Author Topic: Cable has been cut  (Read 21233 times)

JoRocka

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #50 on: April 01, 2016, 12:48:35 PM »
That's awesome!!
I grew up without TV/Cable- and we had dial up- so having regular internet with netflix/amazon prime is definitely sufficint for me.

I've even considered dropping Netflix- but quite frankly- I HATE Prime Streaming- and since my guilty pleasure spending is 3-5$ x that of my netflix monthly bill it seems silly to cut something I use so much- vs just reigning in my personal spending habits.

Yeah- but cable- super over rated- I only miss it for hockey games- but even then- online has almost everything you need.

BTH7117

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #51 on: April 01, 2016, 01:12:45 PM »
We cut the cord as well.  Indoor antennas give us a great over the air reception.

Caveat: We already had an apple TV box, and we do "borrow" our family's log in so we can watch network shows conveniently and the one basic cable show we love (The Americans).

lcmac32

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #52 on: April 13, 2016, 05:23:19 PM »
Month three and I am still happy about cutting the cable.  Nothing like $130 more each month to save.  Still not to the 50% savings rate mark.  Should be there by June 2017.  Could be sooner, but I am okay if it is anytime in 2017.
 

CodAlmighty

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #53 on: April 14, 2016, 05:56:26 AM »
Congratulations to the OP. Every little helps, and the extra $130 per month certainly will.

Our contract ended in February and we didn't renew it so we've been about a month without it now. In the UK we have something called FreeSat which - as the name suggests - is free once you've paid for the box, so we got that. The box will pay for itself within the first 6 weeks of not having a subscription.

It's a double victory for me because my girlfriend isn't fully on-board with the MMM way of life. A year ago neither of us would have considered getting rid of cable, now after following MMM himself I've managed to persuade the other half to give it up!

dude

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #54 on: April 14, 2016, 11:06:37 AM »
I'm jealous, OP.  Want to cut it badly, but DW won't abide!

mwulff

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #55 on: April 15, 2016, 08:03:29 AM »
We cut the cable as well, never ever missed it. It helps that we don't follow sports.

RedmondStash

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #56 on: April 15, 2016, 09:57:16 PM »
Congrats! We are on the verge of cutting our cable. It's hard to do; we've had it for so long. We like hanging out in the evening and watching TV to mellow out for bedtime.

We bought a good antenna, but we're still getting a fair amount of pixelation, possibly because of all the tall trees around the house. I still think it's good enough to replace cable, especially when you look at what $75/month looks like over 30-50 years with compound interest. Yowza.

So it's time. I think.

Daughn

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #57 on: April 20, 2016, 02:56:35 PM »
We have been without cable for several years. Don't miss it one bit. Most of the shows we like are on PBS anyway, plus we have Amazon Prime.

mwulff

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #58 on: April 21, 2016, 12:04:41 AM »
I had a curios cable-cutting incident yesterday.

For many years we have been forced to buy the absolute minimum cable-package (HOA rules, nothing could be done). But as of 03-31 we could get out of that package as well. So I call up the cable company and say "thank you, but no thanks. Please close per 03-31". Their reply was: "Sure, we'll send you a confirmation email".

I get the email and next thing I know they send med a bill for the period of April to the end of June. I cancel the transaction thinking it was just a computer glitch. Next thing I know I'm getting a paper bill in the mail with extra fees.

So I call them up and sure enough. They said they cancelled the package and sent the confirmation but the package was not actually canceled. The CSR was actually really helpful and told me that this time it really was cancelled and all bills were gone.

Moral of the story: Check your automatic payments and remember to remove old-cancelled payments from the system.

Mr.Bubbles

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #59 on: June 10, 2016, 01:22:29 PM »
1 year now cable free... I do not miss it one bit. My DIY skills around the house have improved with more free time so thats good :)

RedmondStash

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #60 on: June 11, 2016, 09:08:21 AM »
We went cable-free a few months ago. A note of warning: Keep a sharp eye on your bill for the first several months; you may continue to be charged things you shouldn't be. I've had to call our phone/ISP (and former cable) provider 3 additional times now over 3 months to get weird cable-related charges on my bill reversed. I still don't know if the bill will be correct next month.

