How Do You Get Live TV?

[GalaxyBoy]

I have a mountain between me and the TV transmitters, but if I didn’t I would definitely have an antenna. We had one of the streaming services that mimics cable, but dumped it because we just don’t watch most of the carp on the cable channels. So now, we subscribe to Paramount plus so we can get the local news, and the few network shows we do watch, which happen to be CBS.

 

[pb4uski]

Do you use a recording capability with your antenna, like a TiVo? Or just live with the commercials?...

Yes, we have a Tivo Roamio OTA that we got from them as a refurb deeply discounted, probably 10 years ago. Still going strong.

The one advantage of the Fire TV Recast is that since it "broadcasts" both live tv from the antenna or shows recorded from the antenna via your home wifi there is no need to run coax cable to each tv that you have.

It has been a godsend for us and makes things much easier. We avoided having to run coax to our dettached garage as a result.

Unfortunately, the Recast has been discontinued but used units are available on EBay. Ours has been very reliable, which is good because if I can't reset it using the FireTV remote I have to climb up into the attic to reset it, but that rarely happens.

 

[jim584672]

89 channels! None that I want to watch.

 

[bltkmt]

We have been using YoutubeTV for about three years and like it. It has gone up in price, however.

 

[GenXguy]

Live TV - no fees / subscriptions!

$15 antenna, some coax, and an amplifier, filters, and splitters gets me FOX, CBS, NBC, ABC, CW, a few PBS stations, MeTV, and COMET. I use a home theater PC DVR to skip commercials. As for sport, this is what I watch most of my NFL football games. I don't really watch other sports.

Streaming Free Live TV with Pluto, Xumo, and Roku Channel mostly. There are others like Sling Freestream, FreeVee, and Tubi with an overlap in a lot of the content.

Of course, I watch on-demand content a lot, but the OP was asking about live tv.

You can pay for streaming Live TV with services like Sling, Fubo, Hulu + LiveTV, Philo, Frndly, Peacock Premium, and YouTube TV.

89 channels! None that I want to watch.

I get a fraction of that many with my antenna in this less densely populated region, but I get the major broadcast networks mentioned, so I'm happy.

 

[Cobra9777]

Not a ripoff compared to cable/satellite…

Maybe. But that comparison is like ancient history at this point. I just look at $75/mo *PLUS* nearly 20 minutes of commercials every hour. And no regional sports channel. That's a ripoff in my book. Sure... DVR, on-demand. DW and DMIL don't do that. They watch their network shows live and sit through the ads. I literally have to leave the room.

 

[disneysteve]

Not a ripoff compared to cable/satellite, though it was a lot more fun when streaming drop ins were $40-45/month…

Sling is $45/month. That's what we have.

 

[gwill1010]

I use you tube tv and it costs 74/month. I share it with a friend so my cost is half of that.

I think this works if you're not using very many streams, else you get busted.

 

[gwill1010]

Big fan of youtube.tv.

 

[N02L84ER]

antenna in the attic

 

[5Miler]

Also antenna in the attic but use old Silicon Dust tuners to send it to my Windows Media Center server. We can watch live on any TV set via WMC extenders or I'll just DVR it and send it to Plex if I want to save the recording for posterity.

 

[like2]

We have an antenna for local channels behind the TV but also YouTube TV for some of the other channels we like- only 65 dollars a month bit it will increase to 75 in February.


We really like You Tube TV and had just cancelled Directv a few months back.

 

[skyking1]

No possibility of OTA so we use youtube TV.
The new home site gets 1 tower of OTA. It is either a religious channel or reruns of the Rifleman and Gunsmoke, etc. At least there is a cable pedestal nearby.

 

[Doribe]

We use an antenna hidden behind the wall. Cost about $45. I googled to find the best antenna for my location.

 

[2017ish]

A version of rabbit ears taped to a window in the basement, with cable up to DW's TV.

 

[DrRoy]

Xfinity

 

[lrip]

Hung an antenna in the garage attic. Gets all the locals when we want news, traffic or weather. Mostly stream programming.

 

[AnneG]

We use a Moho leaf antenna and get tons of free OTA channels. Additionally we have a Roku TV and the Roku Channel provides lots of live TV options. Interestingly enough, the only network station that doesn't come in on the antenna is Fox. We happen to like the weather guy on our local station and they have a streaming version as well that we can get through the Roku live channels.

 

[swakyaby]

Antenna mounted to outdoor eave. It gives excellent reception of the major networks CBS, NBC, ABC, Fox so I can watch local news and about 90% of the NFL games I wish to watch.

 

[big-papa]

We put an antenna in the attic and purchased a TiVO with a lifetime license.

Time has passed and it's very seldom now that we watch any live TV. The TiVO is on autopilot recording the evening news, which we almost never watch and a few network series, but that's about it. These days, of our total viewing time, TiVO (whether live or recorded) is probably less than 1% of our total viewing time...

Cheers.

 

[disneysteve]

These days, of our total viewing time, TiVO (whether live or recorded) is probably less than 1% of our total viewing time.

Same here. We have Sling but probably 98% of our TV viewing comes from streaming services. Personally I wouldn’t mind dropping Sling but I think my wife uses it a little more than I do. It’s the most expensive service we have at $45/month.

 

[chicamuxen]

We have had our antenna strapped to our chimney since we built our house 27 years ago. We replaced it once with a new one. We live about 25-30 miles south of Washington DC, and we are on a hill. So we get great reception.

 

[LastBoomer]

$10 rabbit ears antenna (one time cost).
Commercials, yes, but we all grew up with that!
Mute the commercials. There are some great free broadcast channels, including MoviesTV network: https://moviestvnetwork.com/schedule/

 

[Trailwalker]

Attic antenna connected to an Amazon Fire Recast.

 

[jim584672]

The Twist channel is going off the air at the end of the year.

https://www.watchtwist.com/