As far as cutting cable goes, I "cut" it quite a few years ago though they offered me a faster speed and limited basic cable + HBO for 12 months for less than what I was paying for internet alone.  

 

Before the 12 months ended I called them up telling them I didn't care about the cable tv and that I just wanted the internet, then they offered me another package for 12 months with a faster speed and 45 channels for less than what I was paying the previous month.  I did the same again, I got the same speed but I got more channels for the same price ($63) currently.

 

So that seems like the trick is just to call every year telling them you want to kill the TV and they'll just throw packages at you, you don't get a choice in what tv package you get but I didn't care about the tv anyways I just wanted the internet (which was more by itself than with the package).

 

For sports MLB.tv gives you all the baseball you could want,minus the lame blackout restrictions (can't watch the Rays straight up) but there are workarounds for that. I believe NBA and NHL have similar services but I don't care about either sport enough to check them out. 

 

 NFL is a bit tricky but as mentioned above there is gamepass, you just need a work around *cough*, I find the European version seems to offer more stuff but the Canadian version seems to run smoother (I guess the ping).  I used it for a season and a piece then I found a free/hd alternative 

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Some things are better shared in a pm...

 

 Sorry I got moderated..  

 

Go on.... I'm not a cyber whiz. What are proxies and what's the advantage?

---

Go Jags!
*To stay up for atleast 2 years 3/6/17
2016 draft players I think will be good

• On the Fournette train, will be best back of his class 3/6/17
  
• Lattimore please,  Lockdowns on both sides would be nice
  
• Engram at TE and the MJD clone Samaje Perine
  

I've done some research on this. I'd love to cut the cord but I like my sports, the wife likes her movies and the kids like their children shows and movies. At one point in time I cut the cord so to speak. I got a VPN and a box with Kodi app on it. From there, you can program that app to watch whatever your little heart desires. When I say "whatever your little heart desires", I mean you can watch live sporting events, all the premium stuff, all the cable/satellite channels, all the channels that are out there in the World! Not just US stuff. If it's broadcasted you can watch it. Supposedly, when they fine/arrest people for pirating, they arrest those who distribute, not so much watch. Hence why I went the VPN route. That being said, I resumed my satellite subscription. With the acces I had to every channel imaginable it just seemed way too shady for my liking. Not to mention there was a lot of adult content. Yes I can keep tabs of my kids and make sure they don't watch it, but my bigger fear was what sort of adult content would be available. Obviously this route isn't legal. But, I sure as hell didn't want to have acces to the adult stuff that could possibly have children involved. Whether it did or not, IDK. But I sure as hell wasn't going to find out. So in other words, I was either, too scared to continue or too smart to continue with or without the VPN. If you or others go, or have gone this route, I'd like the feedback on your experiences.

Yep that's your best bet. You can watch whatever you like if you know what you're doing. And I'd you don't there are hundreds of YouTube videos posted to walk you through setting up your Kodi box. I use Kodi on occasion when I can't find what I'm looking for thru Comcast ( or when I don't want to pay for it.. ) and have it on my phone as well so I can watch certain live events if I'm on the go. It's definitely shady though and probably not the best route to go if you want to stay on the right side of the law.


There are plenty of other legal alternatives out there like Netflix, Hulu, Apple TV, Amazon fire stick, and Google Chromecast just to name a few. Get you a Chromecast and a couple of apps on your phone/tablet/laptop and you're good to go.

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"Before you criticize a man, walk a mile in his shoes. That way, if he gets angry, he's a mile away and barefoot."

Call customer retention and tell them you're done. Then watch the magic happen. We actually got that advice from a DirecTV service rep we had out for an equipment problem. He suggested doing this and after being with DTV for 15 years, we finally got a real break.

I do this with Comcast all the time. I politely ask to speak with the retention department and they always connect me over. I usually end up getting a discount on my bill and free HBO thrown in for 3 months. After the 3 months is up I call back in again to speak with retention. I haven't paid for HBO for 2 years now that I think about it...

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"Before you criticize a man, walk a mile in his shoes. That way, if he gets angry, he's a mile away and barefoot."

Call customer retention and tell them you're done. Then watch the magic happen. We actually got that advice from a DirecTV service rep we had out for an equipment problem. He suggested doing this and after being with DTV for 15 years, we finally got a real break.

 

^This.


 

I did this last year, and ended up saving $28. per month and getting a free season of NFL Sunday Ticket.


 

But you have to mean it when you say you want to discontinue the service.

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"Why should I give information to you when all you want to do is find something wrong with it?"

We haven't had anything other than Netflix and Amazon Prime since 2013. The only thing that really sucks is not having network TV for football and we don't live close enough to the nearest stations to pick up anything on antenna and I live in NC so would only see Panthers, Redskins, and other regional teams. I had Game Pass for 2 years but it sucks not being able to see games live and we have medical bills to pay for so I had to let it go.

