# Tivo vs. Hopper



## garyflet (Aug 30, 2013)

We're thinking of getting DISH but wondering if buying the lifetime Tivo might be better than going with the Hopper. We hate subscriptions. Although being able to record 2000 hours on the Hopper is better than 75 on the Tivo, how many shows can you watch? Also the monthly fees on the Hopper plus Joey go up $12/month for a second TV. But we haven't tried either interface. Any thoughts, opinions?


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

TiVos aren't limited to 75 hours. The new Roamio Pro has 6 tuners and can record 475 hour of HD and over 4000 hours of SD.

If you're comparing to the Hopper then you really want to look at either the Roamio Plus or the Pro. They are identical except that the Plus has a 1TB drive (150 hours HD, 1300 SD) and the Pro has a 3TB drive. The Plus is $399 + service and the Pro is $599 + service.

Lifetime service on either box will be $499. So for a Pro with lifetime you're looking at spending $1,100 up front. But once you do there are no more monthly fees and the TiVo will retain a lot of it's value if you ever decide to upgrade or move to a different product. If you'd rather pay monthly the fee is $14.95/mo and there is a 1 year contract with a $75 early termination fee.

To expand to other rooms TiVo sells the TiVo Mini. These cost $99 and have the option of lifetime service for $149 or monthly service for $5.95/mo.

You'll have to compare those prices, plus the cost of cable in your area, to what you'd be paying Dish for a Hopper and see if it's worth it to you.


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## SeaFractor (Apr 16, 2013)

Just an important note, Tivo won't record the Satellite TV signals directly from Dish Network.

So it's a choice of OTA or Cable TV with Tivo versus DishNetwork with Hopper.

In addition, a life time subscription may be less of a deal that previously thought. The life time is for the life of that device. Unless you purchase a hardware warranty, or continue to pay for warranty service from Tivo, you'll find that when that device "dies", so does your lifetime subscription.

Besides, a number of Premiere owners, myself included, are not happy that there are several software bugs still waiting to be resolved, that maybe/maybe not fixed now that the Roamio has been released.

I personally will hold onto the Premier and hope that the issues are resolved, but I'll be a fool if I purchase a Roamio and lifetime subscription after how I've been treated.

Personally, other than the high price of the service, the hardware worked as advertised when I was on Dish. I'm glad I cut the cord and saved $80.00 per month and only do OTA TV with Netflix supplementation (which hangs after watching a show and requires that I press Tivo to return home and then launch the app again, lame!)

If the Dish PalDVR http://www.avsforum.com/t/1099071/the-official-avs-dish-dtvpal-dvr-topic still existed, I'd cut Tivo's plug too.


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

You're a perfect candidate for the Roamio Basic. You can get one with lifetime for $600. ($199 + $399MSD) You can then sell your current TiVo for $300-$350 and only be out of pocket $250-$300. With Roamio you get 4 tuners for OTA and a Netflix app that actually works and is not dog slow. Plus you have the option of expanding with the TiVo Mini.

The Premiere is a piece of crap, and a serious black mark on TiVo's history. If it's the only TiVo you've ever owned then I'm sorry. You picked the wrong generation to join the TiVolution. I've only had my Roamio for a couple days, but it is everything the Premiere should have been. It's fast and usable and actually capable of fulfilling TiVo's "one box" claim.

If I were you I'd sell my Premiere now while prices are still relatively high and get a Roamio. If you're still p*ssed off about it a year from now you can sell it and walk away with a profit.


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

SeaFractor said:


> In addition, a life time subscription may be less of a deal that previously thought. The life time is for the life of that device. Unless you purchase a hardware warranty, or continue to pay for warranty service from Tivo, you'll find that when that device "dies", so does your lifetime subscription.


This has always been true. I have even had a S3 OLED lifetime die(*), but I still would always 'gamble' on lifetime subscription.. Because it virtually always pays for itself, when compared to monthly costs (and/or monthly costs of a cable DVR), amortized over several years... or resale value.

(*) I probably should have called up Tivo at the time and tried to get it fixed/discounted lifetime transfer to a new box, but at the time I wanted to try to recover the shows on the drive (which also died, but powers up -- i.e. I think it might be the controller card). i.e. it wasn't just the power supply, unfortunately.


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## mntvjunkie (May 13, 2009)

I'd recommend the 3 year warranty from Tivo if you go the lifetime route. In 3 years, your lifetime is paid for vs going monthly, so any month of service after that is money in your pocket. 

I had a Series 1, which only lasted about 4 years. My series 2 was finally retired after 6, and my HD is going on 5. I didn't pay for lifetime service until the Tivo HD, and my break even INCLUDING the box was at about the 40 month mark, so the last year and a half have been "free" vs paying monthly. And if I considered the cable company DVR, my break even was at 34 months, so almost 2 years have been "free" assuming I don't sell or use my Tivo HD once the Roamio gets here on Friday.


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## shwru980r (Jun 22, 2008)

If you use Tivo to cut the cord, then I would apply the cable bill savings to the cost of the Tivo as well. You can probably pay off a Lifetime Tivo in less than a year with the cable bill savings alone.


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## AdamNJ (Aug 22, 2013)

one important thing to note here...
The dish hopper is advertised as though it has 6 tuners, "record up to six shows". It doesn't. It only has 3. The six shows at once is only because with "primetime anytime" enabled it uses 1 tuner to record the grouped stream of the 4 local networks, cbs, nbc, fox, abc...then the hopper splits the recordings. And they onlpy hang around for 8 days i think from the ads. So that leaves 2 other tuners available for other channels. otherwise u can only record up to 3 channels at once.

Tivo Roamio can do 4 or 6 on any channel you want. As others mentioned, they only work with cable tv now (sat providers are excluded from the requirements to provide cablecards, as they are not classified as 'cable').


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## mr_smits (Dec 17, 2009)

garyflet said:


> We're thinking of getting DISH but wondering if buying the lifetime Tivo might be better than going with the Hopper. We hate subscriptions. Although being able to record 2000 hours on the Hopper is better than 75 on the Tivo, how many shows can you watch? Also the monthly fees on the Hopper plus Joey go up $12/month for a second TV. But we haven't tried either interface. Any thoughts, opinions?


The DISH Hopper Joey + Slingbox was what I had been seriously considering if Tivo hadn't released the Roamio line. After all, it did win best of 2013 at CES and caused all the CBS/CNET uproar.

People I know with DISH like it. They don't use Slingbox capabilities though. No integrated Netflix is a no-no for me.


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

I'm glad things like the Hopper and Genie exist. I think they are finally putting some pressure on TiVo to innovate. Without them we may not have some of the features in the Roamio and the upcoming out of home streaming stuff.


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## SugarBowl (Jan 5, 2007)

How does Hopper record 2,000 hours ? is that HD ?


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## CrispyCritter (Feb 28, 2001)

Dan203 said:


> I'm glad things like the Hopper and Genie exist. I think they are finally putting some pressure on TiVo to innovate. Without them we may not have some of the features in the Roamio and the upcoming out of home streaming stuff.


Yes, their existence does mean innovation. But I think it's much more that they are putting pressure on the cable companies to allow TiVo (and themselves) to innovate. TiVo actions here have always been dictated by the cable companies - TiVo won't risk legal action by the cable companies. I remain convinced that the only reason we can stream copy-protected shows is the satellite companies did it first, and so the cable companies gave the go-ahead to TiVo to do it - the original language from the cable labs consortium pretty definitely did not allow streaming except in much more controlled circumstances than exist now.


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

We could run into a similar problem when they start streaming outside the home. Some of the early testers indicated that some channels were blocked form being streamed outside the home.


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

AdamNJ said:


> one important thing to note here...
> The dish hopper is advertised as though it has 6 tuners, "record up to six shows". It doesn't. It only has 3. The six shows at once is only because with "primetime anytime" enabled it uses 1 tuner to record the grouped stream of the 4 local networks, cbs, nbc, fox, abc...then the hopper splits the recordings. And they onlpy hang around for 8 days i think from the ads.


I don't have/have never used a Hopper.. But based on reviews, you CAN "save" shows from the Primetime Anytime mega recording. But AFAIK, this is effectively manual.. the equivalent of season passes aren't smart enough to just realize "oh this is in PTA, rip it out afterwards".

Also, at least at one time, you couldn't save the show out of PTA with padding.. So with the common timeslot overruns, that may be an issue depending on what you watch. But at least the Engadget HD guy confirmed to me that Dish considered this a bug and it would hopefully be fixed.

Personally, even though I use Tivo and have cable, the vast majority of what I watch is network shows.. So I would actually love something like PTA. But will "make do" with a Roamio at some point.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

SugarBowl said:


> How does Hopper record 2,000 hours ? is that HD ?


They do use H.264 which takes up less space. But even with H.264, 2000 hours must be an SD number.


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## larrs (May 2, 2005)

Hopper is a 2TB drive so with h264 you are getting 1000 hours of content per TB, which has to be SD. Also, if you check the reviews at Amazon, you'll find they are generally not very good.

Tivo certainly has its detractors, but for ease of use, it cannot and never has been able to be beaten.


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

2TB / 2000 hours = 2.4Mbps. There is no way they could do decent HD video in 2.4Mbps, so it has to be referring to SD. My new TiVo Roamio Pro with 3TB says 470 hours of HD. Which means TiVo assumes an average bitrate of about 14Mbps for HD. Even with H.264 you typically only see a 40% savings so that would still be about 8Mbps, so a 2TB drive would only hold about 550 hours of HD.


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## FredT (Sep 27, 2013)

larrs said:


> Hopper is a 2TB drive so with h264 you are getting 1000 hours of content per TB, which has to be SD. Also, if you check the reviews at Amazon, you'll find they are generally not very good.


Apparently while the Hopper does indeed have a 2TB drive, only 1TB is available for normal recordings. The other is reserved for the primetime anytime recordings. If one doesn't use that feature, then it's effectively a three tuner 1TB box.


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## B Smooth (Jan 7, 2000)

We currently have the hopper. It has its strong points. Primetime anytime is a nice feature. There have been many times where I forgot to record something and its had my back. The hopper will also automatically skip commercials for those primetime shows (if viewing the next day). Its got slingbox built in which is also nice.

It has negative points as well (all of them do)


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## FredT (Sep 27, 2013)

B Smooth said:


> We currently have the hopper. It has its strong points. Primetime anytime is a nice feature. There have been many times where I forgot to record something and its had my back. The hopper will also automatically skip commercials for those primetime shows (if viewing the next day). Its got slingbox built in which is also nice.
> 
> It has negative points as well (all of them do)


What are some of the negative?


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## B Smooth (Jan 7, 2000)

FredT said:


> What are some of the negative?


The joey's can be a bit buggy and slow(sometimes). Playing videos off your network will be hit or miss. The UI is uneven. Some areas are fine. Some look 20 years old. I am not a fan of how it deals with conflicts or your ability to manage "season passes". We just moved to DISH from DirectTV. I would say DTV picture quality is a little better. When there is rain fade, it seems like the joey will lock up when I want to switch from live TV to a recording. I don't like having to buy additional boxes to view netflix, hulu, or HD w/DD movies.

We had Tivo many years ago and I left for DTV looking for greener pastures. When Dish is up, I'll be coming back, hoping the Roamio gets me closer to where I want to be. All three have their strengths and weaknesses.

There is sticker shock on tivo hardware, but you will get quite a bit back when you sell.


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

Did they fix the bug/feature in the hopper yet that you can't save shows with 'padding'?

