Life without cable TV

[NH Hiker]

+1 on the Ooma.

I have the same setup as above. I wanted a phone nearby in each part of my home in case of an emergency. So far that has happened only once. It is worth the $60+ dollars a year to know that I can crawl to a phone if I have to.

Another option is Google Home mini. You can get one for about $30 and then say "call xyz" where xyz is one of your contacts - the microphone has a range of about 30 feet. You only have the one time cost plus you get all the features of a smart speaker.

 

[OldShooter]

For people who enjoy tv,sports,movies whatever, it is the best entertainment value.
Go out to dinner,a play,a sporting event or a concert and tell me how “expensive” Netflix is. Like always you choose what you pay for. I always get a kick out of the bogleheads forum when some person who regularly posts about investing and has a 7 figure portfolio cancels Netflix because they raised it a dollar or something.

Maybe the reason they have 7 figure portfolios is that they pay attention to costs, especially recurring costs.

 

[Global Wizzo]

No Cable

I’ve got a fast internet line, TMobile cell that includes Netflix streaming for a couple dollars for the HD-4K level Off air antenna gets 30-50 stations and I watch the news on a couple. DW has a Netflix CD account for the movies that don’t stream.

Cell service at the house is near zero. Hard line so there is some backup for Hurricane season.

A good book is much better than cable.

GW

 

[aza455]

Google Voice an OBI200 plugged into your router is free after OBI purchase, no 911 service but you can purchase as an extra service for a few dollars a month. You can also plug in as many phones to existing phone jacks as you wish or use a cordless phone system. I dumped my landline about ten years ago now and have saved tons of money.

In order to "activate" all telephone jacks throughout the house, do you plug your OBI into any telephone jack?

 

[airbornesapper]

I sell fully loaded 4K Firesticks in my spare time for spending money. I load them with the most popular apps that include thousands of live channels and current movie and TV shows. All for less than $20/month. I’ve sold quite a few so far. No more cable?

What do you mean by a fully loaded FireStick. Do you mean that you have Kodi running... I gave up on that...

 

[eleighj416]

There are also some closet Netflix freeloaders around here to. But they won't expose themselves!

Damn Right!

 

[statsman]

I don't have Netflix at the moment but it seems legit to share account because you are paying for the # of streams, not the # devices that are signed in with acct. Netflix in past has said they don't challenge password sharing because once max streams are met and someone can't use the service, someone in that group will likely create a new acct.

Interesting. I would never think to use it that way. I guess I worked far too many years with security clearances, and I tended to avoid the gray areas of contracts and such. Funny thing is our DD has set up her Netflix account on our family room TV. We never utilize it unless she's actually here visiting.

 

[Sojourner]

If one is able to get OTA tv signals, then it's a lot easier to live without cable tv today. I can remember when OTA tv was terrible. TV reception was bad and one would be lucky to get 10, maybe 15 channels worth watching. Today with the digital TV signals, if one can get them, it is a dream situation compared to years past.

IMHO, being able to get solid OTA signals (digital or not) has little bearing on my decision to pay for cable or satellite TV. The vast majority of shows I'm interested in come from sources like HBO, Netflix, and other non-OTA channels like The Science Channel, FX, Nat Geo, AMC, etc. Free OTA TV (at least in my area) is mostly a vast wasteland of crappy reality/contest shows, along with some insipid network sitcoms, talk shows, and local news. A few good things here and there, but not enough to bother futzing with an antenna and—to avoid having to watch gazillions of commercials—a dedicated OTA DVR.

 

[RetiredAndLovingIt]

In order to "activate" all telephone jacks throughout the house, do you plug your OBI into any telephone jack?

The OBI has 2 jacks, one plugs into your router I plugged the other into my phone using a line splitter to also plug into a wall jack. I assume you can go direct to the wall I just never tried it. You do need to find and unplug the main phone company jack that comes into your house from their box on your outside wall, that's part of the setup instructions or used to be. This is to avoid any possibility of an electric shock I think. Very easy just find and unplug it like any other phone jack.

 

[Cobra9777]

I sell fully loaded 4K Firesticks in my spare time for spending money. I load them with the most popular apps that include thousands of live channels and current movie and TV shows. All for less than $20/month. I’ve sold quite a few so far. No more cable?

What do you mean by a fully loaded FireStick. Do you mean that you have Kodi running... I gave up on that...

Probably a custom Kodi set-up, including a bunch of 3rd party add-ons that link to pirated content all over the web. My guess is you pay him $20/mo to maintain the links which change on a daily basis as regulators try to block illegal content. I would not touch one of his Firesticks with a ten-foot pole. The linked websites are typically hosted in some very sketchy places by very sketchy people who use pirated copies of the latest movies and TV shows to attract traffic to their sites for other nefarious purposes.

No legitimate service can offer "thousands of live channels and current movie and TV shows" for less than $20/mo.

 

[sgstaley]

We bought our current home in 2001 and never got around to cable television. We love our internet though. Mediacom gouges us at the tune of around $78/mo though.
I just bought our own modem and installed it in about 5 minutes, saving us $10/mo. Looking back I wonder why I ever "rented" a modem ?!??!!?!?
I still think that I am being robbed at almost $70/mo.

 

[triangle]

I find enough content with OTA transmission and streaming. Spectrum's Internet service continues to rise in price and degrade in service up time but I don't have many options. Sometimes I want to call Spectrum and ask if I can get a discount if they agree to stop sending weekly junk mail offers for TV or phone service.

I do miss sports, especially college basketball which in my area has disappeared off regional and national broadcast networks and only offered on ESPN, TBS, or whatever cable package is available.

 

[JP.mpls]

Midpack,
I didn't realize that services like Hulu now offer live streaming. I will have to look into it.

I've been getting by with Netflix, and free over the air digital antenna broadcasts.

OP: you should try a digital antenna for your basic local channels.

JP

That’s why many of us dumped cable or satellite for live streaming (e.g. YouTube TV, Hulu Live) at 1/2 to 1/3 the cost IF you’d have Internet regardless. We cut the cord in Feb 2018 and still have all the live real time network/broadcast TV we’d ever want. Without the crummy customer service and pricing games above...

 

[Scrapr]

Midpack,
I didn't realize that services like Hulu now offer live streaming. I will have to look into it.

I've been getting by with Netflix, and free over the air digital antenna broadcasts.

OP: you should try a digital antenna for your basic local channels.

JP

I streamed a Redbox movie not long ago. I had a Redbox account already & was ready to run to the "box". It popped up as availible on streaming so that's what i did. IIRC it was something a bit obscure. IOW not on Netflix. I think it was $3.99 for an HD stream.