Reply With QuoteThis link is very helpful:Originally Posted by JackBurton
http://assassinhtpc.com/eliminate_cable.pdf
Not sure about the French, but it appears Wimbledon.com will be live streaming matches this year. Pretty sure it wont care who your provider is, and it will be html5 so iOS devices should be able to play too.
This link is very helpful:
http://assassinhtpc.com/eliminate_cable.pdf
That just looks like instructions on how to torrent/usenet to get shows. Not really the legal approach most people here are looking for.
It amazes me how they state that usenet and torrents should be used for legal downloads only but then every picture they show has ripped tv shows and movies on it.
Unfortunately, my main source of news has now disappeared. Xbox Live's MSNBC channel, which used to have timely updates and stream NBC Nightly News, The Rachael Maddow show, and a bunch of other programs is now just the MSN channel, which is just weird youtube clips or something now. Ugh. Anyone see any news on why NBC News and MSNBC content all got pulled?
Rock8man - MS / NBC parted ways. There's a few articles on the net about it, but MS is apparently going to be doing their own news service coming this fall.
http://www.spokesman.com/stories/201...te-as-nbcnews/
I did some analysis and in terms of how much I would be expected to spend on purchasing shows, subscriptions to services(Hulu, netflix, etc) hardware costs and after getting time warner to lower my bill by threatening to leave...it's actually cheaper for me to stay with cable right now.
The only thing that would make it significantly cheaper and worthwhile financially to cut the cable is if I would be willing to pirate everything.
Last edited by JackBurton; 07-18-2012 at 03:56 PM.
Thanks markv. So that happened while I was on vacation in California. I knew I had to miss some stuff, even for a slow news week; and indeed it turns out I did.
That sucks. At least the Daily Show & Colbert are back on the air (Hulu plus), so I get some minimal amount of news through them.
Since I use Windows Media Center on my wife's laptop to record all the Olympic coverage off the air, it has become important to actually learn how to use the 360 interface for the Windows Media Center. I consider myself pretty tech-savvy, but I finally just had to give up because I just couldn't figure out the controls.
Here's the cheat sheet.
You have to press the right thumbstick to the right for play. That was the key thing that I never would have figured out by myself.
Hulu plus is now available on the Apple TV:
http://blog.hulu.com/2012/07/31/hulu...s-on-apple-tv/
I have never been a big Hulu watcher, but, hey, I've got an apple tv. Is Hulu+ "worth it"?
It has newer selections than plain Hulu and more importantly works on mobile and set-top devices. Note that Hulu+ still has commercials, even though you're paying for the service.
Personally, I use plain ol' Hulu on my XBMC HTPC. It skips commercials too.
Well, we put up a valiant fight but my wife cracked. We're getting U-Verse installed on Sat which will include TV and a DVR again. :)
But the upside is that we're only paying $30 more for that TV service than we're paying for internet only right now. So ... not TOO bad. If I cancel Hulu, that would take it down to $20 extra a month for TV so I guess I can live with it.
Nice price! I've been pretty unhappy with Hulu Plus on Xbox Live lately. The season premiere of Saturday Night Live was nearly unplayable. It was constantly interrupted with the swirly buffering symbol, and then the show itself was "skipping" so I didn't get to see many sketches in their entirety even despite the constant buffering. Luckily, Hulu was playing other shows fine that night, only doing this with SNL. But last week, Hulu was doing it to me on the Daily Show, which is just unacceptable. If I can't watch the Daily show in peace at the end of the day, then why the fuck do I even get Hulu Plus?
We couldn't watch Alcatraz because EVERY TIME we tried, we'd be watching the swirly more than the actual show. Other shows are fine though. Odd...
Yesterday my Tivo died. So I would need to get a new Tivo and deal with the pain-in-the-ass factor of setting up the cable cards with Comcast. The appealing alternative (which I've been considering for a while now) is to cancel my Comcast TV and use my PS3 as my exclusive media center.
My wife and I watch Netflix streaming more than anything else. However, there's a handful of current shows my wife would have a hard time giving up. I think Hulu might be the answer for this, but I see a bunch of articles from April/May about needing to prove you are a cable subscriber in order to use the service. Did that come to fruition?
Also, even Hulu plus has commercials? And I assume they are unskippable? I don't know if I could ever go back to watching commercials.
If per episode costs were cheaper on Amazon video I'd probably just use that for current TV, but $2.99 for a 30 minute sitcom in HD? Seriously?
Torn right now.
Are the shows your wife watches on cable networks or broadcast networks? If broadcast, then you don't even need Hulu plus. You can get an antenna and one other piece of equipment. Then you can record shows on your computer using windows media center. Then you can use windows media center extender to watch anything you want on your 360 (including live TV). If you don't have or want to use the 360, I'm sure there must be software to do the same thing on PS3 (actually I'd be curious to know more, maybe this other software works better than Windows Media Center whose console controls are very awkward).
If it is cable network shows that she watches then make sure they are available on Hulu plus on console. I watch the Daily Show and Colbert Report all year long so Hulu Plus is pretty essential to me. But for everything else I use windows media center now, since I can skip commercials on that while skipping commercials is not an option on Hulu plus. The commercials they show are a lot less than the original broadcast by the way. For a 21 minute daily show I watch about 23 or 24 minutes of TV including commercials, not 30 minutes like the original broadcast.
And no, Hulu still doesn't require me to prove I have cable. If they did, that would be the day I unsubscribe and start watching the Daily show and Colbert on Comedy Central's website instead.
