I recently came back to NY for 3 weeks to do an apt reno and had no tv in the apt.. so I have been catching up on all my HGTV shows ..
Happy Watching -

http://www.findinternettv.com/index,direct,2894.aspx

here are ALL SHOWS available free!!!

http://www.findinternettv.com/FullEpisodes.aspx