Cable or Dish?

[DJD]

Just discussed my cable bill with the company here in Lexington. They raised my bill by 7 dollars and I'm sick of it. They do this at least once a year. So I'm gonna get rid of them. They must be hurtin cause they layed off quite a few employees and are raising rates.

So I'm curious if any of you have a dish company for internet and cable and maybe phone? If so have you all looked into it eough to help me weed through all the sales pitches and also to see maybe what is more stable between the two dish companies. Thanks!

[know1]

I'm really cheap when it comes to TV...mostly because I don't care to watch much of it other than sporting events.

I've had Dish Network for years, but I only have the most basic of packages. I pay around $40 a month.

What I've been considering for awhile now is cutting the cable (or satellite) completely and just watching programs through a combination of streaming internet and downloads from places like iTunes. You can watch most network sites directly from the network websites.

Think of the downloads option as like Pay Per View. What I'm doing now is paying $40 a month for TV of which I probably watch less than 1% of it. I can pay $1.99 per show for things I really want to see.

I am a step ahead on getting TV from the internet as I have my laptop hooked directly to my 42" LCD TV. I have a wireless keyboard on the coffee table and when I'm on the computer, I use the picture in picture and watch the TV in the corner.

Like I said, my biggest reason for not doing it yet is sporting events, although I have watched many UK games from the internet when they weren't on channels that I get on my TV. The picture quality isn't the greatest, but I did watch them for free. And since I have the computer connected to the TV, I can sit on the couch and watch the games like I would normally.

[DJD]

I have heard that some hard rains and wind can hurt the signal?

[know1]

I have heard that some hard rains and wind can hurt the signal?

Not sure about wind, but the rain issue is true.

[fcfishman]

I have had Dish TV for 10 years and get the biggest package. All the movie channels and tons of sports, Outdoor Channel, etc. Had excellent results but I only get TV from them, and use Insight for my high speed internet as Dish only has Satellite Internet and it is expensive. Maybe twice a year we lose service for a couple hours due to bad storms but that is about it. Drawbacks are you buy the boxes, you own them, so when they go bad, you have to purchase new ones. Cable rents them to you for $8 a month per each so each has its own merit. Look at Direct TV as well as I understand they have some great specials and waive the box fees to new members.

[Dave Stewart]

I had my phone, internet, tv all bundled with my local phone company last year after the ice storm. I had been contemplating doing that for a while, especially since our cable company that serves my area is one of the highest in the country and their service has got to be one of the worst. Cable was up and down like a yo yo all the time and when you had a problem you would have to call someone that couldn't speak English most of the time, wait 45 minutes just to get them on the phone and then they would tell you that they would be out to check it out next week even though their local office is only about 3 miles from my home..but the folks at the local office won't talk to you about service...they just want your payment.

When the ice storm hit us last year, the cable of course went down and was down for over a month....and they billed all of us subscribers for service during that month. My electric went off for 20 days but my phone was only out for 24 hours. Have only had my phone out of service 3 times in 12 years and when it did go out, a simple phone call to the local office had a repairman here within 2 hours to get things fixed.

By bundling my tv, phone, internet and long distance with local company I am saving about 40.00 bucks a month now from what I was paying for all of those, get just as many channels, have not missed a UK game all season and have only had one internet outage that only lasted 2 hours in the past year. Should have done it a lot sooner....would have kept my blood pressure from boiling over every time I had to deal with the cable folks.

[RoadToad]

I have heard that some hard rains and wind can hurt the signal?

If your dish is mounted well, to where it's nice and solid, the wind shouldn't affect it. Heavy rain and snow do, though. When it snowed a coule weeks ago, some of it stuck to my dish, so I went out there with a garden hose and sprayed it off. It worked, and eliminated any doubts my neighbors might have had about me being nuts.

[Tyme2fish]

All of them will entice you with a teaser rate for the first year. Then when they think they have you hooked, the rates will go up.

I keep getting offers from all three (Dish, Direct, Insight Cable.) They all state price good for one year.

[pontooner]

With the Super Bowl coming up there should be some decent Dish/Direct TV deals out there right now.

This deal here http://slickdeals.net/forums/showthread.php?t=1800049 was almost enough to make me jump ship from Dish to Direct TV but I really didn't need the TV so I passed. Don't know if the deal is still good or not but they don't get much better than that.


Also is your phone company different than your Cable company? Does your phone company offer DSL internet? DSL is often cheaper than Cable internet and if you can bundle your phone and DSL you can save even more.


With Dish and Direct TV there is a chance of whats called rain fade but it usually has to be a very strong storm to cause it. As long as the dish is mounted securley, no obstructions in it's path (trees, tall buildings..) and aligned proprely you shouldn't have the fade happen very often.

So with Dish or Direct TV setup and if possiable phone + DSL you could leave your cable co out in the cold.

[DJD]

I'm checking into that Pontooner. My buddy did that with Windstream and got Direct TV (I think) as a partnership bundle or something. He said the HD signal is stronger? I don't know about that but if it's as good a signal and cheaper? Heck thats what I'm talkin' bout!

[RoadToad]

Dish Network's satellite sits lower in the sky (closer to the horizon) than DirectTV's. I've heard that as a result, the signal is a little weaker and less reliable, but I really don't know. One other thing is, DirectTV is currently in a contract squabble with Versus, and as a result, isn't carrying their signal. DISH still carries Versus. I actually considered switching to DISH just because of that.