Cord Cutters

MonoStereo

Well-Known Member
May 12, 2020
831
1,286
98
58
Kansas City
I just cancelled our DirecTV Stream service. I liked it just fine, but I'm just as happy w/Hulu Live TV for $35-ish less a month. I actually save more than that, because I don't have to shell out $$$ for the Disney bundle every month anymore ( it's included w/Hulu Live TV ).

The only problem is that at this point, I don't have a way to watch my Royals games. Amazon just bailed out Bally Sports & in theory will get the streaming rights to the Royals. If that happens, either they'll be included in Prime Video ( which I already have ) or as an additional product ( which is what I'm assuming will happen ). Even if I have to pay extra for that it should still be cheaper than what DirecTV Stream costs.

I had to make a decision because my DirecTV account would "un-pause" in a few days & I'd start being charged again ( I paused it 3 months ago to give Hulu a shot ). Worst case scenario, I can always resubscribe to them if there ends up being no other way to get my games.
 

MonoStereo

Well-Known Member
May 12, 2020
831
1,286
98
58
Kansas City
The whole Royals/Amazon streaming deal hasn't been ironed out yet, so I ended up ponying up for the Bally Sports App Season Pass so I could watch games. $106 for the baseball regular season, which ends up being about 17 bucks a month. If you read the post directly above this one, you would see that it's still cheaper than paying for DirecTV Stream. The Bally Sports app catches a lotta grief - it's known as a pretty janky way to watch games. But so far I've had zero issues with it, so I dunno what I'm doing right. I only watch via the app on my Roku TV, & maybe other people are watching on their phones or something. Or maybe they just got their shit together after last season. ( shrugs ) Either way, so far so good.
 

scotchandcigar

All I wanted was some steak
Feb 13, 2009
25,722
20,517
168
Vacationland
It just occurred to me that this thread is named incorrectly. Although "cord-cutters" is what they call people who've gotten rid of subscription cable TV with a box, the only people who are truly cutting the cords are those using either satellite dishes (pretty rare now) or cell service as a Wi-Fi hotspot. The rest of us are still relying on cords to provide the internet service, so we can ditch the cable TV providers and use a streaming service.

With that said, I've just seen that our suburban, spread-out town of York has been wired with Fidium fiber optic cable. They just did our street. At present, those of us who don't use a dish or can't get a good cell signal, are still relying on Spectrum coax cable for internet, and then we're either streaming or using the Spectrum cable TV service. Soon, we'll be able to get fiber optic internet service, which I'd imagine would be pretty fast. I'm at about 370 Mbps now, but faster and cheaper (or at least some competition) would be good.
 

scotchandcigar

All I wanted was some steak
Feb 13, 2009
25,722
20,517
168
Vacationland
Soon, we'll be able to get fiber optic internet service, which I'd imagine would be pretty fast. I'm at about 370 Mbps now, but faster and cheaper (or at least some competition) would be good.
According to their site, I'll be able to get 300 Mbps service for $75/month. Well, $65/month, plus $10/month for the Wi-Fi router (I guess you could just buy a router and save on the monthly charge). Or for $85/month, I get 1 Gbps, with the router included. That sounds like the way to go, as we're paying $85 now, including the router fee.
 

scotchandcigar

All I wanted was some steak
Feb 13, 2009
25,722
20,517
168
Vacationland
our suburban, spread-out town of York has been wired with Fidium fiber optic cable. They just did our street. At present, those of us who don't use a dish or can't get a good cell signal, are still relying on Spectrum coax cable for internet, and then we're either streaming or using the Spectrum cable TV service. Soon, we'll be able to get fiber optic internet service, which I'd imagine would be pretty fast. I'm at about 370 Mbps now, but faster and cheaper (or at least some competition) would be good.
for $85/month, I get 1 Gbps, with the router included. That sounds like the way to go, as we're paying $85 now, including the router fee.
Fidium installers stopped by our house yesterday. We're scheduled to get wired-up a week from today. They will run it to our pole and then through the underground conduit to the house. Installation is free, so we only pay for however many days we get service, in case we want to cancel in the first 30 days. It will be discounted to $65/mo. for the 1st year for 1 Gbps, then $85 after. We're paying $89/mo. now (it went up again) for 300 Mbps, so this should be a step in the right direction.

While I've rarely had issues with Spectrum service, they are generally hated in town. For one, they've had a monopoly on high-speed internet and cable TV for years. Their cable TV service is up to $300/mo. now (with internet). And in many parts of town, the service runs through old, unreliable wiring. Also, their customer service sucks, just like Comcast does.

I suspect that when this is all done, the only remaining Spectrum customers will be the ones who want it for cable TV (those who don't want to stream). You know, people like me - until recently.
 

sadchild

Dude
Mar 28, 2016
12,794
14,383
168
54
NH
www.asimplecomplex.com
Their cable TV service is up to $300/mo. now (with internet).
My in-laws just over the state line from you have Breezline (formerly Metrocast). I got a text a few days ago from my MIL:

"What is the quickest/easiest way to change all of the Metrocast emails. The bill this month.... $316!!"

