Help - Considering Apple TV

[homanga]

First of all thank you everyone for advice ahead of time; always appreciate huge forums like this and the vast resources available.

Here is my situation; I currently use DirecTV and have ~110$/month package for my TV channels (nothing premium, all HD and some sports packages).

I am looking to make the switch to AppleTV but I need to understand of couple of things. I know most people use hulu/roku or some equivalent in order to have a decent number of channels.

My question is this can someone walk me through what it would take to obtain access to the following and approximate costs per month.

Wants:
Basic Cable Channels
Sports Broadcasting (I don't have watchespn access at this time; is there a cheap way to obtain this?)
Are there packages out there that all access to NCAABB, NCAAF, NBA, MLB, NHL, etc and ~ how much per month are these?

Again I appreciate all the answers in advance; just trying to figure out if I can make this work and come out better $ wise.

 

[sonicrobby]

Sorry to disappoint, but apple TV isn't really a tv service. Its more of a box to make dumb TVs become smart TVs. So it will give you access to apps like hulu and netflix, and connects well with Macs and iOS devices to play content through your iTunes library, or stream any iTunes purchases.

You won't be able to get any local channels through Apple TV, you will still need the basic cable connection or antenna to achieve those. There are apps available for sports such as NHL, MBA and I believe ESPN has an app for it also, but these require individual subscriptions (don't know how much exactly). And due note that some of the apps still require a tv subscription (login verification of your DirectTV account) to access full content.