I know where you can watch every game for free

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I know where you can watch every game for free

Help a sister out.

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^This.


 

I did this last year, and ended up saving $28. per month and getting a free season of NFL Sunday Ticket.


 

But you have to mean it when you say you want to discontinue the service.

 

They also have a limit on how often and how much they will offer to keep you as a customer. I've had DirecTV 11 years and have negotiated with their retention team about 6 times, all but 1 of which I was seriously considering dropping the service. The items offered to keep me have become incrementally less attractive, but still enough to keep me. My problem is being over 50 miles away from the nearest local network affiliates' HD broadcasting towers, and from what local folks tell me the reception isn't great.

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If something can corrupt you, you're corrupted already.
- Bob Marley


 

^This.


 

I did this last year, and ended up saving $28. per month and getting a free season of NFL Sunday Ticket.


 

But you have to mean it when you say you want to discontinue the service.

 

Exactly. I feel like I am in a position to bluff them because  I have never been a Comcast customer before and I'm sure there are cheap "new customer" deals always  going on there, so worst case scenario that the cord cutting doesn't work out, can always go that route.

 

I don't care much about NFL Sunday Ticket. I had it a couple of years and with going to most of the Jaguar games, I missed out on half of it anyway.

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I am at the end of my rope getting gouged by DirecTV. Has anyone cut the cord? Sling TV seems like it really has a majority of the channels I watch for $20 a month plus a few add-on's. Am I missing something? The main ones I watch that I am not seeing are NFL Network, NBA TV, and Golf Channel. Are these offered with any other packages?

 

For those who have done it, can you give some pro's and con's of your experience?

 

Thanks!

 

Well, I "cut the cord" a few months ago and haven't missed a beat.  I have an Amazon Fire (the box not the stick) and I side-loaded the Kodi app.  I also got an inexpensive over-the-air antenna and receive quite a few channels, though not all of them are in HD, but I can pretty much watch whatever I want in HD.  The key thing is to have a good internet connection and of course, be able to pick up stations over-the-air.

 

With that being said, I can watch the channels that you listed with no problem.  I am not doing anything illegal whatsoever because I am using "commercial off the shelf" hardware and open source software.  Data received over the internet is free as long as you aren't "hacking" into a system to get it.  Is it ethical?  Well, you the person using the equipment and/or software needs to make that decision on your own.  Technically speaking, if someone puts a live stream of copyrighted data onto the internet, it's fair game.  They in fact are the ones breaking the law.  If someone shares copyrighted data using bit torrent or some other protocol on the internet, they are breaking the law.

 

The bottom line is, there is a fine line between legal/ethical and not.  I personally don't download, stream or otherwise obtain content that I know is being illegally hosted.  For the upcoming football season, I'll rely on my over-the-air antenna and perhaps look into a subscription for the Thursday night games.

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There are 10 kinds of people in this world.  Those who understand binary and those who don't.

My setup involves subscriptions to Hulu ($8/month), Netflix ($8/month), Amazon Prime ($100/year) and HBO Now ($15/month).  I cut the cord with DirecTV almost a year ago.  I of course had to keep my Comcast High Speed Internet at $65 per month.  I have a single antennae for local channels and I have it hooked up to a Tablo DVR system which is connected to my router.  I can pull up the Tablo from any TV with a Roku or Apple TV attached to it and watch live TV or recorded shows from the local stations.  The Tablo eliminates the need for an antennae being hooked up to each TV.  The Tablo isn't all that necessary if you have a Hulu subscription, however, I can record live sports like Jaguar games and we don't have to pay CBS for their streamable content which they don't like to share unless you buy a subscription to their app as well.  My wife uses the Tablo more than I do, I just personally use it for the live sports.

 

Shortly after I cut the cord with DirecTV, Comcast called me and offered me a basic cable channel package and free HBO for a year for an additional $5 per month which took my Comcast bill to $70 and with no contract.  I obviously took this deal and cancelled HBO Now in favor of HBO Go.  I do not have a cable box attached to any TV in my house.  I use the above mentioned apps or I log directly into apps like AMC, HGTV, ESPN, etc with my basic channel subscription through Comcast.  

 

I was paying over $200 per month for Comcast Internet and DirecTV.  I now pay approximately $94 per month and that may jump to $110 a month when my free HBO runs out and I need to re-subscribe to HBO Now, but I may wait until next season of Game of Thrones to worry about that.  It can require a little bit of money up front in equipment if you don't already have a Roku, Apple TV or equivalent already hooked up to each TV in your house and the Tablo unit and attached hard drive probably cost me $250 (There's also an option for a $5/month Tablo subscription to update it's channel guide regularly or $150 lifetime subscription, I opted for the lifetime which is essentially paying for 2 1/2 years up front, not a hard decision when you shave $100 or more off your monthly bill).  Native Tablo apps are being discussed for being pre-installed in newer smart TVs so I think they are on the verge of becoming more mainstream than they already are.  There isn't an AppleTV app for Tablo yet but there is for iOS devices and you can obviously Air Play something on your iOS device directly on your AppleTV and the native AppleTV Tablo app should be coming out any week now.  There is already a Tablo app for Roku.