In other words, Thursday NBC prime time shows need at least one minute of end padding. So if I decide to not have the equivalent of SPs for them, can I the next day 'pull out' the shows and save them WITH a minute of end padding on each?

bjdraw previously told me that they did consider this a bug, but AFAIK, it hasn't actually been fixed yet. I'm not actually going to switch to Dish anytime soon (if I could download shows to a computer and own the equipment, I would at the very least strongly consider switching BECAUSE of primetime anytime).


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

mattack said:


> Did they fix the bug/feature in the hopper yet that you can't save shows with 'padding'?
> 
> In other words, Thursday NBC prime time shows need at least one minute of end padding. So if I decide to not have the equivalent of SPs for them, can I the next day 'pull out' the shows and save them WITH a minute of end padding on each?
> 
> bjdraw previously told me that they did consider this a bug, but AFAIK, it hasn't actually been fixed yet. I'm not actually going to switch to Dish anytime soon (if I could download shows to a computer and own the equipment, I would at the very least strongly consider switching BECAUSE of primetime anytime).


I've needed zero padding here for the NBC shows on Thursday I've watched. With no padding the recordings I've watched have ended at the same time as the shows ends. Just as it fades to black, after the credits, the recording ends. And the beginning picks up the Production logo of the previous show.


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

No way.. for *years* I've had to add a minute of padding to NBC Thursday shows, or else they're cut off.. and so have zillions of others here... Maybe this year it's different.. not sure. (I may try 'backup' recordings without padding to see..)


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

mattack said:


> No way.. for *years* I've had to add a minute of padding to NBC Thursday shows, or else they're cut off.. and so have zillions of others here... Maybe this year it's different.. not sure. (I may try 'backup' recordings without padding to see..)


It really depends on where you live and how you get your TV. I am OTA only and with my Rochester NY OTA channels the only one that I have had any issue with is FOX, all the rest including Thursday NBC shows all record fine without any padding (excluding nights affected by live events like football) and this year I don't need any padding on FOX either.


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## Arcady (Oct 14, 2004)

paddle? LOL


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

Arcady said:


> paddle? LOL


 not sure if I was typing to fast or if my auto spell check got me.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

atmuscarella said:


> It really depends on where you live and how you get your TV. I am OTA only and with my Rochester NY OTA channels the only one that I have had any issue with is FOX, all the rest including Thursday NBC shows all record fine without any padding (excluding nights affected by live events like football) and this year I don't need any padding on FOX either.


I did notice a big difference when I was at my parents house recently watching a Redskins football game. I had checked out the game from my Slingbox connected to a TiVo Mini(I have FiOS). And when checking through that, I was still ahead of what was being shown at my parents house on Comcast. I was very surprised how far behind their broadcast on Comcast was since watching over Slingbox remotely already adds a good ten seconds of delay.

So I could see how a recording on NBC at my parents house would cut the ending off on the same shows I had recorded on FiOS since it is being broadcast on their Comcast feed way behind what is being broadcast on my FiOS feed. And if you are talking about two TiVos, then they should both also have the same time. So there is no question that their recordings would get cut off.


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## Series3Sub (Mar 14, 2010)

mattack said:


> I don't have/have never used a Hopper.. But based on reviews, you CAN "save" shows from the Primetime Anytime mega recording. But AFAIK, this is effectively manual.. the equivalent of season passes aren't smart enough to just realize "oh this is in PTA, rip it out afterwards".
> 
> Also, at least at one time, you couldn't save the show out of PTA with padding.. So with the common timeslot overruns, that may be an issue depending on what you watch. But at least the Engadget HD guy confirmed to me that Dish considered this a bug and it would hopefully be fixed.
> 
> Personally, even though I use Tivo and have cable, the vast majority of what I watch is network shows.. So I would actually love something like PTA. But will "make do" with a Roamio at some point.


Actually it is smart enough to take any PTAT recording and put it in the users partition. Also, one can also set an individual timer and the system still will use PTAT to record it (if PTAT is enabled) and put it in the My Recordings section. It is all completely automated. Also, if you find a show in PTAT for which you had no timers, if you select the show from the PTAT you are given options to save just that one episode or set a recurring timers (Season Pass) for that show, with just one button. Extremely automated and easy.

Further, anytime (24/7) including OUTSIDE of PTAT, if one Hopper or Joey is tuned to a local station, any other users who also tune to a local station the Hopper/Joey will still use ONLY that same one tuner. This is true for 2 or more recordings for locals at the same time WITHOUT PTAT being enabled. All 4 of the big nets in any combination can record using the same ONE tuner. This is the case 24/7 without PTAT being enabled.

Also, the AutoHop is really neat. The big nets keep getting rulings against them in their lawsuit. A read of the 9th Circuits upholding a lower court ruling denying preliminary injunction makes very clear the big nets have NO HOPE of winning. They knew this going in and their lawyers must be saying, "Told you so." The lawsuits have absolutely no leverage.


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## Series3Sub (Mar 14, 2010)

FredT said:


> Apparently while the Hopper does indeed have a 2TB drive, only 1TB is available for normal recordings. The other is reserved for the primetime anytime recordings. If one doesn't use that feature, then it's effectively a three tuner 1TB box.


No. It can record all 4 big nets on ONE tuner even outside of PTAT and even if PTAT is NOT enabled.

Further, a USB OTA demod is available, and one can received OTA and all data is integrated into the EPG and one can set a recording just as one would for a SAT channel.


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## Series3Sub (Mar 14, 2010)

To the OP: It really is a matter if you want OTA, Cable, or Sat services. Both the TiVo Roamio line and the Hopper are excellent DVR's with nearly identical features, and both have their annoying fees. You can't go wrong with either service or systems. The only downside for TiVo is the stupid CableCards. This is not TiVo's fault but the cable companies fault. Some people are doing OK with Cable Card, but others are having living nightmares. Also, there is the additional expense of the CC and the cable cos. still finding way to INCREASE the monthly fees for CableCard.

For you, look at what each has to offer as far as channels, and, of course, crunch the numbers. No matter which you choose, it should be a good experience.


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## Series3Sub (Mar 14, 2010)

Dan203 said:


> 2TB / 2000 hours = 2.4Mbps. There is no way they could do decent HD video in 2.4Mbps, so it has to be referring to SD. My new TiVo Roamio Pro with 3TB says 470 hours of HD. Which means TiVo assumes an average bitrate of about 14Mbps for HD. Even with H.264 you typically only see a 40% savings so that would still be about 8Mbps, so a 2TB drive would only hold about 550 hours of HD.


You also need to account for MPEG4 HD streams, the use of 8PSK to allow more throughput and Turbo Coding for even more throughput, and the hardware in sat boxes that exploit software that allows for high quality HD PQ at the users end while using less bandwidth and requiring less data to sent to the home.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

Rather than starting a new thread on this subject, I decided to resurrect this one. I currently have Dish Network and the original Hopper with 1 Joey. I like it fine, but the price is excessive given we also pay for access to Amazon Prime, Netflix, and iTunes. The interface can be a little sluggish at times, especially since they added Apps and "You Might Also Like". Dish PQ could be better -- it is between TWC and DirecTV in my experience. The Hopper has more space than I ever expect to need. It never gets more than 40% full, even with full seasons of shows and lots of movies we plan to watch. AutoHop is nice, but isn't a must-have.

I dislike the bundling of channels that cable/satellite requires. I am paying for way more than I will ever watch. If I were to just buy the shows we watch on iTunes, we would still pay less than paying for Dish every month, and it is the cheapest pay TV option I have right now. If I get an OTA DVR and factor in Amazon and Netflix, the price goes down even more. I don't need cable to get sports because we just don't watch them, and I can wait for shows that come on HBO/Showtime/Starz to come out on iTunes or Blu-Ray.

My question is this: From a purely functional standpoint, how does the base Roamio as an OTA DVR compare to the Hopper? What I am looking for is an easy to use, reliable, DVR which is not a pain to deal with, like the Premier was when I tried it out. I would add a Mini for sure and maybe a Stream later on to take some shows with us on the iPad when we travel. I'd be interested in how the mini compares to the Joey as well.

Thanks,
Ted


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## telemark (Nov 12, 2013)

ncted said:


> What I am looking for is an easy to use, reliable, DVR which is not a pain to deal with, like the Premier was when I tried it out.


Were you saying the Premier was easy to use, reliable or a pain to deal with?


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## steve614 (May 1, 2006)

Sounds like he's saying the Premiere was a pain to deal with.

I'd say in general, the Roamio experience is nothing like what the Premiere was.
However, I might hold off on getting one until TiVo sorts out the mess they created with the last update.


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## tarheelblue32 (Jan 13, 2014)

steve614 said:


> Sounds like he's saying the Premiere was a pain to deal with.
> 
> I'd say in general, the Roamio experience is nothing like what the Premiere was.
> However, I might hold off on getting one until TiVo sorts out the mess they created with the last update.


I have had no problems with the last software update.


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

ncted said:


> My question is this: From a purely functional standpoint, how does the base Roamio as an OTA DVR compare to the Hopper? What I am looking for is an easy to use, reliable, DVR which is not a pain to deal with, like the Premier was when I tried it out. I would add a Mini for sure and maybe a Stream later on to take some shows with us on the iPad when we travel. I'd be interested in how the mini compares to the Joey as well.
> 
> Thanks,
> Ted


I am guessing you will not find very many people that have actually had and used a Dish Hopper DVR and a Base Roamio DVR for OTA.

I do have a Roamio I use for OTA only and it is easy to use and reliable however I can not compare it to a Hopper as I have never seen one.

Just some random thoughts - 

With the Roamio when used with OTA "reliability" is mostly affected by how well it receives your OTA signals. If you have no reception issues it will be very reliable.
Easy of use is in the eyes of the beholder. It may take you some time to get used to how TiVo's UI works compared to the hopper's as they are different, but after you go through the learning curve I think you will find it is a good UI and easy to use.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

telemark said:


> Were you saying the Premier was easy to use, reliable or a pain to deal with?


The Premier was a pain for me due to reception issues, probably muti-path related since the TivoHD I had worked just fine with OTA, and buggy software, resulting is unpredictable reboots. The UI was fine, if slow in HD mode. I had DirecTivos for years and loved them, so I am familiar with using Tivos.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

atmuscarella said:


> I am guessing you will not find very many people that have actually had and used a Dish Hopper DVR and a Base Roamio DVR for OTA.


Yes, that is my conundrum. I will probably try out the Roamio while I still have the Hopper, so I can compare, but I was hoping to come across someone who has at least some familiarity with both.

-Ted


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

The big part of the decision is DISH vs. Cable. If you don't watch sports, and don't watch much other TV, then you might be able to cut the cord, in which case the discussion is about OTA DVRs including Roamio, and Hopper is irrelevant. If you're going to have a standard "cable" subscription, then the big discussion is DISH/Hopper vs. Cable/TiVo, and to be fair, you have to include DirecTV/Genie. That can depend a lot on the market. DISH doesn't even bother to compete anywhere in the NYC market or CT, due to lack of SNY and YES, so I'm a little biased against them (even though as a Red Sox fan... but I need my SNY for basketball). They are the cheapest of all the major MSOs, but you get what you pay for...


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

Bigg said:


> The big part of the decision is DISH vs. Cable. If you don't watch sports, and don't watch much other TV, then you might be able to cut the cord, in which case the discussion is about OTA DVRs including Roamio, and Hopper is irrelevant. If you're going to have a standard "cable" subscription, then the big discussion is DISH/Hopper vs. Cable/TiVo, and to be fair, you have to include DirecTV/Genie. That can depend a lot on the market. DISH doesn't even bother to compete anywhere in the NYC market or CT, due to lack of SNY and YES, so I'm a little biased against them (even though as a Red Sox fan... but I need my SNY for basketball). They are the cheapest of all the major MSOs, but you get what you pay for...


