Update 11/16/10: New Blog Post about 2 months after we got rid of cable.
When we got married and for the first five years of marriage, we didn’t have cable. We just had rabbit ears to watch the networks. We weren’t that big into watching TV for we would mainly watch movies on DVD. There was several times during our marriage that we considered getting cable but it always was around the time that we visited Jennifer’s family where the TV is on all waking hours. We watched so much TV that it burnt us out.
When we moved to OKC, one of the agreements with us moving was to start getting cable with Jennifer staying at home and Lily about to be born. So the past year, we have had cable with DVR and internet through AT&T Uverse. We love it. It helped so much especially when Lily was born and up at all times to watch something on the DVR while rocking Lily. We have recorded many movies that have been on, reruns of TV shows; it has made it that we rarely ever watch live TV. It really helps with sports for I will watch a football game in an hour & a half (it irritates family how fast I go through games).
But we are considering scaling back when we move. We currently have 200+ channels and watch probably a handful. We still prefer watching movies, but we have grown to love DVR. Most of the shows we watch or on a network or easily on the internet. Plus the aspect of saving $50+ a month seems like a good idea.
We are still trying to decide, but what we are thinking is that we will get rid of Uverse and get Cox Internet. But we love DVR so probably buy a TiVo HD DVR. It will cost some upfront to make this change, but it will pay for itself in a few months with savings. I already have all of the equipment for Cox Internet. We would keep our Netflix which we can stream through our Blu-Ray player. Also for sports, if it isn’t on a network, I should be able to watch it on ESPN3.com.
What do you suggest to us for saving money on media entertainment?
Josh
August 23, 2010 at 6:08 pm
Having been a customer of both Cox and UVerse, I can say we will never go back to cable. The internet service is inferior, the channel choices are sub-par (if you watch anything outside of TBS or broadcast stations, you’ll have to get a pricier package from Cox to get the channels you’re interested in). TiVo makes a good DVR, though. The price point between UVerse and Cox wasn’t significant enough to concern us, given Cox’s ability to tack new charges on to things (we saved I think $10 with Cox but lost over 100 channels…and yeah, we don’t watch all of them but for the superior service it was worth the increase in costs).
Michael
August 23, 2010 at 10:20 pm
We love Uverse, but have decided that we don’t want cable so we are just getting internet and would keep Uverse if we could just have internet, but you have to have a TV package as a base. Having internet is a must so if we don’t have TV service, Cox is the only option I can really think of for high speed internet. But we love DVR so we are thinking of getting TiVo.
Scott
August 23, 2010 at 6:59 pm
We only have an antenna and occasionally use hulu as a DVR. I think TiVo has a monthly fee even if you don’t have cable/satellite, so watch out for that. If you are going to watch much video online, you probably don’t want the bargain basement internet. You might end up buffering more than you like. iTunes and Amazon Video on Demand are good options if you just want to watch an episode that you missed. ESPN 3 will have a lot of college football, but still has some blackouts that might get you. I wrote about a lot of this quite awhile ago on my scottspeaksgeek.blogspot.com site if you want to check it out.
Michael
August 23, 2010 at 10:38 pm
I was planning on getting Cox’s Preferred(12mbs downstream speed). Tivo is $11/mo service, so even if I get it I’m saving over $50/month so it would pay for the Tivo within a couple months. If we had an old useful desktop computer, I would probably go the internet only option for DVR. I have the antenna that you have and like it (it just looks funny). We are pretty sure we are getting rid of cable, it’s just if I’m going to buy a Tivo or not.
Scott
August 24, 2010 at 7:09 am
We just have 1.5mbs cable, which works, but I usually quit any other program that might try to use the internet while we watch an online show. I have been pleased with that antenna, even though it gets some funny looks. If you have some channels that don’t always come in, you might look into an outdoor antenna. You can usually hook it up so it runs through the coax lines in your house. That way there’s no indoor antenna and a secondary tv wouldn’t need an antenna either.
Michael
August 24, 2010 at 9:10 am
The good thing is that we live in Edmond not Centerton so it is less than 7 miles to all station towers. The antenna site was saying that just a small antenna works.
Frankie
August 23, 2010 at 10:43 pm
If you just want Internet and don’t want cable, and if you have an iPhone, jailbreak the iPhone. It’s perfectly legal, too! I run my Internet for my house from my 3G off of my iPhone through a jail broken app called Mywi. It’s ridiculously fast, too! Just my $.02 We don’t watch tv, and if we do it’s something we watch either from a redbox movie (DVDs for our toddler) or a football game over at my parents
Michael
August 23, 2010 at 11:00 pm
I don’t have an iPhone, but next year we will be getting phones and that might come into play with what we get whether iPhone or Android. It’s a little too far to stop by parents to watch the football game (5-8 hours driving). Thanks for your comment!