We take a different tack than other readers. Have a TV, with a home theater PC, and 'rabbit ears' antenna.
-Live TV? Check. Rabbit ears gives us ABC, CBS, FOX, CW, and a couple other major networks.
- Movies? Check. Using the internet through our HTPC lets us watch anything through instant streaming on Netflix. No waiting for DVDs, no trips to the rental store. Plus full seasons of lots of TV shows.
- TV shows? Check. We can easily download any cable show, and in fact we have a system that downloads shows as soon as they're released, basically like a DVR.
And the bonuses:
- Music? Check. We have our full MP3 music library on the HTPC, along with easy access to Pandora for 'Radio' and Spotify for any songs we don't have.
- Pictures? Check. We have all of our digital pictures on there and can bring any of them up on the screen at a moment's notice to show friends and family.
- Video games? Check. We bought an aftermarket N64 controller, and downloaded an emulator, so we can now play virtually any N64/SNES game ever made.
- Youtube? Check.
- Internet browser? Check.
- Beautiful-look Media Center software? Check. Compared to your DVR's interface, this thing looks like it's from the future.
- Power consumption? Allegedly better than most set-top boxes, although I've never measured.
Negatives:
-Live sports (in our case, football and hockey). Although football airs on CBS and FOX, hockey is cable only. All the internet streams I've seen are low quality, but can suffice if you really want to watch it. I don't watch much live sports, but when I do, I go over to a cable-equipped family member's house to watch, which is much preferable to watching alone. If I really wanted to, I could watch the playoffs in a bar, and drink plenty of cheap beers, and still make out like a bandit compared to paying a cable bill.
My HTPC cost about $300 to build (although you could build one for less, or buy a unit that would do everything except download shows for about $50), plus $25 for the powered antenna. Axing a $60/mth cable bill, it paid for itself in 7 months, and seemingly overnight moved us from living paycheck-to-paycheck to living somewhat comfortably. I'd recommend it for anyone.