What my wife and I are discovering is that we don't watch any sports other than the Olympics, and what we do watch from non-OTA sources, aside from HBO series, is all on streaming within a year or so. If we were to stay with a pay TV provider, Dish is our only real choice. TWC is horrible, and we have no LOS for DirecTV.

Thanks,
Ted


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

ncted said:


> What my wife and I are discovering is that we don't watch any sports other than the Olympics, and what we do watch from non-OTA sources, aside from HBO series, is all on streaming within a year or so. If we were to stay with a pay TV provider, Dish is our only real choice. TWC is horrible, and we have no LOS for DirecTV.
> 
> Thanks,
> Ted


Even the Olympics are partially only on cable. My point is that streaming and OTA can not, and for the forseeable future, will not replace cable. "Cutting the cord" is fine for people who don't watch much, if any, TV in the first place, but it is not a replacement for cable/satellite/telcoTV.

So if you barely watch TV in the first place, then it would probably not make sense to pay for TV. Streaming doesn't have much to do with that...


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

ncted said:


> I like it fine, but the price is excessive given we also pay for access to Amazon Prime, Netflix, and iTunes.


Wow, I'm amazed you get all of those AND DISH. (I have Amazon Prime, largely to 'play' with the video, but I use it sporadically.. I have thought of resubscribing to Netflix for a month or so to catch up on their originals and a couple other things they have exclusively that I care about.)



Bigg said:


> Even the Olympics are partially only on cable. My point is that streaming and OTA can not, and for the forseeable future, will not replace cable. "Cutting the cord" is fine for people who don't watch much, if any, TV in the first place, but it is not a replacement for cable/satellite/telcoTV.


For the Olympics, the "big events" are on the broadcast network (I think NBC for the foreseeable future).

I also think that your statement is not true of most people. I watch tons of TV.. I have _two_ Tivos that REQUIRE cable (Premiere 4 and Roamio -- I should sell one since I now have tons of tuners).. But the MAJORITY of the shows I watch, and I think is true for many people, are the broadcast stations. (You may say then why do I have cable? Because I _do_ watch cable shows, and even though I could watch many via other means nowadays, I couldn't watch them as easily _without_ commercials.. Also, while this is less true nowadays, when I originally got cable, the cable signal was generally more reliable than an antenna I had to rotate in different directions for different channels.)


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

Bigg said:


> Even the Olympics are partially only on cable. My point is that streaming and OTA can not, and for the forseeable future, will not replace cable. "Cutting the cord" is fine for people who don't watch much, if any, TV in the first place, but it is not a replacement for cable/satellite/telcoTV.
> 
> So if you barely watch TV in the first place, then it would probably not make sense to pay for TV. Streaming doesn't have much to do with that...


We only watch the evening NBC Olympics broadcast (which we almost didn't get to see due to a contract dispute), and even then, we FF through a lot of it. I've considered all that we watch, and the only thing not available on OTA/Streaming/iTunes is the Suze Orman show in CNBC. There used to be a free video podcast on iTunes, but it is audio only now.

There are a lot of advantages to streaming, including lack of commercials (except Hulu of course), and paying less for more appealing content. With Cable/Satellite, I pay for hundreds of channels with shows I don't care about just so I can get the few I do want to see. I already have to subscribe to Netflix and Amazon to get certain content I want to see, so why not watch more on those services for the same price? I may be paying for a lot of shows I won't watch on streaming services, but I will be paying a lot less in general, so the value proposition is better.

Also, not paying for Dish frees up money I can spend on cable shows on iTunes that don't have commercials and the money I spend is targeted directly to that show, not some channel I care nothing for. Anyway, I am not looking to "replace cable." I am looking for a solution that fits our content interests and financial needs better than cable.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

mattack said:


> Wow, I'm amazed you get all of those AND DISH. (I have Amazon Prime, largely to 'play' with the video, but I use it sporadically.. I have thought of resubscribing to Netflix for a month or so to catch up on their originals and a couple other things they have exclusively that I care about.)


Well, we get Amazon mainly for the shipping, but we have watched it a lot more lately. We actually prefer it to Netflix as the apps load more quickly and it seems less likely to suffer buffering issues. Netflix we get for the original series and movies. iTunes is for stuff we can't find elsewhere. Apparently, we are very picky in what we like to watch, so we have to source content from various places.



mattack said:


> I also think that your statement is not true of most people. I watch tons of TV.. I have _two_ Tivos that REQUIRE cable (Premiere 4 and Roamio -- I should sell one since I now have tons of tuners).. But the MAJORITY of the shows I watch, and I think is true for many people, are the broadcast stations. (You may say then why do I have cable? Because I _do_ watch cable shows, and even though I could watch many via other means nowadays, I couldn't watch them as easily _without_ commercials.. Also, while this is less true nowadays, when I originally got cable, the cable signal was generally more reliable than an antenna I had to rotate in different directions for different channels.)


Luckily all my stations are in the same direction other than PBS, which is so close, I don't need to point an antenna in that direction to receive it.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

mattack said:


> I also think that your statement is not true of most people. I watch tons of TV.. I have _two_ Tivos that REQUIRE cable (Premiere 4 and Roamio -- I should sell one since I now have tons of tuners).. But the MAJORITY of the shows I watch, and I think is true for many people, are the broadcast stations. (You may say then why do I have cable? Because I _do_ watch cable shows, and even though I could watch many via other means nowadays, I couldn't watch them as easily _without_ commercials.. Also, while this is less true nowadays, when I originally got cable, the cable signal was generally more reliable than an antenna I had to rotate in different directions for different channels.)


Most people do watch quite a bit of network content, but also watch plenty of cable content. Just HBO and Sports alone, not to mention all the other cable channels are big draws for a lot of people.



ncted said:


> We only watch the evening NBC Olympics broadcast (which we almost didn't get to see due to a contract dispute), and even then, we FF through a lot of it.


You're missing out on a lot, especially in the summer Olympics. They only put a few sports on the network broadcast. The rest of the stuff is sprawled out on several cable networks at all odd hours of the day. Yay for 4 tuner TiVo!



> There are a lot of advantages to streaming, including lack of commercials (except Hulu of course), and paying less for more appealing content.


That's great if you don't watch much TV in the first place, and everything you want is available streaming. For most people, this is not the case. I could survive without some of the stuff that I watch, although I wouldn't enjoy TV nearly as much. Between sports and HBO, I'm at the point where the high-value content that I want is sprawled out across the higher cable tier (XF Preferred) and HBO.



> Anyway, I am not looking to "replace cable." I am looking for a solution that fits our content interests and financial needs better than cable.


There you go. Not paying for a cable TV package is a good idea for people who are willing to _give up cable TV_. And that's been the case since digital OTA broadcasts started, and you could get a good quality signal on the networks.

As for me, I'm sticking with my XF Preferred and HBO. Hopefully eventually I'll live somewhere where I can get FIOS Extreme TV and 75/35 internet.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

Bigg said:


> You're missing out on a lot, especially in the summer Olympics. They only put a few sports on the network broadcast. The rest of the stuff is sprawled out on several cable networks at all odd hours of the day. Yay for 4 tuner TiVo!


Not really from our perspective. We barely have time and interest level to watch the stuff on the nightly broadcast. I'm not saying there isn't interesting stuff there, just not for us.



Bigg said:


> That's great if you don't watch much TV in the first place, and everything you want is available streaming. For most people, this is not the case. I could survive without some of the stuff that I watch, although I wouldn't enjoy TV nearly as much. Between sports and HBO, I'm at the point where the high-value content that I want is sprawled out across the higher cable tier (XF Preferred) and HBO.


Yeah, the pay TV industry knows what keeps people subscribing, and it is sports. I expect that to be the last hold out. Even HBO sees the writing on the wall as evidenced by their Amazon deal this week. I wouldn't say we don't watch much TV, but we watch less than we used to. Even so, we have way more we want to watch than we have time to watch it. Moving to OTA and streaming will not change that -- we'd just be paying less.

I guess we're not "most people," and that is why I asked my original question. I'm not trying to convince anyone else to do what we're contemplating, but I was looking for some guidance from someone who may have already been down that road.

Thanks for all the responses from everyone.

Ted


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## Diana Collins (Aug 21, 2002)

Series3Sub said:


> No. It can record all 4 big nets on ONE tuner even outside of PTAT and even if PTAT is NOT enabled.
> 
> Further, a USB OTA demod is available, and one can received OTA and all data is integrated into the EPG and one can set a recording just as one would for a SAT channel.


Those two "features" are, of course, for most people, mutually exclusive. If you can record all four networks with one tuner, any time, and since those ARE the OTA channels most people care about recording, why would you need an OTA tuner module? Is the Dish OTA tuner module still only one tuner?

The Hopper is a 3 tuner, Dish Network only (plus OTA if you add the extra box) DVR with a Slingbox built-in. Dish employs the trick of putting all the 4 major broadcast networks on one satellite frequency so that they can record all 4 at once. It includes no other streaming service apps. The boxes perform well, the user interface is responsive, and visual good (not great).

The Roamio is a 4 (base) or 6 (Plus and Pro) DVR capable of OTA and cable (Base) or cable only (Plus and Pro) reception. It includes apps for several streaming services. The boxes perform well, the user interface is responsive and visually great.

Personally, I would look at the cost of Dish network programming for what you want to watch, versus your option with cable and/or OTA and streaming services. If both meet your content requirements, only then would I consider the hardware and DVR service fees. While Dish's HD picture quality isn't quite as good as DirecTV's or FiOS's, it is better than most other services.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

ncted said:


> Not really from our perspective. We barely have time and interest level to watch the stuff on the nightly broadcast. I'm not saying there isn't interesting stuff there, just not for us.


Seems like a classic "doesn't really watch TV case". In that case, you shouldn't pay for TV if you're going to watch it!



> Yeah, the pay TV industry knows what keeps people subscribing, and it is sports. I expect that to be the last hold out. Even HBO sees the writing on the wall as evidenced by their Amazon deal this week. I wouldn't say we don't watch much TV, but we watch less than we used to. Even so, we have way more we want to watch than we have time to watch it. Moving to OTA and streaming will not change that -- we'd just be paying less.


Sports just keeps getting bigger and bigger, now with more and more games televised, especially in NCAA basketball and football. And the amount of money these conferences are getting is getting bigger and bigger, and someone (ESPN, CBS, Turner, FOX, etc) has to pay for that...



Diana Collins said:


> Those two "features" are, of course, for most people, mutually exclusive. If you can record all four networks with one tuner, any time, and since those ARE the OTA channels most people care about recording, why would you need an OTA tuner module? Is the Dish OTA tuner module still only one tuner?
> 
> The Hopper is a 3 tuner, Dish Network only (plus OTA if you add the extra box) DVR with a Slingbox built-in. Dish employs the trick of putting all the 4 major broadcast networks on one satellite frequency so that they can record all 4 at once. It includes no other streaming service apps. The boxes perform well, the user interface is responsive, and visual good (not great).
> 
> ...


You could probably have both OTA and PTAT if you wanted PTAT for casual viewing and OTA for better quality or sub-channels that DISH doesn't carry...

DISH's PQ is OK, but it's arguably not even as good as cable...


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

Diana Collins said:


> OTA and cable (Base)


OTA _or_ cable, not OTA _and_ cable.

Or rather, it's "capable" of both, but you can only use one of them at a time (and obviously need to rerun guided setup/change what cable is plugged in to switch).


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

Bigg said:


> Seems like a classic "doesn't really watch TV case". In that case, you shouldn't pay for TV if you're going to watch it!