For years I've tried to get my FIL to just stream the same 50 movies he watches all day and night (the Fast & Furious ones, the Star Wars ones, the Harry Potter ones, and action films like John Wick/Mission Impossible/etc) instead of doing it how he always has: scan the cable guide for 10 minutes and settle on an action movie that's already 1/2 over (I've seen the end of so many action films, but not many beginnings). But that $316/mo price tag may finally be getting him to consider a different method than what he's been doing for 30 years.
 

scotchandcigar

All I wanted was some steak
Feb 13, 2009
25,722
20,517
168
Vacationland
My in-laws just over the state line from you have Breezline (formerly Metrocast). I got a text a few days ago from my MIL:

"What is the quickest/easiest way to change all of the Metrocast emails. The bill this month.... $316!!"

For years I've tried to get my FIL to just stream the same 50 movies he watches all day and night (the Fast & Furious ones, the Star Wars ones, the Harry Potter ones, and action films like John Wick/Mission Impossible/etc) instead of doing it how he always has: scan the cable guide for 10 minutes and settle on an action movie that's already 1/2 over (I've seen the end of so many action films, but not many beginnings). But that $316/mo price tag may finally be getting him to consider a different method than what he's been doing for 30 years.
Now that I'm older and everyone around me is older - I notice that people have spent their lives forming their weird viewing habits, which they stubbornly cling to. We have a friend who only watches "ABC shows". I thought this concept went bye-bye in the 80's, but to this day, he just watches whatever is on ABC. His mother only watches shows about surgeries and medical conditions. My MIL only watches MSNBC. We met someone recently who hasn't really turned on a TV since Friends went off the air. I know people who only watch sports and those shows about antiquing and storage units. Some people only watch cooking and travel shows.

Of course, we are weird too. I think our run of network prime-time TV shows ended with The Office and Modern Family. Everything we watch now is on some cable channel, or a streaming service. Except we watch local and national network news and local news-magazine shows. And occasionally, network late-night TV. But our TV is probably tuned to either Bravo or HGTV like 50% of the time.
 
  • Like
Reactions: sadchild

scotchandcigar

All I wanted was some steak
Feb 13, 2009
25,722
20,517
168
Vacationland
Fidium installers stopped by our house yesterday. We're scheduled to get wired-up a week from today. They will run it to our pole and then through the underground conduit to the house. Installation is free, so we only pay for however many days we get service, in case we want to cancel in the first 30 days. It will be discounted to $65/mo. for the 1st year for 1 Gbps, then $85 after. We're paying $89/mo. now (it went up again) for 300 Mbps, so this should be a step in the right direction.

While I've rarely had issues with Spectrum service, they are generally hated in town. For one, they've had a monopoly on high-speed internet and cable TV for years. Their cable TV service is up to $300/mo. now (with internet). And in many parts of town, the service runs through old, unreliable wiring. Also, their customer service sucks, just like Comcast does.

I suspect that when this is all done, the only remaining Spectrum customers will be the ones who want it for cable TV (those who don't want to stream). You know, people like me - until recently.
Today was the day. A Fidium installer spent over 2 hours here to get me up and running. First he had to get the fiber to our pole, then snake it through our conduit to the house. And that's when it got fun. I thought they'd install a fiber-to-copper box outside the house - like Verizon FIOS did many years ago (in another house) - that would allow them to use our existing wiring in the house. But according to the installer, "yeah, a lot of people think that". The new equipment (modem) has a fiber optic input. My existing modem is upstairs, wired through an interior wall that's not accessible from outside or the basement. It was prewired (ha!) by the electrician before the walls were finished.

But we did have a few cable access spots on the 1st floor, right above the basement. And the fiber optic cable is like a thin wire, not a big coax cable. So it's easy to get it through things. And to simplify the changeover, we used the old network name and password for the new router. Anyway, this is the new Speedtest result.

1726684270107.png

For some reason, the Fidium (Consolidated Communications) app always shows the speed as 1,100 down, 1,100 up. I don't know what that means. Perhaps one is "capacity", and the other is real data. But the big difference is on my work laptop through my VPN

1726684795314.png

That used to be (at most) 50 down and 10 up. I'm guessing I won't have any problems with Zoom meetings anymore.
 
  • Like
Reactions: sadchild

sadchild

Dude
Mar 28, 2016
12,794
14,383
168
54
NH
www.asimplecomplex.com
Of course, we are weird too.
I'm the weirdest. I think I'm the only house in the world that never has the TV on, except a movie once a week on average, and maybe 25 minutes to watch an episode of the one show my wife and I are currently working on once or twice a week.

Right now it's Fresh Prince Of Bel Air (ordered the DVDs on June 21, 2021 and we're only up to season 4). Over the summer we paused Prince for a couple Jap-animes over the summer my son wanted us to watch (Oddtaxi and Kaguya-sama:Love Is War). Before that, couldn't tell you - maybe IT Crowd? Or Kominsky Method?

But between 22 - 23 1/2 hours a day, no TV. But I play music throughout the house either from when I get home from work until bedtime, or on a weekend, up to 12 hours a day. I have speakers wired throughout the house so whatever is on my stereo is also playing upstairs and downstairs.

As mentioned before, at my FIL's house I have seen the second half of every action movie ever made, several episodes of people working outdoors (that Alaska trucker show, that mining for gold show, etc etc etc). And it's the only way I see commercials. If it weren't for him, I wouldn't know wtf people were talking about when they post things like Liberty Biberty.