SlingTV is disappointing

[Midpack]

Now if you could stream Sling content for downloading and replaying like a DVR, then you'd have my interest, and I might even pay a little more for it. But with the flakiness of some online streaming and no ability to skip commercials, I'm not that interested.

Exactly my thoughts. After 15+ years of living happily in the "DVR Era", there is just no way I'd ever give that up willingly, just to save a few dollars. I am thinking of trying out PS Vue next year if I can't negotiate a good deal with DirecTV, since it's the only TV streaming service that has true DVR capabilities right now. Still waiting for that elusive holy grail, though: under $90/month for my personal top 25 cable channels (including HBO and all local channels) with full DVR. Looks like PS Vue comes fairly close to that, but some of my local channels are missing and the DVR functionality is limited (recorded shows only available for 28 days).

I'd hate to give up time shifting with a DVR too, but with Direct TV Now almost every channel can be streamed Live or VOD (some ad free, others not). VOD seems like a decent substitute for a DVR, what am I missing?

 

[Katsmeow]

I'd hate to give up time shifting with a DVR too, but with Direct TV Now almost every channel can be streamed Live or VOD (some ad free, others not). VOD seems like a decent substitute for a DVR, what am I missing?

I think some channels (or maybe shows -- not sure) may not be available for VOD. If they are and availability does not expire then I think that is a reasonable substitute. I think on some services VOD may not be available after X amount of time.

I actually went to the directv now website and was frustrated that I couldn't seem to find out channel line ups or detailed information without signing up for a trial which I didn't want to do. Am I missing some way to get that information?

 

[Midpack]

I think some channels (or maybe shows -- not sure) may not be available for VOD. If they are and availability does not expire then I think that is a reasonable substitute. I think on some services VOD may not be available after X amount of time.

I actually went to the directv now website and was frustrated that I couldn't seem to find out channel line ups or detailed information without signing up for a trial which I didn't want to do. Am I missing some way to get that information?

They definitely make it as hard as possible to find details, but I found a complete list here including what's live and/or VOD DirecTV Now FAQ: All the details on AT&T's new streaming TV service

Like I said earlier, Direct TV Now looks way more compelling to me than Sling TV, but they're off to a rough start, so I'll wait and see - hopefully they'll get sorted quickly.

 

[Sojourner]

After looking a bit more carefully at the DirecTV Now channel lineup and VOD availability, seems like it might be worth considering once they make all the major local channels available in my market. I'm sure they'll sort that out over the coming year and will add more flexible DVR functionality. Once that happens, I could easily see myself going for the $60/month plan that seems to have pretty much everything except some premium movie channels. I haven't paid as little as $60 for satellite or cable TV in well over 10 years!

 

[hesperus]

Now if you could stream Sling content for downloading and replaying like a DVR, then you'd have my interest, and I might even pay a little more for it.

SlingTV is going to be demoing a DVR feature in the coming months. It would be a nice feature. I signed up for the chance to be one of the beta testers, so maybe I'll have a chance to debug it. We've had sling for about 18 months, and although it started poorly (buffering, outages, etc) it's come a long way and now runs quite smoothly with great quality.

 

[Katsmeow]

I want to cut the cord so bad, but I'm hung up on the internet service. DH just spent time today with Comcast. Our current service is $254 a month which is TV, internet and phone. This is for 3 TVs with DVR. With fees it is $290 a month.

What I would really like is the internet service I have now and a much pared down list of TV. They used to sell you a basic local TV channel selection with internet. I would like that to keep my mom happy when she visits (we can't use an antenna - no reception). Then we could do for ourselves some streaming service, probably Playstation Vue.

At one time we had this type of internet from Comcast and it was about $80 a month.

Well, now you can't get the faster internet without at least Digital Starter Service. We have 200 Mbps service. We could move down to 100 but that doesn't save much and still requires Digital Starter.

The next internet down is 25 Mbps which is too slow for the gaming and streaming we do. I could probably manage 75 if they had it or maybe even 50 but 25 is out of the question.

To get our current internet and Digital Starter TV would be $185 a month if we keep phone. We can drop that and it goes down to $175 (plus fees) and requires a 2 year contract. So, it saves $70 a month but it is much fewer channels and doesn't have HBO which we currently have.

Or, for $195 a month ($60 less than we have now) we can basically get what we have for 2 years but HBO would go up $10 in a year.