Sorry, but I think I'm not stating the case well. We do watch a fair bit of TV, probably about 25-30 hours per week *BUT* we're paying for a lot of TV we don't watch, hundreds of channels worth, much of it sports, which we're forced to pay for if we want AMC, FX, TBS, etc. for their original content.



Bigg said:


> Sports just keeps getting bigger and bigger, now with more and more games televised, especially in NCAA basketball and football. And the amount of money these conferences are getting is getting bigger and bigger, and someone (ESPN, CBS, Turner, FOX, etc) has to pay for that...


Right, just as long as it isn't me



Bigg said:


> You could probably have both OTA and PTAT if you wanted PTAT for casual viewing and OTA for better quality or sub-channels that DISH doesn't carry...
> 
> DISH's PQ is OK, but it's arguably not even as good as cable...


Comcast must have pretty good PQ, because TWC PQ is far worse than Dish where I live. That said, I am looking forward to better PQ with OTA.


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## Diana Collins (Aug 21, 2002)

mattack said:


> OTA _or_ cable, not OTA _and_ cable.
> 
> Or rather, it's "capable" of both, but you can only use one of them at a time (and obviously need to rerun guided setup/change what cable is plugged in to switch).


Yup, fingers and brain got out of sync there.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

ncted said:


> Sorry, but I think I'm not stating the case well. We do watch a fair bit of TV, probably about 25-30 hours per week *BUT* we're paying for a lot of TV we don't watch, hundreds of channels worth, much of it sports, which we're forced to pay for if we want AMC, FX, TBS, etc. for their original content.


If you watch much of any TV, I have a real hard time believing that cutting the cord makes any sense, even if you could get the content you want to watch.



> Comcast must have pretty good PQ, because TWC PQ is far worse than Dish where I live. That said, I am looking forward to better PQ with OTA.


A lot of OTA is heavily compressed too...


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

Bigg said:


> If you watch much of any TV, I have a real hard time believing that cutting the cord makes any sense, even if you could get the content you want to watch.


Believe it, my friend. I've done the analysis, and we're only going to miss exactly 1 show, which is available as an audio podcast or in Internet video clips.



Bigg said:


> A lot of OTA is heavily compressed too...


Certainly, but , at worst, it shouldn't look any worse than what I'm getting with Dish now for the same channel, which is received *and* transcoded to MP4 and back before I see it. I am sure some of the sub-channels will look like hell, but they do now.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

ncted said:


> Believe it, my friend. I've done the analysis, and we're only going to miss exactly 1 show, which is available as an audio podcast or in Internet video clips.


Then you're watching a small amount of TV, and shows that happen to be available online. Many shows are not available online in any meaningful way.



> Certainly, but , at worst, it shouldn't look any worse than what I'm getting with Dish now for the same channel, which is received *and* transcoded to MP4 and back before I see it. I am sure some of the sub-channels will look like hell, but they do now.


DISH may be getting a fiber feed, although they may not, so who knows how it will end up comparing...


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

ncted said:


> Sorry, but I think I'm not stating the case well. We do watch a fair bit of TV, probably about 25-30 hours per week *BUT* we're paying for a lot of TV we don't watch, hundreds of channels worth, much of it sports, which we're forced to pay for if we want AMC, FX, TBS, etc. for their original content.


That argument always annoys me. Sure you are paying for tv you don't watch. But you are also paying lower prices than you otherwise would for tv you do watch.

25-30 hrs/week means you are getting your money's worth at the cable tv buffet.


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## steve614 (May 1, 2006)

trip1eX said:


> That argument always annoys me.


The one that annoys me is the notion that if one does not have cable, they must not watch a lot of TV.

I must be an outlier. I have nothing to do BUT watch TV. With the amount of time I have on my hands these days, you'd probably think I struggle to find something to watch.
Nope. My 2TB Tivo capacity is at 90% and I have another 2TB worth of shows sitting on my computer. Way more than I have time to watch. I would just be throwing money away if I subscribed to cable.


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

steve614 said:


> The one that annoys me is the notion that if one does not have cable, they must not watch a lot of TV.
> 
> I must be an outlier. I have nothing to do BUT watch TV. With the amount of time I have on my hands these days, you'd probably think I struggle to find something to watch.
> Nope. My 2TB Tivo capacity is at 90% and I have another 2TB worth of shows sitting on my computer. Way more than I have time to watch. I would just be throwing money away if I subscribed to cable.


I agree I am OTA and free streaming only and have way more content to watch than I ever will have time for. But I am not very picky about what I watch and care nothing about sports. I do go to the movies a few times per month and rent a few Blu-rays from RedBox so I am guessing I do pay for around 4 movies/mo and do turn Hulu+ back on at times but because of the free 6 months I got from TiVo and bing rewards I have only paid for 3 months over the last 4 years and don't expect to ever pay again as long as bing rewards is around.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

trip1eX said:


> That argument always annoys me. Sure you are paying for tv you don't watch. But you are also paying lower prices than you otherwise would for tv you do watch.
> 
> 25-30 hrs/week means you are getting your money's worth at the cable tv buffet.


Sorry to annoy you. Perhaps you could describe what exactly is annoying about wanting less of my money to go for things I don't like and more to go to the things I do like?

Thanks,
Ted


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

Bigg said:


> Then you're watching a small amount of TV, and shows that happen to be available online. Many shows are not available online in any meaningful way.


*Or* perhaps you are just unaware of how much is available online? Perhaps you could go through your Season Passes and share some shows which aren't available online, because, as I said, I only found 1 in my list.



Bigg said:


> DISH may be getting a fiber feed, although they may not, so who knows how it will end up comparing...


I can say that the HD OTA broadcasts I get now on my TVs are less "soft" and "bright" than the same shows I get from Dish. I am not saying Dish looks bad, but OTA looks better. I am not an expert in what things should look like on a properly calibrated set, so my descriptions are just my personal impressions.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

steve614 said:


> The one that annoys me is the notion that if one does not have cable, they must not watch a lot of TV.
> 
> I must be an outlier. I have nothing to do BUT watch TV. With the amount of time I have on my hands these days, you'd probably think I struggle to find something to watch.
> Nope. My 2TB Tivo capacity is at 90% and I have another 2TB worth of shows sitting on my computer. Way more than I have time to watch. I would just be throwing money away if I subscribed to cable.


Because most of the content is on cable, and a lot of the good stuff is even moving upwards to HBO. At this point, I consider TV to be the second digital package up (XF Preferred on Comcast) plus HBO, as that's where the majority of the good content is.



ncted said:


> *Or* perhaps you are just unaware of how much is available online? Perhaps you could go through your Season Passes and share some shows which aren't available online, because, as I said, I only found 1 in my list.


It's very hit or miss. Some stuff is and some stuff isn't. So if you want to watch particular shows, you're going to find some that aren't online. Then you add sports and HBO, and cable is very well entrenched.

Alright, my Season Passes, not including a whole bunch that aren't active right now:

NOVA- available through PBS online or OTA
Frontline- available through PBS online or OTA
Nature- available through PBS online or OTA
VICE- HBO only
Silicon Valley- HBO only
Real Time with Bill Maher- HBO only
Cosmos- OTA, not available streaming
Mythbusters- Purchase only through Amazon, iTunes, VUDU
This Old House- available through PBS online or OTA
Big Bang Theory- OTA or purchase through Amazon, iTunes, VUDU
Daily Show- available delayed through web or purchase
Colbert Report- available delayed through web or purchase
Last Week Tonight- HBO only
The Rachel Maddow Show- available delayed through iTunes podcast
Manual: Monday Night HBO Docs- HBO only
American Experience- available through PBS online or OTA

Live (for this past season):
UConn Mens basketball- in addition to CBS, requires cable package with ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, SNY, CBS SN
UConn Womens basketball- requires cable package with ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, SNY, BTN, CBS SN
March Madness- in addition to CBS, requires cable package with TBS, TNT, and TruTV

So the breakdown is it's mostly HBO and sports, plus some shows that require a purchase or are delayed (or both). Once I move to an area that has AJAM, I will watch some of that as well. I have watched other stuff on Discovery and Animal Planet as well, although those have gone way downhill.

Now add in the cost of buying some shows a la carte, take away the convenience of TiVo for shows that aren't available OTA, and add in the cost of the Comcast de-bundling fee, and you can see why cord cutting is mostly hype. I also want to get into a few other HBO shows, and I've watched some really good documentaries on HBO GO, so that's more cable tie-in right there.



> I can say that the HD OTA broadcasts I get now on my TVs are less "soft" and "bright" than the same shows I get from Dish. I am not saying Dish looks bad, but OTA looks better. I am not an expert in what things should look like on a properly calibrated set, so my descriptions are just my personal impressions.


No matter where they are getting the feed, they are likely compressing it heavily. MPEG-4 is a lot better with motion, but it tends to get soft quickly as well if it's bitrate starved.


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## jmpage2 (Jan 21, 2004)

I'm amazed anyone is replying to this thread as the OP never replied from his original post and probably bought a hopper already.

This thread is officially a drive-by.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

jmpage2 said:


> I'm amazed anyone is replying to this thread as the OP never replied from his original post and probably bought a hopper already.
> 
> This thread is officially a drive-by.


Because it's semi off-topic. Of course it is. It's a forum.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

Bigg said:


> It's very hit or miss. Some stuff is and some stuff isn't. So if you want to watch particular shows, you're going to find some that aren't online. Then you add sports and HBO, and cable is very well entrenched.
> 
> Alright, my Season Passes, not including a whole bunch that aren't active right now:
> 
> ...


So, first of all, you and I watch many of the same shows, minus the sports. The Daily Show and Colbert *are* also available on Hulu BTW. HBO is the toughest to deal with, especially Maher. Most original programming is available on iTunes, including VICE, but you do have to wait a while for it. Alternately, you can get it on Netflix Blu-Ray in the mail, if you can wait even longer. Sadly, Maher only seems to be available as an audio podcast. This is the same issue I ran into with the Suze Orman show my wife watches.



Bigg said:


> Now add in the cost of buying some shows a la carte, take away the convenience of TiVo for shows that aren't available OTA, and add in the cost of the Comcast de-bundling fee, and you can see why cord cutting is mostly hype. I also want to get into a few other HBO shows, and I've watched some really good documentaries on HBO GO, so that's more cable tie-in right there.
> 
> No matter where they are getting the feed, they are likely compressing it heavily. MPEG-4 is a lot better with motion, but it tends to get soft quickly as well if it's bitrate starved.


As I already have to use an interface other than the DVR to watch lots of TV, doing it more often really isn't an inconvenience in my mind. My cable option (TWC) is *so* bad, I am already paying for Internet only as I am on Dish. Getting rid of Dish is $100+ per month I can spend on other stuff, including individual seasons of shows.

About half the people I know locally have cut the cord in some fashion or another (Netflix/Amazon only or some combination of OTA and streaming). People are sick of high prices for the what they are getting, and many will find other ways to get their content for less. I already watch so few things live, or even the next day, and I have so much to choose from, that waiting a year for the new season of some show isn't really a big deal in most cases.

I think the consensus on Dish MPEG4 is it is fairly bit-starved and we also know it is down-rezed to 1440x1080 for 1080i content.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

jmpage2 said:


> I'm amazed anyone is replying to this thread as the OP never replied from his original post and probably bought a hopper already.
> 
> This thread is officially a drive-by.


I hijacked it instead of starting a new thread so as to not clog up the forum with redundant topics.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

ncted said:


> So, first of all, you and I watch many of the same shows, minus the sports. The Daily Show and Colbert *are* also available on Hulu BTW. HBO is the toughest to deal with, especially Maher. Most original programming is available on iTunes, including VICE, but you do have to wait a while for it. Alternately, you can get it on Netflix Blu-Ray in the mail, if you can wait even longer. Sadly, Maher only seems to be available as an audio podcast. This is the same issue I ran into with the Suze Orman show my wife watches.