MoneyCat

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #61 on: June 15, 2016, 10:24:08 PM »
I haven't paid for cable since 2008 and I have missed absolutely nothing. The antenna on our roof gets us 60 channels for free and we skip the commercials with our subscription-free Channel Master DVR+. Savings have been about $1200/year. Not too shabby.

Zoot

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #62 on: June 16, 2016, 07:48:16 AM »
For a DVR I bought a 2011 era Dell business laptop from craigslist for $150 (E6410 model, i5 processor, 4GB ram, HDMI output) and use Mediacenter which is included in Windows7.  The only other hardware needed is an IR remote with USB receiver (~$15 on Amazon) and one or more TV tuner cards ($50-$100).  The laptop is a dedicated DVR appliance, it sits near the TV and is set to sleep whenever it is not recording or playing video in order to minimize power useage.  It's a very simple/clean user interface, I think it's a bit simpler than Tivo and there is no monthly fee.

DH and I have a similar set-up.  I LOOOOOOOOOOVE Media Center and have used it for years.

Media Center won't be a feature of Windows 10, and I hear Microsoft will no longer be supporting it for older versions of Windows.  There have also been issue with the program guide (see http://www.thegreenbutton.tv/forums/viewforum.php?f=96 for a million posts on this topic!).  All of this makes me think that Media Center's days are numbered--and my affection for this setup is so fierce that I will be hanging on to the LAST and will wait for them to wrest it out of my cold, dead hands when the time finally comes.  ;-)

So I'm wondering if anybody out there has suggestions for WMC alternatives if and when it does go away (perish the thought).  Anybody got anything?

gregg687

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #63 on: June 16, 2016, 07:49:16 AM »
I'm thinking about going this route as well.  Any avid sports fans out there- what do you all do?  The only thing I watch on TV is live sports which I know that I can't give up.

Zoot

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #64 on: June 16, 2016, 08:16:15 AM »
I'm thinking about going this route as well.  Any avid sports fans out there- what do you all do?  The only thing I watch on TV is live sports which I know that I can't give up.

Have you looked at an over-the-air antenna?  DH and I experimented with one recently, and were able to get all the broadcast networks, which would cover a lot of live sports.  Neither of us really watches a lot of sports on TV, but DH's cable-cutting concern was "how will I watch the Super Bowl"--but with the antenna we could address that concern so he was good.  ;-)

Also look in to Sling if you want ESPN; I think they have a $20/month package which incudes ESPN and they have other add-on packages in which you might be able to get more sports.

I'll let actual avid sports fans reply in more detail, but check out those as a jumping off point.  :)

WGH

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #65 on: June 16, 2016, 08:28:22 AM »
I'm thinking about going this route as well.  Any avid sports fans out there- what do you all do?  The only thing I watch on TV is live sports which I know that I can't give up.

Google Reddit NBA/MLB/NFL streams

skeeder

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #66 on: June 16, 2016, 08:32:54 AM »
We've been cable/tv service free for 8 years (since marriage).  In the old days, I used to pirate programs so I could watch them on my own accord, now with free services like hulu and the websites having episodes of streaming it's so simple I don't understand why others don't do it.

 

Exflyboy

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #67 on: June 16, 2016, 10:41:13 AM »
I never had cable.. but it did take me about 5 years to convince my Wife to let me cut off the landline phone.

We cut $80 a month from that and then her Verizon bill kept going a few mins over her $40/m plan so it would end up being a $100 bill! even without data!

So That got changed to a Republic $10 talk and text plan.

So an easy $120/m saved. The problem has always been my Wife is unconcerned about money so it sort of grows on trees from her perspective (we have lots of incomce so why the need to save??). Over the last decade or so she has gotten better about this but its been an uphill struggle and source of irritation to me.

Now of course she can retire if she wants to, not sure she totally understands how getting these bills down has contributed to this but she can at least see that because of her Husband's focus on money/investing she can retire.

