I'm almost ready to cut the cord on pay TV service

"Textured Soy Protein" (texturedsoyprotein)
12/10/2015 at 20:56 • Filed to: None

I have cable TV. Like many cable TV customers, I’m going through the yearly ritual of having the bill go up without noticing because it’s on autopay, only to be told that this is the new price, and if I don’t like it, too damn bad.

A year ago, my gf and I signed up for a triple play TV/internet/phone package with Charter, the local cable company here in Madison, WI. It was $127/month all-in, which really when you think about it is kind of ridiculous, but at least we figured it was manageable enough. We didn’t really want or need landline phone, but Charter said that if we got only TV and internet, it would cost us more, so we took the landline phone service.

For our $127/month, we got very nice 60 Mbps internet service, mediocre-at-best “HD” TV service with terrible picture quality, a DVR in our living room only, with like 35 hours of HD recording capacity, and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

Our landline number apparently used to belong to some old lady named Helen, because people kept calling us looking for Helen. I don’t know if Helen died, or just gave up her Charter landline, but everyone kept calling for her. There was the yoga studio looking to see if Helen wanted to sign up for classes again. There were robocalls from the public library reminding Helen to return her books. I recorded a new voicemail greeting that said Helen doesn’t have this number anymore, which stopped most of the calls, except for this one little old lady named Doris who keeps calling for Helen even though every time she calls, we politely remind her that Helen no longer has this number. Doris is a real pain in the ass. Just cross out the number in your Rolodex already, Doris!

The account is in my gf’s name, and set up for automatic payments. Magically, our bill went up to $166/month. They slipped a month past us before we noticed, because it’s on auto payments. Funny how when I called them for tech support last week, they conveniently failed to mention anything about oh by the way our price had gone up $39/month.

At the time we signed up for this bundle, the Charter phone person told me, don’t you worry about that price increase in a year, just call us and we’ll get your bill back down. Of course this year when I called Charter to follow up on this, the person I talked with, even when I repeatedly threatened to cancel the service, kept saying well technically you are still getting a promotional price and saving money compared to the full price , and repeating that there was nothing they could do to lower the price.

I’ve looked into other options, and none are good. We could get Dish Network for somewhat reasonably priced TV and keep Charter for internet, but according to my landlord’s mandatory satellite TV installer company, because we have single-channel wiring in our townhouse, Dish’s Hopper DVR is incompatible with Charter cable internet, and if we want Charter internet, we’d have to get crappy old-school Dish Network service with no HD on our second TV, or DirecTV, which does even worse bait-n-switch price increases than Charter. If we want Dish Network Hopper service, we would have to get internet from AT&T, which has a 250 GB monthly data cap, and we use the shit out of streaming video services like Netflix, and frankly I have a moral objection to any data caps on home internet service, because they’re a blatant cash grab.

All of which is to say, I’m this close to saying fuck it on any kind of pay TV service, because even if we pay for a whole bunch of internet streaming services, at least their pricing is (for the most part) straightforward. Jumping amongst different services is kind of disjointed, and live sports is still a mess, but at least I wouldn’t feel like this guy when I see the bill every month:

DISCUSSION (40)

MM54 > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 21:06

I do not pay for cable since I don’t watch TV nor have any interest in watching TV. That aside, I know a lot of people in a similar situation to you, and it baffles me why they haven’t walked away yet. The cable companies only pull this shit because they know that most people will just accept it.

For less than the cost of cable you can get netflix, amazon prime, and hulu (if you really want hulu, you might be in to that kind of thing) and be covered for most things.

Also, my sister has a “roku” that I’m not sure what it is but it’s something to do with the TV that streams all sorts of stuff for fairly cheap.

For Sweden > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 21:10

But how will you watch racecar?

XJDano > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 21:12

I cable at my old house because it was free. I moved and cable was still free ( to that house, I rented it to family, long story)

Eventually the cable was cut and chucked into the yard. They pay $120ish forthe U-verse thing I think,b but can’t afford full rent at end of the !month. Stupid.

But I have a sweet house now, almost makes up for it.

I won’t pay for something I barely watch.

ADabOfOppo; Gone Plaid (Instructables Can Be Confusable) > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 21:12

This is nothing new. They ALL do that.