So you have good taste in TV. 

The purchase delays are long, and you're back to buying individual episodes, and it ends up being as much as cable with way less content. How quickly are Colbert and Stewart up on Hulu? It's just such a mess.



> As I already have to use an interface other than the DVR to watch lots of TV, doing it more often really isn't an inconvenience in my mind. My cable option (TWC) is *so* bad, I am already paying for Internet only as I am on Dish. Getting rid of Dish is $100+ per month I can spend on other stuff, including individual seasons of shows.


I like TiVo, where everything is pulled down from cable and available in one nice, clean interface for me to watch, and available throughout the house. The other services are a relative kludge. If I had to go through some other device, there's no way I'd be able to watch the shows that I do.



> About half the people I know locally have cut the cord in some fashion or another (Netflix/Amazon only or some combination of OTA and streaming). People are sick of high prices for the what they are getting, and many will find other ways to get their content for less. I already watch so few things live, or even the next day, and I have so much to choose from, that waiting a year for the new season of some show isn't really a big deal in most cases.
> 
> I think the consensus on Dish MPEG4 is it is fairly bit-starved and we also know it is down-rezed to 1440x1080 for 1080i content.


I know a few cord nevers, but all of them have access to cabe at some other location, and some have logins for the services as well. Most people I know have some sort of cable service...

Yeah, it's not technically HD. It's controversial, since it may avoid even worse bit starvation if they used the full resolution at a similar bitrate, but it's still not right.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

Bigg said:


> So you have good taste in TV.
> 
> The purchase delays are long, and you're back to buying individual episodes, and it ends up being as much as cable with way less content. How quickly are Colbert and Stewart up on Hulu? It's just such a mess.


Colbert and Stewart are on Hulu the next day. The April 30 shows are up today.



Bigg said:


> I like TiVo, where everything is pulled down from cable and available in one nice, clean interface for me to watch, and available throughout the house. The other services are a relative kludge. If I had to go through some other device, there's no way I'd be able to watch the shows that I do.


Well, the nice thing is Netflix, Hulu, (and hopefully Amazon Prime soon?) are all viewable and searchable on Tivo, which is actually one of the reasons I am interested in the Roamio.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

ncted said:


> Colbert and Stewart are on Hulu the next day. The April 30 shows are up today.


That's not bad, but it still doesn't cover everything else...



> Well, the nice thing is Netflix, Hulu, (and hopefully Amazon Prime soon?) are all viewable and searchable on Tivo, which is actually one of the reasons I am interested in the Roamio.


That's still not nearly as quick and easy as just playing back a recording... I don't mind searching around for some oddball content or movies, which I already do as a supplement to cable, but for regular usage, it would be a real PITA.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

Bigg said:


> That's still not nearly as quick and easy as just playing back a recording... I don't mind searching around for some oddball content or movies, which I already do as a supplement to cable, but for regular usage, it would be a real PITA.


I guess I am already used to it. It is a requirement for us today. Doing it more isn't a big deal.

-Ted


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

ncted said:


> Sorry to annoy you. Perhaps you could describe what exactly is annoying about wanting less of my money to go for things I don't like and more to go to the things I do like?
> 
> Thanks,
> Ted


The annoying part is you complain about paying for content you don't watch while forgetting this also means you are paying much less (than you otherwise would) for the content you do watch. Remember others are saying the same thing as you and paying for the channels you watch and they don't.

And you say this while watching 25-30 hrs a tv per week. The math seems like it works out in your favor. It sounds like a cabletv/satellitetv package is actually a great deal for you. Not sure why you would be complaining.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

trip1eX said:


> The annoying part is you complain about paying for content you don't watch while forgetting this also means you are paying much less (than you otherwise would) for the content you do watch. Remember others are saying the same thing as you and paying for the channels you watch and they don't.
> 
> And you say this while watching 25-30 hrs a tv per week. The math seems like it works out in your favor. It sounds like a cabletv/satellitetv package is actually a great deal for you. Not sure why you would be complaining.


Yeah, that's why cord cutting is so over-hyped. Everything quickly adds up to be the same or more than cable anyways...


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

trip1eX said:


> The annoying part is you complain about paying for content you don't watch while forgetting this also means you are paying much less (than you otherwise would) for the content you do watch. Remember others are saying the same thing as you and paying for the channels you watch and they don't.
> 
> And you say this while watching 25-30 hrs a tv per week. The math seems like it works out in your favor. It sounds like a cabletv/satellitetv package is actually a great deal for you. Not sure why you would be complaining.


Sorry you don't see it. It is a simple proposition: pay the same or (most likely) less and still get to watch the things I like while not funding drivel I care nothing for. If that isn't for you, I am not annoyed. Not sure why you care, but you clearly do, so my deepest apologies.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

ncted said:


> Sorry you don't see it. It is a simple proposition: pay the same or (most likely) less and still get to watch the things I like while not funding drivel I care nothing for. If that isn't for you, I am not annoyed. Not sure why you care, but you clearly do, so my deepest apologies.


I understand what you want and where you're coming from. But you are ignoring the much higher rates you would pay per channel in an ala carte option. And don't seem to very cognizant of how much your 25-30 hrs of tv watching per week sits in the sweet spot of value derived from a cable or satellite tv package.

You only mention how your satellite tv package negatively affects you when making your argument.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

Bigg said:


> Yeah, that's why cord cutting is so over-hyped. Everything quickly adds up to be the same or more than cable anyways...


Exactly.

I never quite understood it except from the perspective of a person or couple who watches very little tv or doesn't mind watching whatever older content.

I've lived in 3 quite different parts of the country in the past 5 years and I've had the expanded basic type of cable package and its never been more than $60/month. Right now it's like $40 something maybe $50. It was $30/month for the 1st year. I own all my own equipment.

But yet when people talk about the price of their cabletv package they always quote $100+/month??!??

That never made sense and from what I've always seen is people are including their internet cost in there and then making it look like they are going to save that entire $100/month if they cut the cord. Plus of course have no drop in content. It never makes any sense.

If you want to save, then instead of cord cutting, just switch satellite/cabletv providers every year or two.


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

trip1eX said:


> Exactly.
> 
> I never quite understood it except from the perspective of a person or couple who watches very little tv or doesn't mind watching whatever older content.
> 
> ...


It really depends on each person/famlies situation. I "cut the cord" years ago, I watch maybe 2-3 hours of TV per day and have plenty of stuff to watch (in fact more than I have time for as I have about 7 TBs of saved shows now). But I live alone and am not to picky when it comes to what I watch and have access to Redbox to rent movies at a very low cost.

Regarding what Pay TV costs - as everyone knows it is all over the place, my Parents have dish network, 2 receivers no DVRs, SD only, the second tier package with no premiums and it costs $78/mo. For them spending the $78 makes perfect sense, however for me it would be a ridiculous waist of money.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

trip1eX said:


> Exactly.
> 
> I never quite understood it except from the perspective of a person or couple who watches very little tv or doesn't mind watching whatever older content.
> 
> ...


The TV portion on most providers is in the $70 range plus HBO, and that's with no equipment. Since you move around a lot, I'd imagine that you've had promo deals for a year or two at a time?


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

trip1eX said:


> I understand what you want and where you're coming from. But you are ignoring the much higher rates you would pay per channel in an ala carte option. And don't seem to very cognizant of how much your 25-30 hrs of tv watching per week sits in the sweet spot of value derived from a cable or satellite tv package.


I don't care that I would pay much higher rates _PER CHANNEL_. I only care about the total I would pay _for what I actually watch_.. and I would possibly be willing to pay SLIGHTLY more for the "same" amount of stuff (that I care about) in an a la carte world. Similar to how a half gallon of milk costs more per ounce than a gallon of milk... But if you're wasting a half gallon, it's not really a "waste" to pay more.. (though you can freeze half of it, heh)


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

trip1eX said:


> But yet when people talk about the price of their cabletv package they always quote $100+/month??!??
> 
> That never made sense and from what I've always seen is people are including their internet cost in there and then making it look like they are going to save that entire $100/month if they cut the cord. Plus of course have no drop in content. It never makes any sense.
> 
> If you want to save, then instead of cord cutting, just switch satellite/cabletv providers every year or two.


Dish AT200 plus Hopper and 1 Joey costs me $102/month. TWC whole home DVR with one remote box and the digital tier would cost about $130. I've tried TWC, both with their box and TiVo, and it is not a reasonable option. If I could get DirecTV, which I cannot due to line of sight issues, it would be about $110 for a similar setup. None of those includes internet, which is $55 when I have satellite or $33 when I had cable. I already pay for Netflix and Amazon, so how am I not going to save money by switching to OTA?


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

mattack said:


> I don't care that I would pay much higher rates _PER CHANNEL_. I only care about the total I would pay _for what I actually watch_.. and I would possibly be willing to pay SLIGHTLY more for the "same" amount of stuff (that I care about) in an a la carte world. Similar to how a half gallon of milk costs more per ounce than a gallon of milk... But if you're wasting a half gallon, it's not really a "waste" to pay more.. (though you can freeze half of it, heh)


What mattack said.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

mattack said:


> I don't care that I would pay much higher rates _PER CHANNEL_. I only care about the total I would pay _for what I actually watch_.. and I would possibly be willing to pay SLIGHTLY more for the "same" amount of stuff (that I care about) in an a la carte world. Similar to how a half gallon of milk costs more per ounce than a gallon of milk... But if you're wasting a half gallon, it's not really a "waste" to pay more.. (though you can freeze half of it, heh)


If you're watching 25-30 hrs/wk of tv then you are likely to pay more overall by choosing an ala carte option. ONe of the reasons being is because your cost per channel will go up dramatically.

This all annoys me because I never hear anyone mention how much less they are paying for the channels they do watch when paying for a package.

It's always only whining abou the paying for channels you don't watch. I guess I should whine that I'm paying for 99% of the movies on Netflix I don't watch too. Maybe I should just be able to pay for only the ones I do watch and get charged $1/month instead.

That makes as much sense as these ala carte arguments. IT shows a lack of understanding of how the pricing works.

Hell same thing with channels themselves which use the same business model as the cable company only they sell you a package of shows instead of a package of channels. No one watches all the programming from one channel either.

The milk analogy doesn't make sense here. A buffet analogy makes more sense. Do you go to a buffet and then cry that you are paying for the foods you don't care to eat? Do you wish you could only pay for the foods you do eat? Did you know if you were to order the foods you do eat ala carte then they would likely cost you more money than the buffet price unless you're eating much less than an average share of food? Same thing here.

I get annoyed people are so lazy about their argument for ala carte. They just make a broad generalization that they will pay less if they only pay for the channels they watch. It isn't a very informed viewpoint.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

ncted said:


> Dish AT200 plus Hopper and 1 Joey costs me $102/month. TWC whole home DVR with one remote box and the digital tier would cost about $130. I've tried TWC, both with their box and TiVo, and it is not a reasonable option. If I could get DirecTV, which I cannot due to line of sight issues, it would be about $110 for a similar setup. None of those includes internet, which is $55 when I have satellite or $33 when I had cable. I already pay for Netflix and Amazon, so how am I not going to save money by switching to OTA?


You're doing the same sort of thing I complain about in my post. You say it isn't with internet, but it is still such an apples and oranges comparison.

Comparing OTA and Netflix to DISH's 3rd cheapest package.

Not only is the content really different (the amount and timeliness of the content,) but you're not even choosing one of the cheapest DISH packages. And you are including equipment rental fees in your DISH offering that let you time shift while I guess in your OTA alternative you just won't time shift?

SAme thing with your Time Warner numbers I'm sure.