 

Quite frankly I don't miss a thing about having DirecTV.  It took a little bit to get used to not having a Guide for your entire channel package, but I have access to everything I watched before except NFL Network and I now have access to the NFL Network App using someone else's log in info that let me borrow it.  If you're comfortable paying the up front cost of obtaining the necessary equipment or if you already have it, there's really no reason to keep a cable/satellite subscription.  Even if Comcast hadn't had called me with the offer they did, I'd be just fine with those App subscriptions I mentioned above.  

 

I did have SlingTV for a month or two to have access to ESPN and AMC before Comcast called with their offer.  I would resubscribe in the event the $5 upgrade to my package expired, but I will say the things that bothered me about SlingTV were that they didn't have a proper channel guide and some channels were broadcast at louder levels than others.  Hopefully they fixed those issues.

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Okay folks, any posts about the ILLEGAL distribution of broadcast content will be considered a violation of the COC and warning worthy moving forward... so please do not promote anything illegal or questionable on the board! Thank you!

---

What in the Wide Wide World of Sports is agoin' on here???

My setup involves subscriptions to Hulu ($8/month), Netflix ($8/month), Amazon Prime ($100/year) and HBO Now ($15/month).  I cut the cord with DirecTV almost a year ago.  I of course had to keep my Comcast High Speed Internet at $65 per month.  I have a single antennae for local channels and I have it hooked up to a Tablo DVR system which is connected to my router.  I can pull up the Tablo from any TV with a Roku or Apple TV attached to it and watch live TV or recorded shows from the local stations.  The Tablo eliminates the need for an antennae being hooked up to each TV.  The Tablo isn't all that necessary if you have a Hulu subscription, however, I can record live sports like Jaguar games and we don't have to pay CBS for their streamable content which they don't like to share unless you buy a subscription to their app as well.  My wife uses the Tablo more than I do, I just personally use it for the live sports.

 

Shortly after I cut the cord with DirecTV, Comcast called me and offered me a basic cable channel package and free HBO for a year for an additional $5 per month which took my Comcast bill to $70 and with no contract.  I obviously took this deal and cancelled HBO Now in favor of HBO Go.  I do not have a cable box attached to any TV in my house.  I use the above mentioned apps or I log directly into apps like AMC, HGTV, ESPN, etc with my basic channel subscription through Comcast.  

 

I was paying over $200 per month for Comcast Internet and DirecTV.  I now pay approximately $94 per month and that may jump to $110 a month when my free HBO runs out and I need to re-subscribe to HBO Now, but I may wait until next season of Game of Thrones to worry about that.  It can require a little bit of money up front in equipment if you don't already have a Roku, Apple TV or equivalent already hooked up to each TV in your house and the Tablo unit and attached hard drive probably cost me $250 (There's also an option for a $5/month Tablo subscription to update it's channel guide regularly or $150 lifetime subscription, I opted for the lifetime which is essentially paying for 2 1/2 years up front, not a hard decision when you shave $100 or more off your monthly bill).  Native Tablo apps are being discussed for being pre-installed in newer smart TVs so I think they are on the verge of becoming more mainstream than they already are.  There isn't an AppleTV app for Tablo yet but there is for iOS devices and you can obviously Air Play something on your iOS device directly on your AppleTV and the native AppleTV Tablo app should be coming out any week now.  There is already a Tablo app for Roku.

 

Quite frankly I don't miss a thing about having DirecTV.  It took a little bit to get used to not having a Guide for your entire channel package, but I have access to everything I watched before except NFL Network and I now have access to the NFL Network App using someone else's log in info that let me borrow it.  If you're comfortable paying the up front cost of obtaining the necessary equipment or if you already have it, there's really no reason to keep a cable/satellite subscription.  Even if Comcast hadn't had called me with the offer they did, I'd be just fine with those App subscriptions I mentioned above.  

 

I did have SlingTV for a month or two to have access to ESPN and AMC before Comcast called with their offer.  I would resubscribe in the event the $5 upgrade to my package expired, but I will say the things that bothered me about SlingTV were that they didn't have a proper channel guide and some channels were broadcast at louder levels than others.  Hopefully they fixed those issues.

 

 

Nice post. Thanks.

 

So, this NFL Network app, is this like a channel on Roku or whatnot that is accessible like HBOGO, etc with a login, or is it just mobile? If that is the case, I would gladly pay my buddy monthly for his login. NFLN is really the only thing keeping me from pulling the trigger here.