There doesn't seem to be a way to get internet above 25 Mbps unless we are willing to spend almost $100 a month for TV (technically the 200 Mbps internet is about $100 a month but you can't actually get it without another $75 to $100 of TV).

 

[ziggy29]

I'd hate to give up time shifting with a DVR too, but with Direct TV Now almost every channel can be streamed Live or VOD (some ad free, others not). VOD seems like a decent substitute for a DVR, what am I missing?

VOD still requires real-time streaming, I think, which (at least where we live) includes a lot of stuttering when the internet pipeline gets constipated. Being able to capture the entire stream locally for playback would eliminate that. It also makes pause, rewind, et cetera a lot less painless. (I've compared how it's done on TiVo and on Roku, for example, and there is no comparison.)

 

[Midpack]

VOD still requires real-time streaming, I think, which (at least where we live) includes a lot of stuttering when the internet pipeline gets constipated. Being able to capture the entire stream locally for playback would eliminate that. It also makes pause, rewind, et cetera a lot less painless. (I've compared how it's done on TiVo and on Roku, for example, and there is no comparison.)

VOD is "real-time streaming" as you note. I guess I need to bite the bullet and get one of these streaming services to see for myself. I've never heard people with Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, etc. complain much about "stuttering" or buffering issues, but I haven't 'listened' for that either. I'd be very disappointed if buffering delayed viewing too often, worse yet DW would be telling me 'told you!' constantly.

 

[broadway]

I want to cut the cord so bad, but I'm hung up on the internet service. DH just spent time today with Comcast. Our current service is $254 a month which is TV, internet and phone. This is for 3 TVs with DVR. With fees it is $290 a month.

We pay $51.57 for Comcast basic cable + internet.

Basic cable which is just ABC, NBC, CBS, PBS, CW, FOX. Because we are half-way between Philadelphia and NYC, we get both sets of channels.
No DVRs. Just have a DTA box which unscrambles the cable signal which so far has been free.

The internet is Economy Plus which is the slowest.

My phone service is landline with Verizon, and I plan on keeping it that way.

I cannot imagine paying $290 a month for cable and internet.

 

[Fishingmn]

We do Sling TV and really only watch 3 channels but for $25/mo it's worth it to us.

HGTV - requirement for the DW
Fox Sports - Minnesota Wild, Timberwolves, Twins and some Gopher Hockey
CNN - when there's big news event

Otherwise it's over the air for local (with DVR) or Netflix.

That combination works well and saves us significantly over our old cable bill.

 

[audreyh1]

VOD is "real-time streaming" as you note. I guess I need to bite the bullet and get one of these streaming services to see for myself. I've never heard people with Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, etc. complain much about "stuttering" or buffering issues, but I haven't 'listened' for that either. I'd be very disappointed if buffering delayed viewing too often, worse yet DW would be telling me 'told you!' constantly.

Any stuttering or buffering issues are only when our internet provider is having technical issues. Never due to the streaming service like Netflix, and we only have 10mbps which is no longer a high rate.

 

[ERD50]

Any stuttering or buffering issues are only when our internet provider is having technical issues. Never due to the streaming service like Netflix, and we only have 10mbps which is no longer a high rate.

Actually, the source can make a difference. I see that Netflix has various options and algorithms for matching the download speed/quality to help avoid buffering. You can go into account prefs, and set max bandwidth, and they monitor delays, and will reset the speed/quality lower if needed. Other sources may not have this flexibility, and use a 'one stream rate fits all' approach.

Ours maxes at ~ 6 mpbs, and Netflix is almost always fine, I think we generally get the 'one step lower' quality level, which is just fine for our viewing.

I haven't figured out if Sling TV does this, DW has used it some, I have only a little.

-ERD50

 

[GTFan]

Our Xfinity internet/TV has become insanely expensive ($290 a month for 3 TVs). Cutting down channels only cuts the price by a tiny amount.

Yep, that's insane. I just re-upped a Comcast 2 year double play (Blast HSI + all channels + HBO) for $110 a month, about $120 with all taxes and fees included. I was on a $100/mo. new customer promo before so $10/mo. increase after 2 years which is not that bad, except they have added another $8/mo. in broadcast and regional sports fees over time.

That's using a single Cablecard in a Tivo + 3 Minis, which means I don't pay their ripoff equipment and outlet fees. The Tivo whole-house setup paid for itself a year ago vs. renting boxes. Plus I get a $2.50/mo. credit for using my own equipment.

