Which is better? Cable, Satelite, Direct TV?

[bitemark46]

Enlighten me. Just moved into my new house and undecided on which is the best bang for buck. If it matters I also was thinking on getting some type of ISP like road runner. I don't need a bizillion channels but around 100-200 is the max for me. ;)
Thanks. -Mark

[Jeff]

Cable, I have DTV right now, and every fuckin time it rains... Boom. No TV. Everything has it's downsides tho.

[Top End Civic]

digital cable rocks! It never goes out, tons of channels, the menu is sooo much better than DTV.

Up here in Gainesville COX is the big provider. It is about $85/month for digital cable with HBO and Cinemax and high speed internet. I dont know about the Tampa area though

[Jeff]

It does go out periodicly. Very random.

[schoellnasty]

I got bright house. i like it. got about 300 channels, but you can choose which ones you want and which you dont. and goin highspeed with roadrunner was a good call. id say go with cable.

[bitemark46]

So with digital cable you pay for the cable and the internet cable in the same bill? Cause right now with dial up(ya I know) I pay like 23$ for the phone and 23$ for AOL per month. So for 46$ a month that's basically half of the digital cable and I can also get road runner for about the same price? Did that make sense?

-Mark

[accord95]

direct TV all the way, and it has to be like a hurricane outside for it to go out, at least with mine.

[The Kyle]

bright house! 56/month for the first 6 months, its a little special gimmick they got going on...

[lstepnio]

BrightHouse is offering 40hr DVR boxes for an extra $6/mo. ;)

[MartyMcfly]

Originally posted by supaflytiger
I got bright house. i like it. got about 300 channels, but you can choose which ones you want and which you dont. and goin highspeed with roadrunner was a good call. id say go with cable.

Same here, I love it.

only gone out once or twice, during really bad storms.

[Keith]

direct TV

[Skillionaire]

As long as you dont set it up half assed from the start you will hardly ever have problems with Direct TV. Just take your time and make sure you are att full signal strength before you bolt it down.

[dscivicdx]

brighthouse is way better than direct tv. we had dtv at my place and got rid of it for digital cable. they have a deal right now so you get digital cable and roadrunner for like $100... and thats with all the hbo's, showtimes and the movie channel

[accord95]

Originally posted by Cronic
Cable, I have DTV right now, and every fuckin time it rains... Boom. No TV. Everything has it's downsides tho.

your shit aint pointed straight enough. i have a compass if you want to fix your problem. mine never goes out and ive had it for 2 years.

[Tom N]

Originally posted by accord95
your shit aint pointed straight enough. i have a compass if you want to fix your problem. mine never goes out and ive had it for 2 years.



I agree. I`ve had mine for about 4yrs and it takes a hell of a storm to loose a signal. Plus DTV is the only one with the NFL ticket.:D

[Charles]

Digital cable sucks........... it's < DirectTV for sure

[Just Dave]

While I agree that a bad setup can cause your DTV signal to "fade" in light rain, I think cable is still better. If it takes an engineer with an abacus to setup my DTV dish to avoid fadeouts, then seems to me its not reliable enough for me to consider. Also, for me anyway, pricing between cable and DTV is very similar, so I'll stick with cable. With cable, there's alot less chance of outages in the rain, and my TV and internet are on one bill.

[Tom N]

I put mine up myself. It took me about a half hour. Main reason i stuck with it is like i said NFL sunday ticket. I love football and cable doesnt have it nor will they ever.

[n20teg]

my parents own a company called video helpers...ok we do home theators ... so that includes dealing with cable satelite ect pluse we install direct tv..what we do is cable without the whole house its cost efective and satelite in the main room so u can get nfl and stuff like that plus satelite is true digital that mean better picture and cable is not they have an analog system, sean if your satelite gose out when it rains it was not instaled the right way or its in the wrong spot, if u have any qestion pm me

[the anti-rice]

Mark, I posted the samething lastmonth. Do a search for it. BTW, I just got DirecTV.