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Okay folks, any posts about the ILLEGAL distribution of broadcast content will be considered a violation of the COC and warning worthy moving forward... so please do not promote anything illegal or questionable on the board! Thank you!

but the internet and illegal activity goes hand and hand with cutting the cord!  Without napster would we have mp3s so readily available, would the music industry have changed so much in the last decade?  Without pirating would companies like netflix still find a way to run original content on a business model built for the pirate crowd?

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Go Jags!
*To stay up for atleast 2 years 3/6/17
2016 draft players I think will be good

• On the Fournette train, will be best back of his class 3/6/17
  
• Lattimore please,  Lockdowns on both sides would be nice
  
• Engram at TE and the MJD clone Samaje Perine
  

Nice post. Thanks.

 

So, this NFL Network app, is this like a channel on Roku or whatnot that is accessible like HBOGO, etc with a login, or is it just mobile? If that is the case, I would gladly pay my buddy monthly for his login. NFLN is really the only thing keeping me from pulling the trigger here.

 

There is an NFL Now app that has it's own free content but also allows you to login with proper credentials and watch live streaming NFL Network.  The NFL Now app is native on Roku and AppleTV.

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but the internet and illegal activity goes hand and hand with cutting the cord!  Without napster would we have mp3s so readily available, would the music industry have changed so much in the last decade?  Without pirating would companies like netflix still find a way to run original content on a business model built for the pirate crowd?

Banks and bank robbery also go hand in hand, but we aren't going to be promoting that either! :thumbsup:

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What in the Wide Wide World of Sports is agoin' on here???

I will add that I think subscription apps are the way all video content will be delivered and consumed in the future.  Might as well go ahead and get on board with it now and save money at the same time.

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I will add that I think subscription apps are the way all video content will be delivered and consumed in the future.  Might as well go ahead and get on board with it now and save money at the same time.

 

Awesome. Thanks a lot. One more question. How did you arrive at the Tablo as a DVR choice? I saw a couple options like Tivo and Channel Master, but they all seem to be compatible with different streaming services. Can you actually schedule and record content from the streaming services they are compatible with or does it only work with the antenna?

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Banks and bank robbery also go hand in hand, but we aren't going to be promoting that either! :thumbsup:

Haha in my original moderated post I was simply teaching people how to and the options available.  Not so much promoting but showing exactly what is it out there and how to manipulate your IP address so it doesn't come back to you.


At no point did I say this is a better way to do it and save money, although I did mention that what you would be doing is illegal and could get you in trouble, at that point it becomes a personal choice.


I used to hate the occupy movement because I don't like the idea of ruining a perfectly good park to crappily protest however I have come to realize we all occupy in our own way.  Many in my generation (30 year oldish) occupy with how we access entertainment.  In the past people would occupy by getting those illegal cable boxes.  Some of you might steal wifi from a neighbor although secured wifi is becoming more common.  Threatening to leave your cable company for a better deal is another way.  If you work under the table jobs you occupy! 


Peer to Peer software is a pretty amazing technological innovation and can be used entirely legally, thats all I was saying  :thumbsup:

 

I will add that I think subscription apps are the way all video content will be delivered and consumed in the future.  Might as well go ahead and get on board with it now and save money at the same time.

Thats the idea,  I think there is a belief that CableTV, the internet, gaming, computers, streaming devices are all different things but the more these items progress the more they have become highly similar and capable of doing each others job.

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Go Jags!
*To stay up for atleast 2 years 3/6/17
2016 draft players I think will be good

• On the Fournette train, will be best back of his class 3/6/17
  
• Lattimore please,  Lockdowns on both sides would be nice
  
• Engram at TE and the MJD clone Samaje Perine
  

Haha in my original moderated post I was simply teaching people how to and the options available.  Not so much promoting but showing exactly what is it out there and how to manipulate your IP address so it doesn't come back to you.

At no point did I say this is a better way to do it and save money, although I did mention that what you would be doing is illegal and could get you in trouble, at that point it becomes a personal choice.

I used to hate the occupy movement because I don't like the idea of ruining a perfectly good park to crappily protest however I have come to realize we all occupy in our own way.  Many in my generation (30 year oldish) occupy with how we access entertainment.  In the past people would occupy by getting those illegal cable boxes.  Some of you might steal wifi from a neighbor although secured wifi is becoming more common.  Threatening to leave your cable company for a better deal is another way.  If you work under the table jobs you occupy! 

Peer to Peer software is a pretty amazing technological innovation and can be used entirely legally, thats all I was saying  :thumbsup:

 



Thats the idea,  I think there is a belief that CableTV, the internet, gaming, computers, streaming devices are all different things but the more these items progress the more they have become highly similar and capable of doing each others job.

That's all well and good, just don't share the info on the board. :no:

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What in the Wide Wide World of Sports is agoin' on here???