I get that same new customer promo every 2 years when my current one expires. It wouldn't be much cheaper to only go with HSI + streaming services (something like $100 a month I think) and I wouldn't be able to auto-skip all those commercials without a DVR. Plus my son uses a ton of data today, we'd probably exceed the new 1TB data cap if we went all streaming.

Streaming is a very poor substitute to a good DVR setup IMO, but I can see why folks like it if they don't watch much TV.

 

[GTFan]

I'd hate to give up time shifting with a DVR too, but with Direct TV Now almost every channel can be streamed Live or VOD (some ad free, others not). VOD seems like a decent substitute for a DVR, what am I missing?

Unskippable ads, limited VOD viewing windows, buffering issues, no Dolby Digital on a TON of stuff (e.g. none of the streaming TV providers have it). With a DVR you record and watch whenever and however you want with cable/OTA quality, which can be YMMV but is very good and rock-solid for me.

My Tivos and Minis all have commercial auto-skip for the big networks with a separate program I added (kmttg), don't even have to press a button.

 

[mpeirce]

Streaming is a very poor substitute to a good DVR setup IMO, but I can see why folks like it if they don't watch much TV.

One feature of TiVo I appreciate is how it keeps track of what I've seen. I set it to "Record New Only" and I never have to deal with remembering which episodes we've watched - it takes care of that.

That's not a huge issue for story line shows, but shows like House Hunters International (for example) we just want to see ones we haven't seen before. There's no easy way I know to track that sort of thing across other services.

Netflix does track what I watch on Netflix, but (a) sometimes I watch things on other services and (b) sometimes it looses track of what's I've already seen on Netflix.

I hope the TV world reinvents itself quickly, but I'm not convinced it'll get to where I hope it ends up anytime soon.

 

[Katsmeow]

Yep, that's insane. I just re-upped a Comcast 2 year double play (Blast HSI + all channels + HBO) for $110 a month, about $120 with all taxes and fees included. I was on a $100/mo. new customer promo before so $10/mo. increase after 2 years which is not that bad, except they have added another $8/mo. in broadcast and regional sports fees over time.

That's using a single Cablecard in a Tivo + 3 Minis, which means I don't pay their ripoff equipment and outlet fees. The Tivo whole-house setup paid for itself a year ago vs. renting boxes. Plus I get a $2.50/mo. credit for using my own equipment.

I get that same new customer promo every 2 years when my current one expires. It wouldn't be much cheaper to only go with HSI + streaming services (something like $100 a month I think) and I wouldn't be able to auto-skip all those commercials without a DVR. Plus my son uses a ton of data today, we'd probably exceed the new 1TB data cap if we went all streaming.

Streaming is a very poor substitute to a good DVR setup IMO, but I can see why folks like it if they don't watch much TV.

I wish I could do that. We were on a promo for Triple Play, but that ran out a year and a half ago. We were paying $200, but then it jumped up to $240 and then this summer went to $274, and just last month went to $290. We've called several times to try to get something better but the offers have been awful. The one now that would save $60 a month is the best one we've gotten. The last time we checked it was going to save hardly anything and required a 2 year contract.

Where they really have us on the internet. I would just get internet alone if I could and just do streaming stuff for everything else. But, with the gaming and streaming we do, I can't tolerate the 25 mbps service. That is the fastest service that doesn't require a TV package. The next level is 100 mbps (we have 200 now) but requires the TV package.

We can't go anywhere else for internet. The only other option in our area is DSL from a carrier that people say isn't good and is on 10 mbps so way too slow.

 

[GTFan]

You might not need triple play with cell phones and free/cheap VOIP services like Obi with Google voice or Ooma. Port that number out and see what kind of double play you can get. It looks like you might be paying a lot of rental fees too.

Easy way to see what you can save with double is to use incognito mode browser to go to Xfinity.com and see what a new customer can get. Put in a neighbor s address that doesn't have it.

 

[Midpack]

Unskippable ads, limited VOD viewing windows, buffering issues, no Dolby Digital on a TON of stuff (e.g. none of the streaming TV providers have it). With a DVR you record and watch whenever and however you want with cable/OTA quality, which can be YMMV but is very good and rock-solid for me.

My Tivos and Minis all have commercial auto-skip for the big networks with a separate program I added (kmttg), don't even have to press a button.

