I have been seriously considering switching from digital cable (current provider is SuddenLink) to satellite. There have been some lingering questions about this though. 1. I have heard that broadband internet is way more expensive from satellite providers than cable providers. Is that true? This is the major sticking point for me. 2. Are there really hidden fees and lock-in sections on contracts you sign with satellite companies? 3. Does weather really play a big role in picture quality and reception on satellite models? 4. Do you have to pay for upgrades and things like that? I will probably have some more questions later on.
I was reluctant to switch for many years, but I'm glad now that I am on Direct TV. 1. I have Direct TV but my internet is still done through cable. I just pay one bill to Direct TV and the other to comcast/TW 2. There can be a contract that you agree to, but it wasn't too hidden when I signed up. 3. I was most concerned about the weather, but I have once for less than 5 minutes had a wether related outage in the 4 years I've had satellite. Overall I had more cable problems with the digital signal breaking up over cable. I get better reception with Direct TV, not worse and with fewer interruptions.
If you combined the 2 bills how much would they be? Right now, I have two regular digital cable boxes (no DVR) and I get every channel available. That plus Internet runs me about $150 a month.
SBC dish network absolutely sucked. Even minor weather issues killed the connection, the price sucked, and quality/service was poor.
My internet one is about $55 a month, and I think the Direct TV ends up being $88 or about $64 depending on whether the NBA league Pass payment is on there. But I don't have all the movie channels. I just have one set of movie channels and the package that has the most basic channels that you can get. Intitially it will be cheaper because I think they usually offer deals at first for the movie channels. I live in California so the prices might be different elsewhere.
i use dish network,silver hd package, love it, with 2 movie channels showtime/hbo i pay about 99 a month. i use dsl through at&t for about 15 a month... no problems with dish for past 4 months, did have direct tv in austin couple years ago and it would go out, i think it just depends on your line of sight. if there are leaves/trees and windy/rainy could be a problem but non-issue for me now. the hd programming is far superior with satellite vs cable and i love the DVR i upgraded to, 1 box 2 rooms in HD
I have DirecTV and DSL for internet. My DirecTV bill is $134. I get all the channels including all HDTV channels. I have 1 HD DVR, 1 regular DVR, and 1 HD receiver. My DSL/Phone bill is around $62, but I have the highest DSL speed that they offer 6Mbps. It would be a lot cheaper if you get the 3Mbps DSL.
I think the only thing stopping me (aside from my cable being free) from getting DirecTV, is that, there are a total of 5 TVs in this house, and well, 5 satellite receivers would suck. I think once I'm out on my own though, I'll probably be switching to DirecTV.
Are you locked in when you start service. I really just want it for the NFL Network and NFL Sunday Ticket. I could do that for half a year.
Man I hated Dish Network. I had to call them 3 times in 8 months to come to my house to service my dish. Each time they tried to charge me but I b****ed until they did it for free. I would sometimes have my dish out for a week before they had someone come out and fix it. If it is storming outside don't expect to be able to watch tv.
Soon you can have a choice of TV from Dish Cable or telephone companies. They are buidling fiber optic lines which will allow them to carry TV signals easily.
sucks man, ive had no problems, and its stormed plenty. like i said before i think it depends on the original set up. make sure theres nothing in the way at all and youll be fine. TW customer service was awful when i had them so dish was just the same
I have another alternative for you: DSL. For the price you're paying for Cable Internet, you could get the fastest DSL download and upload speeds. I am doing DirecTV and SBC DSL (the lower priced DSL). Dish network does NOT have Sunday Ticket. You have to do DirecTV for that. And with Sunday Ticket, you'd have to either pay in a lump sum, or split it amongst four months. As far as outages and service interruptions, neither has been cut off at all, and I have had DirecTV go out maybe twice in the four months I had it. May I ask why you're asking about this now, instead of just before the NFL season started? You could have saved BIG TIME on watching some premium movie channels. They had the best deal going even without High Definition.
Sunday Ticket is DirecTV only.....it is not available on any other cable or satellite provider. If Sunday Ticket is your primary reason for getting it, then you should probably wait until the summer time when they offer some nice deals for new customers.
Yeah I figure I just was one of those people who had a bad run of luck with them. I know other people that have dish and have not had any problems. And the thing is that I had the dish on my roof with nothing even close to it. I just had really, really bad luck with them. The thing is after they had someone come out the first time to fix my dish I thought it would be fine. By the time I had to call someone out for the 3rd time I was done and ready to switch back to cable. Besides that I got a special deal to switch from dish to cable. I got the highest digital cable programming package, a DVR, cable to 3 rooms, 12 months of all the Starz movie channels and I pay $43 a month which is actually $15 cheaper a month than I was paying for my dish package with a DVR so it all worked out in the end.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070108/tc_nm/electronics_show_directv_dc_1 DirecTV sees 100 HD channels, Net videos in '07 LAS VEGAS (Reuters) - Top U.S. satellite television operator DirecTV Group Inc. plans to announce on Monday it has secured agreements for 60 high-definition channels from major TV networks, as part of a goal to launch 100 HD channels in 2007. These channels, expected to debut in the third quarter of 2007, will include HD versions of well-known networks including those owned by General Electric controlled NBC Universal and Time Warner Inc.'s Turner Networks, executives said. The news will be part of a roster of announcements at the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this week, where DirecTV will also discuss plans to allow subscribers to connect to Internet videos from their home computers as well as a portable version of its service that fits in a suitcase called Sat-Go. "All of these add-ons that enable new features are fantastic," Eric Shanks, executive vice president of DirecTV Entertainment, said in a phone interview ahead of the announcement. But, "Where the world is going is into HD. None of the wireless products is going to bring you 100 channels of HD. Once you have standard definition content, these things help you share it."
