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No Surround on Cable TV Apps - 2.0 Only
- Thread starter Aragornii
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HobeSoundDarryl
macrumors G5
All of the streaming services are limited to stereo or mono sound for traditional cable channels.
If one cares about quality picture & sound for live television, the priority is over-the-air (via antenna), then traditional cable or SATT. Streaming services main benefit is relatively cheaper pricing. Part of what makes it cheaper is tradeoffs like audio, "DVR"s that are not as full featured as traditional hardware DVRs, a few channels you wish were available but not on any given service, and so on. To those happy with such tradeoffs, it seems they can "save" anywhere from about $10 to about $30-$50 per month, except in those cases where someone lets all new subscriber deals lapse and has many TVs to feed (and thus many boxes to lease). Those are the ones who have the $150-$300/month cable horror stories to share.
If you want to get a better price than lapsed cable/satt deals, flex your consumer muscle by pressing competitive offers. These entities will deal if they are facing potential defections to a better deal with a competitor(s). And if they won't deal, fire them.
Myself? I went with traditional cable but no leased boxes (including buying my own broadband modem), using HDHomeRun boxes for TV, an OTA antenna for locals and the terrific Channels app to function as the on screen (combined & traditional) guide and (much more like a traditional hardware) DVR. All that (TV) works through
TVs. The "double play" deal is better- IMO- than paying more for internet alone and then paying for a streaming service and trying to roll with the tradeoffs.
Still, when the special offers are about to end, I use competition offers to either get them to re-up me with discounts OR I'm prepared to hop to one of those competitors and give them nothing for a year or two. They usually want the promotional offer revenue more than having my account become a zero revenue account.
Another card that could be played is simply turn it off for a few weeks and they'll quickly start sending "special offers" to try to lure back a recently-canceled customer.
The key here is being a consumer instead of someone who just rolls over and pays whatever a seller wants to charge. They want your money much, much more than you should want or need this particular kind of service.
If one cares about quality picture & sound for live television, the priority is over-the-air (via antenna), then traditional cable or SATT. Streaming services main benefit is relatively cheaper pricing. Part of what makes it cheaper is tradeoffs like audio, "DVR"s that are not as full featured as traditional hardware DVRs, a few channels you wish were available but not on any given service, and so on. To those happy with such tradeoffs, it seems they can "save" anywhere from about $10 to about $30-$50 per month, except in those cases where someone lets all new subscriber deals lapse and has many TVs to feed (and thus many boxes to lease). Those are the ones who have the $150-$300/month cable horror stories to share.
If you want to get a better price than lapsed cable/satt deals, flex your consumer muscle by pressing competitive offers. These entities will deal if they are facing potential defections to a better deal with a competitor(s). And if they won't deal, fire them.
Myself? I went with traditional cable but no leased boxes (including buying my own broadband modem), using HDHomeRun boxes for TV, an OTA antenna for locals and the terrific Channels app to function as the on screen (combined & traditional) guide and (much more like a traditional hardware) DVR. All that (TV) works through
TVs. The "double play" deal is better- IMO- than paying more for internet alone and then paying for a streaming service and trying to roll with the tradeoffs.Still, when the special offers are about to end, I use competition offers to either get them to re-up me with discounts OR I'm prepared to hop to one of those competitors and give them nothing for a year or two. They usually want the promotional offer revenue more than having my account become a zero revenue account.
Another card that could be played is simply turn it off for a few weeks and they'll quickly start sending "special offers" to try to lure back a recently-canceled customer.
The key here is being a consumer instead of someone who just rolls over and pays whatever a seller wants to charge. They want your money much, much more than you should want or need this particular kind of service.
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That is super helpful, thanks very much. My original set-up was HD antenna for OTA broadcasts and a Tivo Bolt DVR plus Netflix account. That was my perfect, hassle free set-up. Only problem was I needed ESPN and Fox Sports.
Turns out that my cable company will give me a cable card and good channel selection for only $5/mo more than they're charging me for my internet service, so I put a cable card in my Tivo and use that. It's a huge hassle to troubleshoot and the quality is worse, but that's the tradeoff to watch live sports. Would love to be able to just stream those few cable channels I need through my ATV, but I guess that's never going to be ab option.
HobeSoundDarryl
macrumors G5
errol pointed the way. HDHomeRun Prime works with cable card. Several other HDHomeRun boxes offer OTA options.
Channels app will put BOTH cable and OTA channels in a single on-screen-guide. There's even a "FAVS" option in Channels to show only the channels you want (hiding the ones you don't) AND you can put them in whatever order you want (all sports channels together, all movie channels together, etc- however you want them).
Channels app DVR is much more like a classic hardware DVR than any of the virtual DVRs with the various streaming services. Bonus: (unlike even traditional DVRs) add whatever amount of storage you want AND access anything you record with Mac software like Quicktime, FCPX, etc.
And all that works throughTV.
Personally, I think it is THE best option available for hanging onto classic quality (like DD 5.1 sound, full DVR functionality, etc) while feeding into the primary "cord cutter" desire of reduced pricing for live TV service. And bonus: all that video doesn't burn one byte against broadband data caps... AND even cablecard can generally qualify as TV service in "double play" and "triple play" bundle offers. More bonus: since cablecard is still cable, all of the individual channel & network apps that require an active cable subscription work here too.
Channels app will put BOTH cable and OTA channels in a single on-screen-guide. There's even a "FAVS" option in Channels to show only the channels you want (hiding the ones you don't) AND you can put them in whatever order you want (all sports channels together, all movie channels together, etc- however you want them).
Channels app DVR is much more like a classic hardware DVR than any of the virtual DVRs with the various streaming services. Bonus: (unlike even traditional DVRs) add whatever amount of storage you want AND access anything you record with Mac software like Quicktime, FCPX, etc.
And all that works through
TV.Personally, I think it is THE best option available for hanging onto classic quality (like DD 5.1 sound, full DVR functionality, etc) while feeding into the primary "cord cutter" desire of reduced pricing for live TV service. And bonus: all that video doesn't burn one byte against broadband data caps... AND even cablecard can generally qualify as TV service in "double play" and "triple play" bundle offers. More bonus: since cablecard is still cable, all of the individual channel & network apps that require an active cable subscription work here too.
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