Plus no mention of the discounts you can get from any provider during your first year. Nor how you can switch providers every year or two to help keep prices low.

I just love how everyone cord cutting is paying for way more expensive cable packages than I ever paid for in my life. And I've always had a fairly average package of all the major cable channels.


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

trip1eX said:


> It's always only whining abou the paying for channels you don't watch. I guess I should whine that I'm paying for 99% of the movies on Netflix I don't watch too. Maybe I should just be able to pay for only the ones I do watch and get charged $1/month instead.


You *CAN* do that, NOT THROUGH NETFLIX though.

You already CAN PPV for movies.. Not $1/month, but pretty darn cheaply through Redbox...

I admit I'm basically asking for a hybrid of the "all you can eat" and PPV worlds.

Yes, I think eventually we will get to something closer to utopia, with everything available all the time (but it will only be closer to utopia if it's available WITHOUT COMMERCIALS, for a higher price of course).

As it is now, I don't mind the channel paradigm. So I can pay for a channel, which you can call a "bundle" of similar programming if you want to (heh).. so with my Tivo, I would get "all I can eat" on the specific channel(s) I paid for.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

trip1eX said:


> If you're watching 25-30 hrs/wk of tv then you are likely to pay more overall by choosing an ala carte option. ONe of the reasons being is because your cost per channel will go up dramatically.
> 
> This all annoys me because I never hear anyone mention how much less they are paying for the channels they do watch when paying for a package.
> 
> ...


I respectfully disagree.


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

I think I will make some general comments on the concept of A La Cart video or more specifically video obtained by some method other than a cable/satellite bundle of services. 

First lets be clear, it is here now, most people access some video by one or more of the A La Cart methods now, it can provide nearly unlimited video choices, and with a little restraint can easily costs significantly less than paying for cable or satellite bundled services. Pretty much the only thing that isn't available A La Cart now is the ability to purchase access to individual cable only channel streams (note much of the content is available via some other A La Cart method). 

In the world of video consumption - content is King - when, where, and for how much (dollars and effort) a person can obtain it, is really what this is all about. Some content will be more easily obtain via a cable channel, other content will be more easily obtained via some other A La Cart method, some content will only be available one way or the other and some content via either method. 

The question that each household has to ask itself is if the convenience and specific content available via various cable or satellite packages is worth the cost. For many (most) families that answer will likely be that it is worth the cost, the reality is if you bundle a good DVR with pretty much any cable/satellite package you have easy access to a nearly unlimited supply of content.

That said anyone who doesn't think you can obtain 30+/- hours of content per week via (legal) A La Cart methods for less than the cost of cable/satellite packages either isn't trying very hard or is having their view clouded by their desire for specific content that they believe is only on cable channels or significantly easier to obtain via cable channels.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

mattack said:


> You *CAN* do that, NOT THROUGH NETFLIX though.
> 
> You already CAN PPV for movies.. Not $1/month, but pretty darn cheaply through Redbox...


Why not just mention the library while we're at it and how you can get movies for free in response to my point? Makes as much sense.

I never said you can't rent movies today or buy shows ala carte. I said, when referring to Netflix, that some people want to select their 10 shows from Netflix that they watch and be able to pay $1/month instead. I'm saying that's not how things work. It doesn't quite work like milk.



mattack said:


> I admit I'm basically asking for a hybrid of the "all you can eat" and PPV worlds.
> 
> Yes, I think eventually we will get to something closer to utopia, with everything available all the time (but it will only be closer to utopia if it's available WITHOUT COMMERCIALS, for a higher price of course).
> 
> As it is now, I don't mind the channel paradigm. So I can pay for a channel, which you can call a "bundle" of similar programming if you want to (heh).. so with my Tivo, I would get "all I can eat" on the specific channel(s) I paid for.


Ok I guess your point is you want channels ala carte and shows ala carte. Well, via streaming and discs, we have ala carte shows. We don't have channel ala carte. I'm not against channel ala carte at all. And I'm not saying channel ala carte is a utopia. I'm saying the utopia is ...the average tv viewer expecting to order their channels ala carte while paying much less. That's a massive assumption especially if we say average tv household instead of viewer.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

atmuscarella said:


> First lets be clear, it is here now, most people access some video by one or more of the A La Cart methods can provide nearly unlimited video choices, and with a little restraint can easily costs significantly less than paying for cable or satellite bundled services.





atmuscarella said:


> The question that each household has to ask itself is if the convenience and specific content available via various cable or satellite packages is worth the cost. For many (most) families that answer will likely be that it is worth the cost, the reality is if you bundle a good DVR with pretty much any cable/satellite package you have easy access to a nearly unlimited supply of content.





atmuscarella said:


> That said anyone who doesn't think you can obtain 30+/- hours of content per week via (legal) A La Cart methods for less than the cost of cable/satellite packages either isn't trying very hard or is having their view clouded by their desire for specific content that they believe is only on cable channels or significantly easier to obtain via cable channels.


Your 2nd paragraph that I quoted doesn't seem to agree with your 1st and 3rd. I got a mixed message at least.

And this notion you can get 30 hrs cheaper ala carte is way too broad a brushstroke. I mean it depends on what you watch.

I mean if you watch mostly network tv and can get all those shows OTA then your generalization starts to ring true. But if you watch a healthy dose of cable shows and few network shows then it stops ringing true.

And not sure if you are thinking a family of 4 typically only watches 30 hrs a week?


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

atmuscarella said:


> That said anyone who doesn't think you can obtain 30+/- hours of content per week via (legal) A La Cart methods for less than the cost of cable/satellite packages either isn't trying very hard or is having their view clouded by their desire for specific content that they believe is only on cable channels or significantly easier to obtain via cable channels.


It's not about the availability of content in general. There's tons of content out there without cable. The issue is availability of specific content. Look at HBO's lineup, and then sports, and with either one of those, not to mention both combined, you have to have cable.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

ncted said:


> I respectfully disagree.


That's a non-reply.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

trip1eX said:


> That's a non-reply.


It was the reply I thought your post deserved as I had already made my arguments to the contrary for my specific viewing habits. Your antiquated assertions do not resemble the current landscape, and you do not seem interested in learning that times have changed. It is no longer 1999.

It is not my job to disabuse you. If you are happy paying what you do for what you have, I would not attempt to convince you otherwise. My purpose here is to focus on improving the value proposition for my wife and myself. Thanks for your feedback in any case.

Ted


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

trip1eX said:


> Your 2nd paragraph that I quoted doesn't seem to agree with your 1st and 3rd. I got a mixed message at least.
> 
> And this notion you can get 30 hrs cheaper ala carte is way too broad a brushstroke. I mean it depends on what you watch.
> 
> ...





Bigg said:


> It's not about the availability of content in general. There's tons of content out there without cable. The issue is availability of specific content. Look at HBO's lineup, and then sports, and with either one of those, not to mention both combined, you have to have cable.


I think I will respond to both of your posts together and in a general way. I think it is likely we have generational differences and very likely a different view on the over all value of video consumption.

When I was a kid all we had was one black & white TV for a family of 5 and it got 4 channels (5 when I was older). There was no cable/satellite and VHS tapes hadn't been dreamed of yet. So you either watched one of the 4-5 channels or went to the movies. With that very limited amount of choice we always had something we wanted to watch and looked forward to watching a few hours of TV every night.

Well allot has changed since then, one thing is the value I put on spending time consuming video. I still enjoy "watching TV" a few hours a day, but look at it as primarily spending a few hours effectively doing nothing, while being mildly entertained. I actually have as much fun setting up my equipment (DVRs, streaming devices, HTPC, antennas, etc.) and playing with it as I do watching the video they give me access to. So as you can guess I enjoy spending time figuring out ways to access more video content without having cable/satellite as much or more than actually watching the video.

So based on my personal experience, preferences, and value I place on video consumption, I find it laughable that anyone believes you "need" a cable/satellite sub to have access to enough video content.

That said I also understand the benefit (and value) of cable/satellite for most households that just want easy access to lots of content.

On the conversation about having cable/satellite channels available A La Cart, I don't ever see it happen without a Government mandate as none of the companies involved would benefit enough to force the change. On if such an A La Cart system would cost less or not, not likely, but it could if again the Government mandated a full A La Cart only system, no packages, no bundling allow period, and then treated the delivery system as a regulated utility. That would force "channels" to compete on price for their content which might drive prices down.

There is a good dream - all cable and telephone lines removed and replaced with one very high speed fiber line to every home in the country. The fiber line owners become regulated utilities and not allowed to deliver any services.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

atmuscarella said:


> So based on my personal experience, preferences, and value I place on video consumption, I find it laughable that anyone believes you "need" a cable/satellite sub to have access to enough video content.


Your premesis is entirely wrong. You're just looking at the quantity, or the amount of variety available. That's irrelevant. No one watches even 1 percent of the video available on cable, or even on any of the big streaming services.

It's about what that content is. There are two main areas where I have to have cable to get the content that I want.

The first is basketball, where last season I needed ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, SNY, CBSSports, BTN, TBS, TNT, TruTV, and of course CBS to follow my teams as well as other teams I was interested in watching. Also, 3 of the 4 Olympics channels were cable channels.

The second is HBO. More of my weekly TV consumption is now coming from HBO than from anywhere else, and their programming is absolutely second to none.

I also have roommates, and between all of us, we watch football, NCAA mens and women's basketball, hockey, and baseball, and all of us watch HBO.

HBO and Sports each have people tied to cable, and the combination is extremely powerful. It is kind of weird though, how we have this big gap in the middle where there are very few good cable channels anymore, with PBS and HBO sort of bookending the lineup, with some sports and news (including Comedy Central for news) sprinkled in the middle.

I hate the business model, but on a dollar for dollar basis, compared to other sources of video entertainment, cable is a pretty darn good deal if you break out the per-show or per-hour price you're paying.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

I just wish I didn't have to subsidize those sports channels. Since they cost the most and the majority of people don't watch them.


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## HarperVision (May 14, 2007)

Bigg said:


> Your premesis is entirely wrong. ......


How do you know that where he lives is "entirely wrong", have you ever been there?


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

aaronwt said:


> I just wish I didn't have to subsidize those sports channels. Since they cost the most and the majority of people don't watch them.


The vast majority of people follow at least one sport, some several, so most people want those channels. Sports have been a major driver for DirecTV for quite some time.



HarperVision said:


> How do you know that where he lives is "entirely wrong", have you ever been there?


Whoops. Good catch. His premise is all wrong.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

Sure many people watch a channel or two but the vast majority of people don't come close to even watching all the ESPN channels. Let alone the dozens of other sports networks. 
Of course ESPn is the main offender since their channels cost so much. 

Personally I only on occasion watch the main one. Yet I have no choice but to pay for the rest. I'm not even sure I've met any one that watches all of the ESPN channels. If people could pick and choose the channels they watch, things would change drastically. Especially for the sports channels since they could no longer be subsidized by all the people that don't watch them. They would need to charge a lot more per subscriber to get the same amount of income


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

aaronwt said:


> Sure many people watch a channel or two but the vast majority of people don't come close to even watching all the ESPN channels. Let alone the dozens of other sports networks.
> Of course ESPn is the main offender since their channels cost so much.
> 
> Personally I only on occasion watch the main one. Yet I have no choice but to pay for the rest. I'm not even sure I've met any one that watches all of the ESPN channels. If people could pick and choose the channels they watch, things would change drastically. Especially for the sports channels since they could no longer be subsidized by all the people that don't watch them. They would need to charge a lot more per subscriber to get the same amount of income


If you follow a particular team, especially an NCAA basketball team, you get thrown all over the place. This past year, not counting overlap moves to ESPNNews or ESPN Classic, National Champions UConn were on SNY, ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, CBSSports, BTN, CBS, and March Madness was on ESPN and ESPN2 for women and TNT, TruTV, TBS, and CBS for the men's. UConn is on ESPN/SNY primarily, since the American's contract is owned by ESPN, although some conferences either have their own channel (like BTN), or are with CBSSports. No matter which network owns your conference's contract, you're on some cable channel.