Getting internet only service will cost nearly just as much. Especially once you factor in paying for the content that used to be “free” with your cable subscription.

Write the FCC and complain. Until we are rid of the regional cable monopolies and media cartels, nothing will change.

Be really radical and unplug entirely. Get a library card, and just read?

Textured Soy Protein > For Sweden
12/10/2015 at 21:13

I’ll torrent the Sky F1 broadcasts after the fact and ignore the internet to prevent spoilers.

Textured Soy Protein > MM54
12/10/2015 at 21:14

I have a Roku hooked up to one tv and a Playstation 3 hooked up to the other. Both are capable of lots of video streaming stuff. The main things that keep us hooked up are live sports and my girlfriend’s obsession with cheesy Hallmark Channel Christmas movies. Well, she could probably find those on Amazon or something if she wanted.

Birddog > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 21:19

Charter sounds like the Mediacom BS I had in Iowa. I wound up cutting the cord (technically they did, right at the box in the yard) and never looked back.

I’ll get Cable or Dish again at some point but right now I can find many better uses for $150+/month.

plak424 > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 21:20

All I can say is fuck the cable companies and the cell providers.

Phyrxes once again has a wagon! > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 21:22

I dumped cable for similar reasons, I use a Roku to stream amazon/netflix/hulu/whatever else has an app for the TV. For those networks that can’t be bothered to create a roku app I use a chromecast to stream the webpage from their PC. Before the chromecast I just hooked the Mrs. Laptop to the TV over HDMI and called it done.

Textured Soy Protein > plak424
12/10/2015 at 21:23

I do enjoy my cheap prepaid cell phone service.

DoYouEvenShift > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 21:26

Fuck cable companies! I canceled mine a year ago and dont miss it. 99% mindless garbage anyways. Netflix and Youtube yay!!

Also the price of internet is too damn high!

Kinja'd!!!

E92M3 > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 21:26

Do it! I gave up cable TV over a year ago. It was hard giving up the Velocity channel at first, but I don’t even miss it now (except when the Dakar or Isle of Man is being ran). Now I have Netflix, and purchase an average of $20 worth of stuff a month off iTunes.

I did have to upgrade to business internet though because I was going over their residential data cap.

ttyymmnn > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 21:30

If I could solve the sports problem, I’d dump cable (Dish) too. I can’t stand paying for 200 channels when we watch about 5 of them.

MM54 > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 21:33

At this point I refer to my xbox 360 as my Netflixbox

MM54 > ttyymmnn
12/10/2015 at 21:34

I don’t really get in to any sort of sports (other than motorsport which I’ve accepted to just not be televised) so I don’t have a solution for you on that front!

plak424 > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 21:38

Smarter than me. I pay out the ass for a dumbass expensive plan every month so I’ll have service.

ttyymmnn > MM54
12/10/2015 at 21:56

The cable companies really have you by the cajones is you like live or international sport. And they know it. I could live with ESPN and NBCSports, but in order to have NBC I have to have one of Dish’s top packages. And every other provider is the same way. Believe me, I checked.

Ogre8 > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 21:56

Ditched cable, kept broadband, Hulu, Netflix and Amazon prime which we got a year of free with a kindle. We use a mohu leaf for OTA hd tv and a TiVo. Saving money even with TiVo monthly fee. Go to antennaweb to see what you can get free over the air in your area.

Highlander-Datsuns are Forever > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 22:07

I’ve gone from $88/month to $137/month for just internet and tv with Charter. I would drop them if we got more than 4 channels on broadcast tv. In california where we used to live we got like 25 channels on broadcast tv. Spent many a night watching re-runs of HeMan.

dsigned001 - O.R.C. hunter > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 22:13

I’m pretty sure netflix has more cheesy movies than you can shake a stick at.

dsigned001 - O.R.C. hunter > Textured Soy Protein
12/10/2015 at 22:16

Dump them and lobby for municipal fiber.

smobgirl > MM54
12/10/2015 at 23:09

I “have cable” because cable plus Internet is $25/month less than internet alone. Which is to say, someone somewhere thinks I'm getting cable TV, but there isn't even any way to connect it to my television.

and 100 more > Textured Soy Protein
12/11/2015 at 00:31

I dropped cable and land line phone years ago and have never been inclined to to back.