[Charles]

Yup.... the picture and sound on cable sucks compared to directTV

[Jordan Y.]

We have directv up here and regular cable down in the family's beach house. The cable sucks, picture quality is terrible. I can never get used to relying on a worthless "tv guide channel", especially after they changed their format so that 2/3 of the screen is taken up by their worthless advertising and low-quality programming. It takes a storm in the red/yellow to knock out directv, something along the lines of a hurricane feeder band or one of those really nasty thunderstorms that comes through once in a while. I almost can't stand watching tv without the channel guide, though I believe digital cable has the same feature.

[Tripw0l]

Basically: DTV = Decent chance of having problems with bad storms/alignment etc. Digi Cable = Seemless video, nonstop. Close but not quite as many features as DTV.

Road Runner - Fast as hell, goes out every now and again. Verizon DSL - Single Duplex 1/2 the speed of RR really, but NEVER goes out.
Earthlink - CRAP.
Dial-up/AOL - I feel like I should shoot myself just for ever using it.

[the anti-rice]

Another thing about DTV, when that storm comes, how are you gonna know where its at? Your TV wont get a signal. :smirk: Happend lastnight. Tornado warnings in Hills. County but we didnt know anything else because the satelite was out. :|
Oh btw, you dont get Baynews9 with DTV, and if you want another reciever for another room, thats another $5-6/month. Cable you can have anywhere.

[lstepnio]

Brighthouse offers digital decoders boxes(the crappy analog boxes are being all phased out) and the digital boxes have a really nice interactive channel guide. You can get HDTV(HBO, SHOW, ABC, FOX, PBS), and a 40 hour DVR decoder that works with the interactive channel guide, Video On-Demand and Roadrunner cable modem service and VoIP telephone will be comming in the near future.

[accord95]

Originally posted by Force Fed 23
While If it takes an engineer with an abacus to setup my DTV dish to avoid fadeouts, then seems to me its not reliable enough for me to consider

all it takes is a compass

[accord95]

Originally posted by the anti-rice
Another thing about DTV, when that storm comes, how are you gonna know where its at? Your TV wont get a signal. :smirk: Happend lastnight. Tornado warnings in Hills. County but we didnt know anything else because the satelite was out. :|
Oh btw, you dont get Baynews9 with DTV, and if you want another reciever for another room, thats another $5-6/month. Cable you can have anywhere.

if your DTV goes out or if you want to watch bay news9 then just switch it over to an intenna. i have my intenna in the back of the DTV reciever and just hit the intenna button on your remote and you still get baynews9 and you can still see the warnings.:doh:

[Just Dave]

Bay News 9 is a Time Warner "Bright House" channel and is not available over anything but Time Warner cable.

[J-Dizzle]

Direct Tv here also , hardly ever goes out , and when it does i swicth transponders and its fine

[the anti-rice]

Originally posted by accord95
if your DTV goes out or if you want to watch bay news9 then just switch it over to an intenna. i have my intenna in the back of the DTV reciever and just hit the intenna button on your remote and you still get baynews9 and you can still see the warnings.:doh:
ohhhhhhhhh gotcha. :D thanx

[Tom N]

Originally posted by the anti-rice
Another thing about DTV, when that storm comes, how are you gonna know where its at? Your TV wont get a signal. :smirk: Happend lastnight. Tornado warnings in Hills. County but we didnt know anything else because the satelite was out. :|
Oh btw, you dont get Baynews9 with DTV,



You get baynews9 on the web. As well as accuweather, weatherchannel.

[Tom N]

Originally posted by Tripw0l
Basically: DTV = Decent chance of having problems with bad storms/alignment etc. Digi Cable = Seemless video, nonstop. Close but not quite as many features as DTV.