Add in the Olympics with NBCSports, MSNBC, and CNBC, in addition to NBC, and you've covered quite a bit.

ESPN is absurdly overpriced, however, they have the highest standards for the quality of their broadcasts, and they put a ton of money into buying the rights and producing the broadcasts.

What I hate more are the hundreds of garbage channels. Even formerly good channels like History and Discovery are garbage now. MTV doesn't do much with music, and on down the line. Outside sports and news, there is almost nothing decent left in the middle of the lineup, it's all either PBS or HBO these days...


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

ncted said:


> It was the reply I thought your post deserved as I had already made my arguments to the contrary for my specific viewing habits. Your antiquated assertions do not resemble the current landscape, and you do not seem interested in learning that times have changed. It is no longer 1999.
> 
> It is not my job to disabuse you. If you are happy paying what you do for what you have, I would not attempt to convince you otherwise. My purpose here is to focus on improving the value proposition for my wife and myself. Thanks for your feedback in any case.
> 
> Ted


I haven't read any contrarian arguments from you.

I'm all for you and everyone else including myself finding the best deal for the content they watch. IF that includes or only includes OTA and streaming then I'm all for it.

All I did was point out that your (and many others) generalization about cable costing you more because you pay for channels you don't watch is one massive assumption.

YOur reply is......zzzzz.. Nothing.

I was at least hoping to hear more about what you watch that add up to 30 hrs a week. And if that includes your wife too or not or ?

I also pointed how cable/satellite to OTA/streaming comparisons are usually absurd and yours proved to be no exception. I said why.

I was hoping you would have something to say when I pointed this out, but ....crickets.

I'm sorry if you think pointing these things out is antiquated thinking. As far I know the math I'm using still works in 2014 even though it was developed many hundreds and thousands of years ago.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

atmuscarella said:


> So based on my personal experience, preferences, and value I place on video consumption, I find it laughable that anyone believes you "need" a cable/satellite sub to have access to enough video content.


No one is making this argument.



atmuscarella said:


> On the conversation about having cable/satellite channels available A La Cart, I don't ever see it happen without a Government mandate as none of the companies involved would benefit enough to force the change. On if such an A La Cart system would cost less or not, not likely, but it could if again the Government mandated a full A La Cart only system, no packages, no bundling allow period, and then treated the delivery system as a regulated utility. That would force "channels" to compete on price for their content which might drive prices down.


I think customers can help force it to some extent. Write letters to cable and satellite companies. Write letters to the FCC. And with more video available via streaming it will only help pressure cable/content companies. And there does come a point where if, for example, sports programming, becomes too much of one's bill and you aren't watching it all then things will change. Maybe this just means a no sports channel option.

But realize that ala carte doesn't necessarily mean lower prices. IT depends on your viewing habits.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

aaronwt said:


> Sure many people watch a channel or two but the vast majority of people don't come close to even watching all the ESPN channels. Let alone the dozens of other sports networks.
> Of course ESPn is the main offender since their channels cost so much.
> 
> Personally I only on occasion watch the main one. Yet I have no choice but to pay for the rest. I'm not even sure I've met any one that watches all of the ESPN channels. If people could pick and choose the channels they watch, things would change drastically. Especially for the sports channels since they could no longer be subsidized by all the people that don't watch them. They would need to charge a lot more per subscriber to get the same amount of income


Yeah but you aren't paying much for the other ESPNs.

And I'm not sure how you can just say you watch the main one and don't watch ESPN2 at all. Because sometimes events I want to watch are on 2 and sometimes they are 1. I have no idea what is going to be where. That's part of the reason they have 2 main channels.

I do agree if sports programming is way too much of the cost of your cable bill and you watch no sports then ...something needs to change and something probably will be done eventually.

And, believe it or not, cable/satellite companies are fighting back on some of these costs. And refusing to carry some sports programming.

And I've read some are even starting to offer or at least are considering no-sports options.

Even Dish chairman Charlie Ergen predicted in 2012 that non-sports fans would eventually rebel against the rising costs and "there will be one day an offering out there that doesn't include sports."

Not sure the difference in cost will be mind blowing or not.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

Bigg said:


> What I hate more are the hundreds of garbage channels. Even formerly good channels like History and Discovery are garbage now. MTV doesn't do much with music, and on down the line. Outside sports and news, there is almost nothing decent left in the middle of the lineup, it's all either PBS or HBO these days...


Yep there's lots of garbage in my cabletv package. But one man's garbage is another man's treasure and it takes alot of garbage to create a hit sorta speak. So you have a combination of garbage others like and garbage that no one likes and is soon to canceled and replaced by something new.

And further complicating things is you never know what channel a hit show is going to be on. My family enjoyed Pawn Stars for a few seasons on the otherwise now mostly garbage History Channel.


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## mcf57 (Oct 19, 2012)

I think another deterrent of a-la-cart becoming a reality too is the fact that ISPs like Comcast and AT&T are putting hard data caps on their bandwidth packages. This could severely limit the ability for some others to come in and offer HD a-la-cart of some kind that is then delivered over an internet connection. I think Sony and Verizon have been trying to hammer this out, but having a data cap might prevent a lot of people with going this route.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

trip1eX said:


> I haven't read any contrarian arguments from you.


Then you haven't bothered to read my preceding posts in this forum.



trip1eX said:


> I'm all for you and everyone else including myself finding the best deal for the content they watch. IF that includes or only includes OTA and streaming then I'm all for it.
> 
> All I did was point out that your (and many others) generalization about cable costing you more because you pay for channels you don't watch is one massive assumption.
> 
> ...


You want math, here it is.

Here is what I pay for video content now per month (on average):

Dish: $103 (AT200, 1 Hopper, 1 Joey)
Netflix: $9 
Amazon: $8
iTunes: $15 (to rent movies)
Total: *$135*

If I switch to OTA + Streaming, this is what expect to pay:

Tivo: $21 (worst case, or I could get lifetime)
Netflix: $9 
Amazon: $8
Hulu Plus: $8
iTunes: $15 
Total: *$61*
Savings: *$74* or *$95* with lifetime.

If I buy a Roamio and a Mini to replace my Hopper and Joey, it would cost me $989.95 worst case, with lifetime and 3 year warranties. Throw in a really nice antenna for $137.20, and the total is $1127.15. If I am saving $95/month, I would recover my sunk costs in less than a year, and then I am only paying $40/month for content.

Here are the shows my wife and I currently record on our DVR and where we would get them with OTA + Streaming:

NOVA: OTA
Nature: OTA
Frontline: OTA
NBC Nightly News: OTA
Modern Family: OTA
Big Bang Theory: OTA
Saturday Night Live: OTA
Castle: OTA
60 Minutes: OTA
Falling Skies: Amazon Prime
Suze Orman: iTunes Audio Podcast (this is the only one where we'd lose out)
The Daily Show: Hulu Plus
Meet the Press: OTA
CBS News Sunday Morning: OTA
The Good Wife: Amazon Prime
Masterpiece Classic: OTA
Arrow: OTA
The Colbert Report: Hulu Plus
Mad Men: Netflix
Orphan Black: Amazon Prime
Doctor Who: Amazon Prime
Survivor: OTA
Today: OTA
The Walking Dead: Netflix
Bones: OTA
Grey's Anatomy: OTA
Reign: OTA
Nashville: OTA
Revenge: OTA
Pretty Little Liars: Netflix
Twisted: Netflix
The Amazing Race: OTA

There are also more and more other shows we watch already on Netflix and Amazon prime, like Orange is the New Black, House of Cards, Weeds, Stargate SG-1 (finally got around to watching this just recently), etc.

We could watch 50 hours a week and still have more to watch than we have time for, and we don't even watch sports except some of the Olympics every couple of years. There are tradeoffs. We would have to wait for shows to get populated on the streaming services, but we have too much to watch now, so waiting isn't a big deal for us.

On-demand streaming is the future. Paying for cable is the past. Everyone just hasn't realized it yet.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

FWIW: I wasn't really interested in entering into a discussion of the merits of OTA vs. Pay TV. I really just was looking for a comparison between the Hopper and Roamio.

Thanks,
Ted


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

ncted said:


> Then you haven't bothered to read my preceding posts in this forum.
> 
> You want math, here it is.
> 
> ...


laughable conclusion. I don't think you realize that most people don't want to wait a year to watch their favorite shows.

I don't think you realize that comparing the price of a show a year later to the price of a show when it first debuts is apples vs oranges.

You should be pricing your Mad Men, your Falling Skies, etc on iTunes/Amazon at $3-$4/per show for an apples to apples comparison.

Also I don't get why you price in DISH's top200 instead of top120 package given your viewing habits?!??

Also not sure why you then need Amazon, Netflix and iTunes if you have DISH???!? That also makes the comparison silly. I mean here you are,...using this logic of, ....'I can wait a year to watch shows.' 'I have enough content to watch as it is.' So if that's really your mentality then why wouldn't DISH alone be enough?

Not that I care about what anyone does. To each their own. I just get annoyed when they try to project that outwards into some conclusion or generalization or massive assumption of a trend and then use a non-sensical apples to oranges comparison to "prove" it.

Here's a much more apples to apples comparison. DISH top120 vs Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, OTA and iTunes.

$75/month regular price for TOP120, Hopper and Joey after taxes.

vs Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, OTA and iTunes which is $40/month (before taxes?) using your figures plus lets say $10/month for Tivo setup. That would drag your worst case Tivo + lifetime costs out over 8 years or so which seems pretty reasonable if not conservative.

So I'm seeing $75 vs $50.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

trip1eX said:


> laughable conclusion. I don't think you realize that most people don't want to wait a year to watch their favorite shows.


You clearly do not get that I don't give a flying flip whether other people are willing to wait. The only thing most people I know are unwilling to wait for is sports, so I don't accept your assertion that most people are unwilling to wait anyway. The ever-declining ratings and ever-increasing streaming indicates that is the way things continue to go.



trip1eX said:


> I don't think you realize that comparing the price of a show a year later to the price of a show when it first debuts is apples vs oranges.
> 
> You should be pricing your Mad Men, your Falling Skies, etc on iTunes/Amazon at $3-$4/per show for an apples to apples comparison.


If I am willing to wait, then why would I do this? That is kind of the whole premise of moving to this model, to break the mold of the legacy pay TV model in favor of something that favors the content consumer instead of the content distributor.



trip1eX said:


> Also I don't get why you price in DISH's top200 instead of top120 package given your viewing habits?!??


BBC America is only in the AT200 and higher. (Doctor Who, Orphan Black, etc.)



trip1eX said:


> Also not sure why you then need Amazon, Netflix and iTunes if you have DISH???!? That also makes the comparison silly. I mean here you are,...using this logic of, ....'I can wait a year to watch shows.' 'I have enough content to watch as it is.' So if that's really your mentality then why wouldn't DISH alone be enough?


All the stuff that isn't on pay TV as well as the shows like Weeds which we didn't watch when it was first on.



trip1eX said:


> Not that I care about what anyone does. To each their own. I just get annoyed when they try to project that outwards into some conclusion or generalization or massive assumption of a trend and then use a non-sensical apples to oranges comparison to "prove" it.
> 
> Here's a much more apples to apples comparison. DISH top120 vs Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, OTA and iTunes.


