Home audio & video: How are you hooked up to watch TV?
- 11/19/07 9:48 AM
Comcast cable
by rsimanski - 11/19/07 6:53 PM In reply to: How are you hooked up to watch TV? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I subscribe to Comcast's cable TV service. Channel selection is very good and the DVR in the set-top box has changed the way that I view television. Whenever I've needed technical support, I've been able to get an agent on the line quickly and their support has been good.
On the negative side, the tests of the emergency broadcast network are annoying and seem to come up more often than necessary. I encounter them at least once a week. If I'm recording or playing back a program on the DVR, they interrupt the recording or playback. If I'm in the process of transferring a recording from the DVR to my DVD recorder, I wind up with a wasted disc.
Next, the On Demand pay-per-view service will sometimes reject an order even though my account is paid up in full. This service is run by another company, not Comcast, and there doesn't seem to be much that Comcast can do about it.
Also, once in a while, the audio and video break up every few minutes for an extended period of time. This also ruins a recording, of course.
Finally, although I'm generally pleased with the service, I think that the prices are a bit too high.
comcast cable with no converter box connected yet.
by coffeecan - 11/19/07 7:04 PM In reply to: How are you hooked up to watch TV? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
We mostly watch sports, news, weather, AMC, TCM, history, discovery, and hgtv via comcast cable, that's it.
We have hardly had a problem with comcast in recent times.
We are in the process of researching new type HD TVs. Our present oldest TV is 19 years and a crt. Our youngest TV is 6 years and a crt.
So we will have to make some big changes soon.
There are a lot of channels out there but not a whole lot of content for us.
Having guests, hobbies, and using the internet seems to have displaced most of our tv watching. Sorry but there are really not many programs that seem to be enjoyable anymore.
Our TV does serve us as a movie screen via the dvds we rent.
We are looking forward to getting a newer tv and bigger screen
so we can enjoy the better graphics of todays sports tv and the rental dvds.
Thanks.
satellite
by mightymike2 - 11/19/07 7:22 PM In reply to: How are you hooked up to watch TV? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I'm hooked up to satellite, and have been since 1998.
Five years with Starchoice but then their HD was terrible, well it wasn't that their HD was terrible, it was their HD tuner. It gave us nothing but trouble and they were not in any mood to help so we switched to Bell, their tuner and HD channels have been consistantly good. no problems.
Satellite TV is horribly expensive but cable TV was the same price when we switched back in 98.
mightymike
By the way, we have never rented from either of them, always bought our own equipment. No obligations, we can walk away at any time.
sat-the only way
by TJRatfink - 11/19/07 7:34 PM In reply to: How are you hooked up to watch TV? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
DirecTV-without question the best picture and sound!
We use DirectTV, but it's not perfect.....
by M J Gray - 11/19/07 8:27 PM In reply to: How are you hooked up to watch TV? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
We use DirectTV, but it's not perfect in any sense of the word. Though they claim to be more reliable and better in storms than the cable companies, ours often goes out or changes stations when the skies are clear and bright. Calling them and having our signal tweaked hasn't helped. It's highly annoying.
How are you hooked up to watch TV?
by futuresmkt - 11/19/07 8:39 PM In reply to: How are you hooked up to watch TV? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Comcast cable/roadband
cable service increasingly spotty, lost picture, frozen picture, too expensive
Satalite dish
by dickzmac - 11/19/07 9:17 PM In reply to: How are you hooked up to watch TV? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Direct cable. Like it more than cable. More channels, cheaperand DVR. Dick
Comcast Digital Cable, Good and Bad Experiences
by insomniac419 - 11/19/07 9:31 PM In reply to: How are you hooked up to watch TV? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
We've had to exchange our DVR about 3 times. Shows randomly disappear without anyone deleting them and without the memory being full, shows start to record and don't stop (600 minutes recorded on one show), the cable resets every day at 4 am and messes up whatever is recording.
BUT, my cable and internet are bundled together and I love the internet service...guess that doesn't have much to do with the cable part of it.
The lineup and channels offered are better than satellite - at least in my area.
For the most part, the channels come in great and we don't have problems with service. I do notice that when I am watching cable on my regular TV without the digital tuner that it just seems to be missing something.
Not very technical, I know, but...well...you asked! 
Cable connection for our TV
by navyron - 11/19/07 9:44 PM In reply to: How are you hooked up to watch TV? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
We have cable thru "Click" cable, part of our local utilities system with City of Tacoma. We have great HD quality and great pricing. It's nice to have more than one choice for local cable!
How are you hooked up to watch TV?
by pklon - 11/19/07 10:34 PM In reply to: How are you hooked up to watch TV? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I'm hooked up to DirecTV satellite TV. We enjoy it a lot, especially the XM radio channels.
We Love Our DISH TV
by arminfields - 11/19/07 10:39 PM In reply to: How are you hooked up to watch TV? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
We never watch commercials, we can record two programs at once and watch a third, we never miss any show we want to see because we use easy-to-set timers for everything, and we can save 100 hours of programming.
We'd NEVER go back to regular TV.
Armin
Comcast
by kdreetz - 11/20/07 12:19 AM In reply to: How are you hooked up to watch TV? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Comcast, but not by choice. They are the only non-dish option I have in my tiny town of San Francisco! Their digital cable is good, hardly any interruptions and a decent price; however my cable internet is too expensive and not always reliable. I would describe this as a love-hate relationship with Comcast!