Road Runner - Fast as hell, goes out every now and again. Verizon DSL - Single Duplex 1/2 the speed of RR really, but NEVER goes out.
Earthlink - CRAP.
Dial-up/AOL - I feel like I should shoot myself just for ever using it.




Why do you say earthlink is crap? This is a real question. I switched to earthlink highspeed last month and it has been more reliable so far than the 2 years i had road runner. I know i have only been using it for a month so far but it has yet to go out on me, unlike RR. Its also cheaper and you get a free dial up account which is nice if you have a laptop.

[DETriment]

digital cable all the way, i played with one of the new dvr boxes, cool shit, so worth it.

[xxlmadhatterlxx]

Brighthouse sounds like it would suit your needs

[Jordan Y.]

Originally posted by TRIPLE G
Why do you say earthlink is crap? This is a real question. I switched to earthlink highspeed last month and it has been more reliable so far than the 2 years i had road runner. I know i have only been using it for a month so far but it has yet to go out on me, unlike RR. Its also cheaper and you get a free dial up account which is nice if you have a laptop.

I've been using earthlink cable since last may, it's just rebadged road runner. Half the times I've called tech support, the earthlink guys ended up transferring me to the local time warner people.

Also, I do have a regular antenna to pick up the broadcast stations as a backup, heck, the first 8 years we lived at this house all we had was broadcast.

[bitemark46]

Ok it sounds like the majority is either digi cable or brighthouse. Now my other question is how much is earthlink and how much is road runner per month. I did like the option of having the internet and cable on the same bill. Which combo was that again? -Mark

[the anti-rice]

RR is Brighthouse. I think RR is about 45/mo.

[Jordan Y.]

paying $40 a month for earthlink cable

[Rotary7]

earthlink

[Angry Pirate]

Cable, I have DTV right now, and every fuckin time it rains... Boom. No TV. Everything has it's downsides tho.
It did the same for me. I hated my DTV. I'd recommend cable.

[Treysdad]

I have gone back and forth for years. Nothing is worse than everytime it rains, the damn satellite goes out. Stick with cable.

[Rich]

The people who are complaining about the dish going out in the rain either didn't have it pointed true enough, or it wasn't mounted well enough. The new DirecTV 5LNB dishes are a good bit bigger and have less rain fade as a result. I haven't had mine fade once since it was installed, and even my 3lnb oval dish only went out once in a great while.

Customer Service = DirecTV BY FAR
Picture Quality, HD quality = DirecTV
Interface, Remotes = DirecTV
Programming = DirecTV (Sunday Ticket, screw Bay News 9)
Ease of installation = Cable
Reliability = Cable by a slim margin

I honestly thing that the only thing going for the cable company is CableCard technology on newer HD sets, making it possible to get all of your channels without a set top box. Also, if you are a Tivo fan (superior to any of the DVR's), the new generation HD boxes only work with cable, as DirecTV has their own DVR technology. The new generation Tivo boxes also accept dual channel cable cards for dual tuners.

[Malevolent X]

I have had the satellite and I say buy cable. Nothing worse than having a movie be ruined by wind, rain, etc. Atleast with cable it doesn't go out all the time.

[RoadRacer]

holy 2003! ......Direct TV for me

[Karma]

I use cable and I have HBO. I don't watch too much tv.

[ImportLuv]

Im running on a satillite scrambler. PlayBoy, TEN, Starz, and 800+ recievable channels for free is fucking awesome, that's not until when i have to relocated the signal because Dish Network move their signals all the time :lol:

Id say cable isnt too bad, it gives you less headaches at the end.

[JamesH]

Moving to technology forum now.

[eclipsegst303]

Satellite is better. I have used cable, but not digital cable....1 thing I cannot stand is sitting there watching a channel that scrolls through the TV guide trying to find what to watch. With satellite, you just manually go through the guide, and select what to watch. Digital cable might be this way, but I dont know.

And it takes VERY hard rain to knock out the signal. Its happend to me maybe three times a year at the most.