Wednesday, August 14, 2013

Cutting the cable

A few weeks ago we decided to drop our Dish Network.  We enjoyed Dish.  I wasn't displeases with them, but we were spending over $110/month.  That money could be used in many other places.  And in my opinion we just didn't spend enough time watching it to justify the expense.
So, a couple of years ago, I found an interesting YouTube video on making an antenna to pick up the over the air signals.  So far it's not too bad.  But we've still not watched a lot.



Besides over the air, we have Netflix (disk and streaming) which helps a lot.  There are so many shows and TV series that I've either never watched, or never watched all of them.  Netflix alone can help fill in a lot of the gaps.

We also have a Roku.  A Roku 2 XD actually.  With it, there are tons of free programming we're able to get.  There are also pay channels we can get (like my MLS package which is great, but only if you like soccer).

Because I have a Playstation 3, I watch You Tube videos on our TV as well.  You'd be surprised at what you can find on You Tube.

Both the PS3 and the Roku allows access to Amazon on Demand.  Another great way to get movies or TV series that you might want to watch!

Several years ago, I had bought a piece of software called PlayOn.  It's a server that runs on one of my computers and will stream movies to it from websites (like ABC, NBC, Syfy, etc.), then serve them back up to a machine that can connect to the media server (PS3 and the Roku both can do this).  I've never used it much, but hope to now take advantage of it much more.

One other option is my laptop.  It has HDMI out which will allow me to stream TV shows from my laptop and watch them on the TV.  Which I plan on doing for Duck Dynasty if all goes well!

While the Roku and PS3 both cost money (one time fees), as well as some of the channels you can get (like my MLS channel which is a once a year fee).  I already had spent money on those items on top of our Satellite bill!

So, we're just a few weeks into it, and I like it.  And I love the money I'm saving!

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