Dumb Question
by quickrick - 11/20/07 12:34 AM In reply to: How are you hooked up to watch TV? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
The question was asked as though the choice was exclusive - like your answer couldn't possibly be more than one of the options.
For the record, I have satellite AND cable, AND 'over the air' - but not rabbit ears. My system allows me to watch via any mode I choose.
Years ago, before there was cable available in my area, I install coaxial cable throughout my house and mounted the biggest TV antenna that I could buy along with two in-series signal amplifiers. That netted me almost 50 channels over the air, including ALL channels from York, PA; Baltimore, MD; Harrisburg, PA; Washington, DC; and Philadephia, PA; as well as Lebanon, PA; and Hershey, PA. That encompassed 4 different PBS channels.
When I say 'almost' 50 that means I could watch about 40 with pretty good clarity, another dozen with some fuzz and another dozen where you could hear the signal but it was too fuzzy to bother with. This analog system already had its 20th birthday and is still in place and working fine but is used less and less over time.
The big transition was last year when I bought my first HD flat panel (37" LCD). [I'll get back to that.]
When PrimeStar first became available, I signed up. Over 200 channels was great and I didn't have to pay for local or network channels (premium) because I could switch to antenna with a click on the remote. This was a terrific system which we enjoyed for a number of years.
Then there was Direct TV. Direct bought PrimeStar so there was no choice in switching. They installed a different dish and the familiarity of my great system got flushed. We spent a year learning the new system which included learning where all the channels had moved. Compared to PrimeStar, Direct TV sucked but there were no choices. I live in the "boonies" were I still couldn't get cable.
Even after a year of getting familiar with the system, it was apparent that Direct TV was no PrimeStar. It was akward to use. Not very intuitive, the remotes had problems, the movie you were watching in the evening was interrupted on most nights as the system would simply turn off - then start up again on another channel. This happened 2 out of three nights. It was awful. Every few months we would lose the signal completely as Direct TV kept changing their coding system to eliminate hackers. We'd call and in a couple of days we would have TV again...or, they send us a new card for each box to get us back up and running. Again, it was awful.
Being the brut for punishment that I am, I decided to sign up for their "High Speed" Internet Broadband service (in addition to TV). Initially I was quite pleased as instead of "Dial Up" speeds I was surfing at incredible speed. I could download a 119Meg file in 15 seconds - WOW. Over the next three years the "High Speed" got slower and slower and slower until I reached the point where my download speed was 2.1K. That's not a typo. My "broad band" internet connection was running at a fraction of the speed of 'dial up'!!!
I should have known...the way they screwed up our TV watching...they screwed up my internet even worse. And yes, of course, there were many phone calls dealing with agravating idiots - I won't even take you there. My son is a computer expert and indicating they were limiting the bandwidth in order to accomodate all their new customers. Get this...I'm paying $69.95 for 2.1K of internet. They WERE limiting bandwidth and continued to lie about it. Finally, I heard that Comcast cable became available in my area, out here in the boonies.
Before switching, I purchased a 37" LG LCD HDTV. This unit made by LG was the absolute hands down choice after many hours of research. First, there was about 13 hrs of internet research. Then my wife and I went to Circuit City to compare picture quality. There were over two hundreds different flat panel sets on display including LCD and Plasma but NOT couting sets with tubes.
When you walk into the store and spend a couple of hours looking over all these marvelous pictures fed with an HD digital signal, you could eliminate about half. That still leaves about a hundred choices.
Now, I had already heard that there were only about a dozen HD signals out there at the time. Therefore, the picture quality for standard (not HD) was just as important. Therefore I asked the store clerk to feed the sets with a standard signal. It took almost two hours but we finally got someone who knew how to do that. The standard signal was completely undigestable by all but two sets. A Panasonic and an LG unit. And, the picture quality was notably better with the 37" LCD sets than with the larger units. Note that the Plasma sets - even if they could have digested the standard signal, were out - because of the short life span.
The choice was now easy. The LG set had a built in HD tuner where the Panasonic did not. The clerk said I could just have my cable company add the HD tuner...I wasn't buying the logic.
When WE installed the set, we were completely amazed. We were pulling 11 HD channels 'out of the air'...no charge, via my antenna system. This would have been impossible without a 'built in' HD tuner. And, it has separate jacks for cable and antenna so both are connected at the same time. It's great!
OK, so now I switch from Direct TV. However, I did not turn off satellite until I was sure the cable was going to be satisfactory. Comcast had just absorbed SUSCOM so there was about a three month transition period with some difficulties. However, they did get their act together and today we have BOTH excellent high speed true Broadband internet AND excellent digital and HD TV. Comcast provides the local and network channels WITHOUT charging a premium. Therefore, I am now using the antenna system very little. BUT, it's still there if I need it.
30,000 hours
by jest2525 - 11/21/07 3:25 PM In reply to: Dumb Question by quickrickShort life spans on Plasmas? Conservatively speaking, 30,000 hours of life expectancy equates to about 13 1/2 years of viewing for the average family. I'd hardly consider that a short life span. Compare that to 7 to 10 years life span for an LCD that WILL require bulb replacement.
sattelite t.v
by gradv1950 - 11/20/07 1:56 AM In reply to: How are you hooked up to watch TV? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
am satisfied with mine, i have the whole package with sky, they do like their repeats however. Also have hd and i find the hd in sport exactly the same as ordinary tv, yet the adverts are completly different, its awsome in the adverts, yet the same in the actual programme, bbc is the best channel for hd i find, what do others think.
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