You clearly do care, otherwise you wouldn't argue so strongly for the status quo.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

trip1eX said:


> l
> 
> Here's a much more apples to apples comparison. DISH top120 vs Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, OTA and iTunes.
> 
> ...


Well, the actual price for AT120, Hopper, Joey, and taxes for me is $81. All my prices included taxes and were rounded to the nearest dollar. In any case, your comparison is not what I would do, so it has no bearing on me.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

ncted said:


> Well, the actual price for AT120, Hopper, Joey, and taxes for me is $81. All my prices included taxes and were rounded to the nearest dollar. In any case, your comparison is not what I would do, so it has no bearing on me.


Make that $82. Just got a rate increase notice.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

ncted said:


> Well, the actual price for AT120, Hopper, Joey, and taxes for me is $81. All my prices included taxes and were rounded to the nearest dollar. In any case, your comparison is not what I would do, so it has no bearing on me.


And so why not use $81 number instead of $103?!??

Every cord cutter feels the need to use this sort of logic when justifying their decision.

And then when you call them on their bs they play the "I'll do what I want" card. 

It must be a nice world to live in.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

ncted said:


> You clearly do not get that I don't give a flying flip whether other people are willing to wait. The only thing most people I know are unwilling to wait for is sports, so I don't accept your assertion that most people are unwilling to wait anyway. The ever-declining ratings and ever-increasing streaming indicates that is the way things continue to go.


I don't care about your personal preferences. I'm just calling you on your bs comparisons. And how you try to pass them as apples to apples. IT's obvious one can pay less for content if they wait. That's been the business model for content for a long period of time.



ncted said:


> Y
> If I am willing to wait, then why would I do this? That is kind of the whole premise of moving to this model, to break the mold of the legacy pay TV model in favor of something that favors the content consumer instead of the content distributor.


? STreaming shows a year later is no different than buying the dvd a year later. And that's been around for awhile.

It doesn't break the legacy pay tv model because it isn't the same thing. It is a secondary outlet for content just like dvds have been.

In your comparisons you aren't including the purchase of tvs shows from iTunes the day of or day after instead of waiting a year. That would be closer to a competitor to the legacy pay tv model.



ncted said:


> BBC America is only in the AT200 and higher. (Doctor Who, Orphan Black, etc.)


Ok now I see some of the reason there. You didn't mention that earlier. But it still seems odd that you pay $22/month more just for those 2 shows given how when you cut the cord you suddenly are willing to do without first run content and even without 1 show your wife watches in order to save money.

It's a strange dichotomy.



ncted said:


> Y
> All the stuff that isn't on pay TV as well as the shows like Weeds which we didn't watch when it was first on.


So using your own logic why not wait for Weeds to appear in syndication or wait for a free 3 months of Showtime deal or .... Or watch something else. That is how you seem to rationalize your cutting the cord decisions after all.



ncted said:


> Y
> You clearly do care, otherwise you wouldn't argue so strongly for the status quo.


Umm I'm for transparency and the truth. IT's clear you can't handle the truth otherwise you wouldn't make such apples to oranges comparisons. And make these sweeping generalizations and conclusions.

I've only pointed out 2 things. Cord cutters all make apples to oranges comparisons. And going pure ala carte wouldn't necessarily save a person money.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

ncted said:


> Make that $82. Just got a rate increase notice.


No different than Amazon nor Netflix.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

trip1eX said:


> I don't care about your personal preferences. I'm just calling you on your bs comparisons. And how you try to pass them as apples to apples. IT's obvious one can pay less for content if they wait. That's been the business model for content for a long period of time.
> 
> ? STreaming shows a year later is no different than buying the dvd a year later. And that's been around for awhile.
> 
> ...


It has been a couple of years, but I did the a la carte comparison with iTunes, and it came out about the same as paying for cable/satellite. Streaming options weren't what they are now, so that wasn't really a great alternative.

Millions have cut the cord, so are all those people wrong, just because you say so? I never said cord cutting was exactly the same as paying large sums of money for access to content as soon as it becomes available. I said I could get all I wanted and more for less cost.

FWIW: I watched many TV shows on DVD (from in-the-mail Netflix) in the past, and that was great. The clear difference between that and streaming is the immediacy and portability streaming provides.

IMHO, the interesting dichotomy is to complain that the comparison of disparate things (pay TV and streaming/OTA) isn't comparing the same type of things. Seems fairly contradictory to me.

Of course they are not exactly the same. There are always trade offs. There would be trade offs with going from Dish to TimeWarnerCable (my other Pay TV option). Weighing those trade-offs are an individual choice. You clearly don't want to endure the trade-offs. Why do you care that I am saying I am willing?

Speaking of trade-offs, what I *actually* want to know is whether I will suffer any by going from Hopper/Joey to Roamio/Mini. I am not talking about content. I am talking about usability, stability, performance, etc.

Thanks,
Ted


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

ncted said:


> It has been a couple of years, but I did the a la carte comparison with iTunes, and it came out about the same as paying for cable/satellite. Streaming options weren't what they are now, so that wasn't really a great alternative.
> 
> Millions have cut the cord, so are all those people wrong, just because you say so? I never said cord cutting was exactly the same as paying large sums of money for access to content as soon as it becomes available. I said I could get all I wanted and more for less cost.
> 
> ...


Show me where I said people are wrong for cutting the cord.

All I'm saying is the logic people like to lay out for doing so is never apples to apples. IT's weird to see cord cutters do the same thing big corporations like to do with their comparisons.

I don't care what tradeoffs you want to make. OR what you do. I'm just not sure why you feel the need to pass off watching content a year after it comes out as the same service you get in a cable or satellite tv package or why you like to include Netflix, Amazon and itunes on the same side of the equation as DISH. And then basically say, well if I take out DISH then tv is much cheaper for me. Doh!

Even funnier coming from someone that doesn't want to pay for content they don't watch and wants to cut programming costs. This is the same person who adds Netflix, Amazon and a $15/month iTunes habit to a DISH Top200 sub. Not wrong to do that. But doesn't exactly jive with some of your sweeping declarations.

This (the watching shows a year later) is a major tradeoff. It isn't some minor equipment difference or UI difference that you would see going from satellite to cable or vice versa.

And thus one is supposed to believe that you're seriously inquiring about how a Tivo is going to work compared to a Hopper on a Tivo forum when according to your logic you would be getting the same content for $70 less per month if you went with Tivo? Really?

Just please tell me I'm in the twilight zone?


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

trip1eX said:


> Yep there's lots of garbage in my cabletv package. But one man's garbage is another man's treasure and it takes alot of garbage to create a hit sorta speak. So you have a combination of garbage others like and garbage that no one likes and is soon to canceled and replaced by something new.
> 
> And further complicating things is you never know what channel a hit show is going to be on. My family enjoyed Pawn Stars for a few seasons on the otherwise now mostly garbage History Channel.


Most of those series shows are just junk. True, you never know what's going to be on where.



ncted said:


> On-demand streaming is the future. Paying for cable is the past. Everyone just hasn't realized it yet.


Not until the content is available through streaming, and the quality and reliability is the same as cable. Content is probably the biggest one. I don't see content un-bundling anytime soon. If anything, the advent of a lot of it being available by cable-based streaming has made cable that much stronger.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

trip1eX said:


> Yeah but you aren't paying much for the other ESPNs.
> 
> And I'm not sure how you can just say you watch the main one and don't watch ESPN2 at all. Because sometimes events I want to watch are on 2 and sometimes they are 1. I have no idea what is going to be where. That's part of the reason they have 2 main channels.
> 
> .................


Me personally, I don't watch any ESPN channels except the main one. And that would normally be for an NFL game. Nothing else.

As far as other content. I currently pay $75 a month for the Ultimate HD tier on FiOS in a bundle. Which also includes several premium channels and the Redzone channel. Plus I do have OTA. But alot of my recordings are from cable. For me to drop cable and purchase the shows from streaming would cost me alot more than what I pay now. It would not be worth it for me to cut the cord. Of course I'm sure I could pare things down and get the price lower. But TV is so inexpensive right now. I pay $45 less than I did in 2001 when I had DirecTV. And I pay less than in 2007 when I first got FiOS. And I get alot more channels than back then. So I can't really complain much.


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## ncted (May 13, 2007)

trip1eX said:


> Show me where I said people are wrong for cutting the cord.
> 
> All I'm saying is the logic people like to lay out for doing so is never apples to apples. IT's weird to see cord cutters do the same thing big corporations like to do with their comparisons.
> 
> ...


I'm clearly not getting through to you, so I'm guessing one of us in some kind of zone. You're ignoring the entire premise, so I'll be ignoring you on this topic from here on out with the following caveat:

No one here has given me any reason to think I will be as happy Roamio/Mini as I am with the Hopper/Joey. Everyone seems more interested in assaulting my reasons for wanting to switch. Based on this discussion, the horrible experiences I've had the last 2 times I tried to switch to Tivo, and the impression I get that Tivo seems to be moving away from the OTA market and hardware in general, I have serious doubts I would be happy with the Roamio doing OTA-only -- not because of content issues, but because I've seen almost no one championing the platform, and the feedback I have gotten from the community has been to try to dissuade me from that path.

I've seen more support for Tivo from folks in the Dish forums on Satelliteguys. Dish is still the least expensive Pay TV option available to me, and they apparently have the best hardware/software platform and a very helpful community, so, unless something surprising happens, I expect I'll stick with Dish and reduce my package to the AT120 as you suggested and watch BBC America shows when they arrive on Amazon Prime, at least until someone comes out with an OTA DVR that is actually comparable to the Hopper.

Thanks for whatever.

Later,
Ted


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

TiVo is a cable-oriented product. If it weren't for the fact that they could easily make a cable/OTA product to get in on the over-hyped "cord cutting" phenomenon, there wouldn't be an OTA TiVo.

TiVo makes most of their money from deals with small MSOs to provide DVRs, and as such, their consumer sales are also very geared towards cable.

So the real comparison is DISH/Hopper vs. TiVo/cable. It looks like you're in a TWC area, so you have the misflagged channel problem, which cripples a part of TiVo's functionality, as well as a lack of VOD support. However, the fair comparison is still DISH/Hopper vs. TiVo/cable.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

ncted said:


> I'm clearly not getting through to you, so I'm guessing one of us in some kind of zone. You're ignoring the entire premise, so I'll be ignoring you on this topic from here on out with the following caveat:
> 
> No one here has given me any reason to think I will be as happy Roamio/Mini as I am with the Hopper/Joey. Everyone seems more interested in assaulting my reasons for wanting to switch. Based on this discussion, the horrible experiences I've had the last 2 times I tried to switch to Tivo, and the impression I get that Tivo seems to be moving away from the OTA market and hardware in general, I have serious doubts I would be happy with the Roamio doing OTA-only -- not because of content issues, but because I've seen almost no one championing the platform, and the feedback I have gotten from the community has been to try to dissuade me from that path.
> 
> ...


Well if you are ignoring me now it won't be much different than what has been going on. 

Anyway if you can get over the content difference and the use of 3 apps plus a DVR UI to watch tv assuming your OTA reception is doable then I don't see why moving to a Tivo from a Hopper would be a show stopper in light of saving $70/month according to your figures.


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## bstar1456 (May 9, 2014)

Tivo is good. But You have to do a cost benifit analysis taking consideration of market and demand.


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## tibbyjr (May 17, 2014)

Hi
I have went from Hopper to Roamio plus and have some questions .
1- Can you have more than 1 set of favorites ?
2- can the Romio auto tune ?
3- Does the guide take over a day to get all program information ? ( I get the Hd Channels but the guide says to be announced , but I do have guide information on Sd stations) and if this is a problem do I contact Tivo or Comcast ?
Thanks.


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