Not a bad place to be..:)

So now that she is
« Last Edit: June 23, 2016, 03:23:06 PM by Exflyboy »

21runner

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #68 on: June 20, 2016, 09:26:37 AM »
I use Netflix and own a Roku TV. I love the Roku, there are so many things available to watch even without cable. I also built an OTA antenna to grab ABC, NBC, CBS, etc. I'm trying to cut down my TV time though.

tj

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #69 on: June 20, 2016, 09:44:06 PM »
I've been about four months now without a TV subscription....and it was a little odd having live TV in the hotel room this past weekend. I didn't take a phone charger either, so spent very little time on the internet. i definitely have not missed the wall to wall cable American news coverage....

katsiki

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #70 on: June 21, 2016, 09:16:35 AM »
1 month for us and it's been fine.  My wife was worried about news.  With our Roku, we get CNN (clips), SkyNews, EuroNews and OANN ($4/mo).  We prefer OANN and Skynews anyway.

MoneyCat

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #71 on: June 21, 2016, 10:04:59 PM »
I've been using an OTA rooftop antenna for the past year and I miss absolutely nothing. 90%+ of our TV watching was already OTA network channels and then I discovered that I could watch a lot of the cable sports I enjoyed on Spanish language OTA channels. I mean, seriously, who cares if I can't understand the commentators. It's not like they add anything to the sporting event anyway.

noodlestache

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #72 on: June 23, 2016, 02:51:58 PM »
I've been checking this thread periodically and everyone's updates have inspired me to to cut the cord since I really don't watch that much tv. However my husband follows a lot of sports, so cutting the cord was never really an option... That was until Time Warner decided it was time to increase our bill to $120/mo for cable and internet. We weren't going to pay for any of that, so he cancelled our cable this week. Tomorrow is our last day of cable tv and I am happy to report this will save us around $60/mo because of it!

Captain and Mrs Slow

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #73 on: August 16, 2016, 01:50:20 PM »
I live in Germany so my situation is slighly different but we finally cut the cord as well. I'm not a sports fan so I'm not affected that way but we both love movies and that's the reason we stuck it out so long. But honestly this  days there are so many streaming services out there it's not an issue anymore. Having commercial free TV is a nice side benefit of streaming.

For movies I recommend Vid Angel and I Stream It All. Vidangel is particularly interesting as they "rent" movies for a buck but it requires setting up filters (i.e. No sex or swearing). Neither require a VPN.

For TV shows I use Hulu ad free version. BBC iplayer is phenomenal but like Hulu requires a VPN. An added benefit is they allow you to download shows which comes in real handy when your travelling. I've tried other British TV apps (ITV Channel 4) but they all show commercials and just aren't as slick.

Amazon (Germany) is my backup when travellng. Thier catalogue isn't the best but they allow you to download which again is a benefit when travelling?

I dropped Netflix once they started cracking down on VPNs, that and I hardly ever watched it.


tj

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #74 on: August 16, 2016, 04:05:41 PM »
I've been checking this thread periodically and everyone's updates have inspired me to to cut the cord since I really don't watch that much tv. However my husband follows a lot of sports, so cutting the cord was never really an option... That was until Time Warner decided it was time to increase our bill to $120/mo for cable and internet. We weren't going to pay for any of that, so he cancelled our cable this week. Tomorrow is our last day of cable tv and I am happy to report this will save us around $60/mo because of it!

Look into SLing TV or PlaystationVue. Hulu is allegedly coming out with something similar in 2017.



katsiki

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #75 on: August 16, 2016, 06:11:48 PM »
I just discovered Vid Angel myself (on a Roku).  Interesting concept.  I like the idea of the filtering.  The price point might be get some folks away from Redbox.

sun and sand

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #76 on: August 16, 2016, 07:15:03 PM »
I cut cable one week ago and then went on vacation.......

Exflyboy

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #77 on: August 19, 2016, 10:35:50 PM »
Growing up in the UK and emigrating to the US in 1997 I totally didn't know what cable was (they have cable/satellite now).

So when I got to the US the idea that you plugged your TV into a cable to get programming (and paid for the privilege) seemed a really dumb idea.

So I never did and it still seems like a dumb idea..:)

icemodeled

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Re: Cable has been cut
« Reply #78 on: August 21, 2016, 09:58:21 PM »
We cut cable 2 years ago now! We do not have Netflix, Hulu or any streaming stuff. Actually quite happy to be disconnected from it all.. We only watched a handful of shows and majority was garbage. We rent movies from the library and occasionally some tv season favorites. We also have a stash of favorites we had bought. We will never go back to it.