If you have sufficiently fast internet, then you basically have the world in your palm already.

Textured Soy Protein > ADabOfOppo; Gone Plaid (Instructables Can Be Confusable)
12/11/2015 at 01:17

Full price for Charter internet is $60. I already pay for Netflix and Amazon Prime. We already have antennas hooked up to both TVs. Living room has a PS3 and upstairs has a 2015 Roku 2.

I could get ad-free Hulu for I think $12 and maaybe Sling for $20 (mostly for live ESPN) and I’d still be saving about $35/month compared to our total cable bill before it went up. I don’t think Sling works on PS3 so might have to get another Roku for downstairs but that’s like $60.

Another idea is for my gf to cancel her Charter account and me to sign up as a “new” customer to get the promo discount on internet for a year before it goes up to the full $60.

Textured Soy Protein > E92M3
12/11/2015 at 01:22

Data caps for home internet service are such bullshit. I can “choose” between Charter and AT&T but there’s a 250 GB cap on AT&T and none on Charter.

I’m not inherently opposed to usage-based pricing for things like internet and TV. In fact, that could make a lot of sense. But only if there were clear and consistent standards for a pay-as-you-go arrangement, kind of like we have with our utilities like water, gas and electric. If it were implemented in the usual big telecom company “let’s find new and different ways to overcharge people more for the same service” pricing model, no, that’s terrible.

Textured Soy Protein > Highlander-Datsuns are Forever
12/11/2015 at 01:24

We have not a ton of broadcast channels, but actually before I moved in with my gf she was totally fine with an antenna and Netflix. I had to go and get her hooked on pay TV. But I don’t think she’s totally attached to it, especially if we can save a good amount of money.

Textured Soy Protein > Birddog
12/11/2015 at 01:34

At my old place, I paid full price for Charter internet for $60/month, and was paying about the same for Dish TV. So $120 but at least it stayed around the same and I didn’t have to do too much bitching about rate increases. Actually the Dish DVR boxes kept dieing on me so I’d accumulate a bunch of $10/month discounts that Dish gave me for the trouble.

But that was a 1-bedroom apartment and 1 TV. I had the old-school DVR not the Hopper, although even that was better than Charter’s shit TV service.

If I went for a similar old school Dish box, our second TV would be stuck on SD only, and if we got Dish Hopper, we’d have to go for AT&T internet, and they have data caps.

I could do DirecTV with either Charter or AT&T but DirecTV pricing is crazy high. They’re all like “oh it’s only $30/month fit the first year!” but they tack on a bullshit $15/month “advanced equipment fee” and ANOTHER monthly fee for the second receiver. And on top of that, your bill goes up a ton in the second year, and you have to sign a 2 year contract to get the first-year-only discount.

Textured Soy Protein > Ogre8
12/11/2015 at 01:37

We actually already have antennas hooked up to both of our TVs. If I’m watching a sports thing on one of the broadcast networks, the picture quality is way better through the antenna. But I like the DVR for watching football because I can pause it, go do something else for a while, then fast forward the ridiculous number of commercials. Not sure I’d pay for a TiVo with the small number of OTA channels here.

jariten1781 > Textured Soy Protein
12/11/2015 at 07:42

Internet streaming services still lack sports, news magazines (48 hours, 60 minute, 20/20, etc), and still have terrible catalogs of movies compared to the premium channel. Until that’s fixed I’m stuck on cable. Luckily we’ve got 2 providers locally plus the satellites so it either keeps them in check or I just bounce services and stay on the promo prices ad infinitum.

Humorously, when Comcast came to switch over (I was going from DirecTV to Comcast) service a few years ago the tech physically cut the coax running from the dish to the house...I guess he figured I could re-terminate or run new wires.

E92M3 > Textured Soy Protein
12/11/2015 at 09:42

It is bullshit. It’s comcast way of still getting their money from you even if you have switched to netflix. They make up the cable tv loss by charging you double for internet. With 2 devices streaming netflix I was over the cap within 10 days into the billing cycle.

Textured Soy Protein > jariten1781
12/11/2015 at 10:35

I don’t watch those news shows you mentioned but most are on broadcast networks. I already have antennas hooked up to both my TVs.