Be aware that Hulu has an incredibly annoying habit of marking shows as "Web Only" which means you have to watch them on your PC and the Hulu app won't show them. It's pretty fucking frustrating when you find a show you want to watch and then ... oh, I see.
Thanks for the info.
All broadcast, I believe. So, an antenna is probably a good option but I'm wondering if it's even worth the trouble. We're talking about maybe 3-4 shows.
The only thing I would personally miss is Mythbusters, but I suppose I can wait for it to hit Netflix.
I love the PS3 Media Server, and I just generally prefer the experience of watching media on my PS3 over the 360. It works great for downloaded video on my PC, and I prefer the controls and UI for Netflix, etc. It seems to me that the PS3 is just better and jumping in and watching something quickly.
Adding to that, the PS3 is a better engineered piece of hardware. I am on 360 #3, and my optical drive recently failed. Grrr...
Interesting. Perhaps they changed their plans, then. There was a bunch of articles about it earlier this year.
If you're technical, you can probably fix the TiVo. Buy a bigger hard drive, search for "tivo image", and follow the instructions. If that sounds daunting, don't do it.
You could also call TiVo and see if they'll fix the thing for you.
TiVo also has a deal right now where you get 3 months free service when you sign up for a new subscription. This makes the device cost $22/month for the first year. Of course that is on top of your cable subscription.
If you do decide to cut the cord, I suggest getting a $99 Roku 2 XS box, plugging it into your network, and running plex media server on a desktop in your network to stream stuff to the roku that it doesn't handle natively. You will also need to subscribe to hulu+, and will probably want netflix and amazon prime also. All together that will run around $30/month.
Oh, I didn't know PS3 media server let you do that. I also used to prefer the PS3 for watching things off my computer. It's just a smoother experience. But I switched to 360 when I cut the cable because Windows Media Center let me watch live TV off the antenna or in general act like a DVR. I used PS3 media server all the time to watch stuff on my TV, but I didn't know that it included DVR functionality until just now.
Plex on roku will be a much, much, better experience than any hacked-together solution involving a PS3 or xbox. Infinitely. Just no comparison. Oh, and it works with hulu, not just hulu+, so you can watch all that "web only" content. Roku is also a best-in-class hulu+ and netflix client.
Also if you go with Plex you can stream all that stuff over the internet to your laptop, smartphone, or tablet too.
Last edited by stusser; 11-14-2012 at 11:25 AM.
Is amazon prime really worth it? Last time I looked it didn't have any TV shows or movies for instant watch that I was interested in (that weren't already available on Netflix or Hulu).
I actually upgraded my Tivo HD hard drive a year ago. Worked great. But now the Tivo doesn't power up at all. It's completely dead, so that's probably beyond my abilities to repair. Sending it in might be an option, but I'm leery of throwing good money after bad.
Interesting. I'll give it a look. I haven't really considered a Roku because it seemed like I was just duplicating capabilities I have on my PS3 (which I've been pretty happy with -- much happier than the 360 experience).
I am a prime subscriber because I spend a ton of money every year at Amazon and the free shipping pays for itself a couple of times over. I don't think I'd pay for it for just the video services. They don't seem to have much that isn't available on Netflix.
Well yeah I do love the free shipping on amazon prime, but I already get that thanks to my brother listing me on his prime account. The part I don't get is the instant video library.
My wife and I are going the antenna, Netflix, Hulu Plus, and Amazon Instant route to avoid the cost of cable.
Amazon is nice, but the selection just isn't there to justify the $6.60 per month (though you pay it annually) for the video. We have it for the shipping. The video is gravy. Netflix is a much better option for streaming video at only a little over a dollar more per month.
If you have access to an .edu email account, you can sign up to amazon prime for free for 6 months. That's the free shipping only, but the thing is that after that, you can sign up to the full amazon prime including streaming for half price. I think it's something like forty bucks per year.
I don't know how the streaming experience compares on the roku versus the PS3 as I don't have a PS3, but everybody says the roku is best in class, particularly for netflix. Roku started out as a netflix-only streamer.
Roku is pretty good, mostly because it's always on so getting into Netflix or Hulu is faster than powering up a console and loading the app. The only reservation I would have is there is a persistent bug in the Roku Netflix app that keeps it from reliably advancing to the next episode when watching TV shows. That's been going on for months and months. They say they're working on it but it still isn't resolved. The way the PS3 auto plays the next episode perfectly is very nice by contrast.
But Rokus are very cheap, silent and recently had Xbox Bing style cross service search added. They're great for extending streaming services to additional TVs in your house. They're super easy to use for older or younger people as well. I recommend them without reservation.
My own next to-do item in this area is still getting a wireless router that supports a or n. But if get one that just supports n not a, then I need to get new 360 wireless dongle that supports n. But either of those would be tough sells to the wife. Our current setup works great for Netflix and Hulu plus on the 360. I'm the only one that uses the windows media center extender to record and watch network shows. And we certainly don't need a new router for any other reason. What annoys me the most about the setup is that even with wireless g that we have now, sometimes it just works flawlessly. Perfect 1080p live feed or recording transmitted wirelessly. But other times it's horrible. I wish I could figure out what changes. Is it the moisture in the air or something? Are certain temperatures more conducive to good wireless g transmissions?
If it's an HD tivo and you have lifetime on it then it's probably still worth fixing via http://www.weaknees.com/ for about 100 bucks. If you already have the cable cards then you don't need to make an appointment, they can re-activate over the phone.
Even if you don't fix it you can still ebay the thing for some cash since the lifetime is what is worth the money and somebody else will.
If you were paying month to month though ditch the tivo.
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