If you put aside the cost, certainly the incumbents are better. But at one third to half the cost, Direct TV Now is worth consideration for us, IF they get their birthing issues fixed. YMMV

And if this isn't the answer (maybe not), we're one step closer to throttling back the cable & satellite rip offs!

 

[aja8888]

I wish I could do that. We were on a promo for Triple Play, but that ran out a year and a half ago. We were paying $200, but then it jumped up to $240 and then this summer went to $274, and just last month went to $290. We've called several times to try to get something better but the offers have been awful. The one now that would save $60 a month is the best one we've gotten. The last time we checked it was going to save hardly anything and required a 2 year contract.

Where they really have us on the internet. I would just get internet alone if I could and just do streaming stuff for everything else. But, with the gaming and streaming we do, I can't tolerate the 25 mbps service. That is the fastest service that doesn't require a TV package. The next level is 100 mbps (we have 200 now) but requires the TV package.

We can't go anywhere else for internet. The only other option in our area is DSL from a carrier that people say isn't good and is on 10 mbps so way too slow.

We are in the same area and same boat. We have 3 TV's one DVR box and two other boxes, with VOIP phone and internet and no premium channels. We don't stream much or play internet games but our bill crept up to $254/month then I went nuts.

I got Comcast on the phone and threatened to buy Tivo boxes when they had a current sale. You should have heard the agent doing all they could to hold us to the junk rental boxes (big profit center). Somehow we got the package dropped to $180/month. But they increase prices every 6 months and its creeping up again.

Since we have no real other quality choice for internet, we are stuck with them. Maybe this year I will look into the dish offers. What a pain in the @$$ this is each year.

 

[GTFan]

If you put aside the cost, certainly the incumbents are better. But at one third to half the cost, Direct TV Now is worth consideration for us, IF they get their birthing issues fixed. YMMV

Yes, certainly YMMV - as mentioned in our area the HSI + DTV Now (or Sling, PS Vue etc.) combo is not significantly cheaper than the double play deal I get with Comcast. It's maybe $10-15 cheaper and you have all the disadvantages with streaming that I mentioned above, plus I have free HBO and way more channels (most of which we don't watch of course, but some we do). But more importantly, ad-skipping is a must. I'm not going to go backwards with streaming and have to deal with ads.

 

[GTFan]

I got Comcast on the phone and threatened to buy Tivo boxes when they had a current sale.

Our Tivo + 3 Minis paid for themselves vs. renting in a couple of years. And they're so much better than what Comcast has anyway.

Just bite the bullet and do it when they have a sale. With the recent black Friday Tivo deals you could have spent around $800 for a 6-tuner 2TB Roamio Pro + 3 Minis and that would easily pay for itself in less than 2 years (assuming $40 or so a month in Comcast rental fees). If the hard drive ever fails on the Roamio it's a simple drop-in replacement, it reformats the drive and you're good to go again.

 

[Bestwifeever]

We have only one TV with a Comcast box and then have one with a bluray player that we use for streaming Netflix and Amazon Prime (we have an OTA antenna there too as we can get maybe half the local channels with the direction the room faces, but we don't really watch even those). We don't pay Comcast anything for that TV.

Do you really need the TV capabilities for three TVs, Katsmeow?

 

[misanman]

And they're so much better than what Comcast has anyway.

The Comcast X1 system is pretty amazing, to me anyway. But I haven't used TiVo, so what do I know.

 

[stlguy57]

Had SlingTV for a couple weeks to try it out. It was just OK but disappointed it didn't have more offerings.

DirecTV NOW launched and tried them for a week. Now I've cancelled Sling and sticking with DirecTV NOW. They have an introductory offer if you keep their 60.00 package called GO Big after the trial, you can have it for 35.00 as long as you don't switch packages. If you pay 3 months in advance, you will get a free AppleTV or Amazon Firestick. Already had AppleTV...it's pretty good for 35.00. Add HBO for 5.00/month.

It's cut my cable TV bill by 50%.

 

[Katsmeow]

Do you really need the TV capabilities for three TVs, Katsmeow?

Currently we do. We have it on the TV in our bedroom and in 2 guest rooms. One guest room is the one used by my mom when she is down here and she mostly doesn't do anything when she is here except watch TV (well, eat and sleep but still...). Also, if DH and I want to watch something different then we can each have a TV to watch. Then we have one in our college student son's room for him to use when here. He will be out of the house soon so we could drop that one. But, it only cuts the cost $10. We have a TV in our living room but it has an XBox on it so we use it for Netflix but not for TV.