I’ve never gotten much value from premium movie channels. I’m not very picky about watching a specific movie, I just want something entertaining to watch. And if there is something specific I want to watch that’s not on a steaming service, I torrent it.

Live sports is harder, but at least ESPN is part of Dish Sling TV.

jariten1781 > Textured Soy Protein
12/11/2015 at 10:57

The news magazines only come on once a week on broadcast, only cover recent stuff...and the recent stuff isn’t always interesting. My wife and I like to binge watch them and select the ones with interesting stories...the only places that have multiple years old copies of them are Investigation Discovery, OWN, TLC etc. It’s not like murder mysteries or scam artists are less interesting because they operated in 1998 vs. today.

I don’t P2p much anymore, haven’t since Kazaa and Napster were things...personal thing...don’t like taking things just because they’re inconvenient to get ahold of or expensive. I will still do it for things that have literally no distribution channels and no legitimate way to get ahold of in this country, mostly Asian dramas, which my wife cannot survive without, and foreign concerts which are only aired on live TV and never distributed to anyone anywhere ever..

So yeah, it's still a no-go for me for a while. I was actually cord-cut for a number of years in the early 2ks, but got all moralistic and didn't have time anyway to keep up diving through the internet to keep finding reliable trackers.

uofime-2 > Textured Soy Protein
12/11/2015 at 11:14

Did they explain why charter’s internet is incompatible with the hopper?

Is the local network/router crap, because that can easily be replaced. For internet broadband is certainly faster than ATT’s DSL.

RockRam > Textured Soy Protein
12/11/2015 at 11:46

That’s rough. Do it bro. I stream the regular Netflix/Hulu to Chromecast. The thing about Chromecast though is you can stream from other sources. So if you come upon a website streaming your favorite live sports event, you can just cast it to your TV. I still get free NFL Redzone or the occasional UFC fight nights. Just takes some looking around first.

Textured Soy Protein > uofime-2
12/11/2015 at 13:38

Supposedly there’s something with what specific RF frequencies the Hopper uses vs. cable internet. I don’t know if that prevents us from getting Hopper at all, or if it’s like, the stuff the Hopper uses to send video to the non-primary receiver boxes. I’m going to email back the satellite install contractor company and see if they can clarify.

Textured Soy Protein > RockRam
12/11/2015 at 14:09

Supposedly my Roku also does screen mirroring but I haven’t tried it yet.

uofime-2 > Textured Soy Protein
12/11/2015 at 14:45

Strange, but I really don’t know anything about the hopper.

I’m sure it’ll be an interesting story.

Textured Soy Protein > uofime-2
12/11/2015 at 15:31

Well, they emailed me back. They didn’t give specific technical details, but according to them, Dish Hopper service, even with only 1 tv and no secondary boxes, causes problems when sharing wiring with Charter internet service.

The solution would be to run wiring where the cable outlets in the rooms where we want Dish service to work are connected only to Dish, and the room where we’d put the cable modem is only connected to Charter. Which if we owned a standalone house, would be no big deal.

But since we’re in a rental townhouse, 1 of 6 connected units, there’s a main distribution box that splits off into 1 line for each unit. All the outlets in the unit go into that 1 main distribution line for our unit, and there’s no way to wire in 2 services separately.

uofime-2 > Textured Soy Protein
12/11/2015 at 15:39

Ah, where there’s your problem!

If you could just run one line into the unit you could get away with it.

Wait, is the breaker box in the same room? then you could have the modem in the basement and run Ethernet over one of the circuits, to a router in your unit.

Textured Soy Protein > uofime-2
12/11/2015 at 15:57

The landlord made it very clear the only people allowed to mess with the coax wiring CTI Satellite (the satellite contractor) and Charter (the cable company). CTI says they can’t do Dish Hopper + Charter internet in my unit. They won’t even set it up.

If I want Dish + Charter, it’d have to be the old-school Dish receiver which only does SD channels on the second tv. My options are:

Charter internet + tv
Charter internet + DirecTV
Charter internet + Dish old-school
AT&T internet + tv
AT&T internet + DirecTV
AT&T internet + Dish Hopper

AT&T internet has a 250 GB data cap, and both AT&T and DirecTV lock you in to 2-year contracts where the price in the second year is ridiculous.