Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Cancel cable?

I know what you're thinking, "He can't be serious." Watch me.

Come on, it isn't like it is that hard to do when you have broadband internet. Between Netflix, Newsleecher, and Hulu I will be more than alright.

Currently, some friends of mine are all hyped up debating between plasma or LCD HDTVs, Blu Ray or HD DVD, Comcast or DirecTV when the real challenge going forward will be how fast is your broadband connection. Look, I'm trying to move ahead of the crowd for once. The future is now. For a single guy such as myself, most of my TV watching will be done on a computer or in my specific case a 14.1 widescreen laptop going forward. I have tried to fight it. But you know the old saying, "don't fight 'gainst it, work with it."

Now I am not advocating you toss that big screen TV out the door because when it comes to entertaining guests nothing beats 50 inches of Hi Definition. NOTHING!

So in summary, what this means is what it has always meant, time to get a bigger pipe. And right now it looks like Verizon's FiOS has a great deal for the first 7 mos. Of course they want me to sign a 2 year agreement which may be broken for free if I move to a place where FiOS is not offered otherwise I pay the $150 termination fee.
1st month: FREE
2nd - 7th months: $37.99
8th - 24th months: $47.99
Bonus: $20 Target gift card

Or would you recommend that I just buy a 3G wireless card from either Sprint or ATT? I know the pipe isn't as big as FiOS but it will be with me wherever I go. That has to be a huge plus. Those plans run around $60/month (unlimited for Sprint & 5GB for ATT).

PS: My next goal is to convince the NFL that they need the internet version of the NFL Package.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well if you've got a 50 inch HDTV and a computer, make the necessary arrangements to set up a media server. I use a Mac Mini myself but really any moderately modern computer is adequate.

Pack some external hard drives full of TV series and movies, and manage it onscreen via remote, wireless mouse/keyboard, or VPN from your laptop (my personal favorite).

No reason to deprive yourself just because you canceled cable!

Anonymous said...

You're absolutely right. With Hulu and Netflix canceling cable has been pretty seamless.

We also bought a digital converter box (about $20 after rebate) and receive free digital TV broadcasts which are sharper than our old digital cable signal. I've heard that a lot of people with high end flatscreens are using free digital HD TV to get the best possible signal (since its less compressed than cable), so this may be one of the few times when the cheapest choice (free) provides the best quality.

Just started a blog detailing our experience (which has been quite good). Best of luck with FIOS. I have friends who have been very pleased with it.

Troy said...

Hi CancelCable.com,

Got my coupon cards 2 days ago and bought the Digital Stream Digital-to-Analog Converter w/ Pass-through (Model: DTX9950) and an antenna (25% off if you buy at same time). Totally impressed by the picture quality on roughly 20 channels or so. Thanks for the 411 and nice blog also.

Anonymous said...

Hi Troy - glad to hear that you made the switch!