Moving from Directv and Cable

[MatthewB]

Actually it's pronounced Row K (say Row with a k on the end) it's Japanese for 6 (almost 30 years of martial arts you learn how to say the numbers quite well). Roku means 6 because it was the sixth development of the box that finally worked.

I actually pay 41.00 a month for Directv as I get their cheapest plan as I'm not into sports and have no movie channels. I was paying 80.00 under a bundle package but when I threatened to cut the cord they first tried to say how great all their sports and movie channels were. Yeah wrong person to convince of that. I told them that SlingTV could give me everything I want to watch so they dropped my price. This includes my whole home HD/DVR and two other boxes that can record and watch off the main box and insurance. Now my Centurylink bill is 140.00 a month which includes Directv, Cell phone, high speed internet 20 Mbps and home phone

 

[Towen7]

Actually it's pronounced Row K (say Row with a k on the end) it's Japanese for 6 (almost 30 years of martial arts you learn how to say the numbers quite well). Roku means 6 because it was the sixth development of the box that finally worked.

I sat in on a webcast of a conference with high level execs at AT&T and several hardware makers, including Roku. The guy from Roku pronounced it Row-Coo so I'm going with that.

Better yet... Just search YouTube for videos from the company themselves and you'll hear it pronounced Row-coo. So I suppose, oddly enough, there is no connection between 30 years of martial arts training in Arizona and an electronic device to stream video over the Internet.

 

[Barney]

Well, I dropped Sling and since Roku just got Playstation Vue, I signed up for the 70+ for $34.99 a month. Has a learning curve but a cloud DVR for 28 days. So far I really like it. ESPN Longhorn Network & FOX Sports Southwest along will all the ESPN's , FS channels (to just get these two - ABC/ESPN & just FS1with Sling cost me $43 a month and alot less channels and no DVR).
Loads real fast on my Roku 4.

 

[Towen7]

And just to pile on...

The reference to 'six' has nothing to do with the number of boxes they tried. Below is a snip from their website...

https://www.roku.com/about/executive-team

Anthony Wood, Founder and CEO
A pioneer and innovator in TV and digital media, Anthony Wood is the Founder and CEO of Roku, a name that means "six" in Japanese to represent his sixth company. In the early days of Roku, Anthony also served as the vice president of Internet TV at Netflix, where he developed what is known today as the Roku streaming player, originally designed as the original video player for Netflix. Prior to Roku, Anthony invented the digital video recorder (DVR) and founded ReplayTV, where he served as President and CEO before the company's acquisition and subsequent sale to DirecTV. Before ReplayTV, Anthony was co-Founder and CEO of iBand, Inc., an Internet software company sold to Macromedia in 1996. The code base developed by Anthony at iBand became a central part of the original core code of Macromedia now known as Adobe Dreamweaver. After selling iBand, Anthony became the vice president of Internet Authoring at Macromedia. Earlier in his career, Anthony was Founder and CEO of SunRize Industries, a supplier of hardware and software tools for non-linear audio recording and editing. Anthony holds a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from Texas A&M University.

 

[mzpro5]

I am about two moths in of having no cable/satellite having canceled my DirecTV two months ago after being a customer for close to twenty years.

Everything I watch is thru Roku and I have to say I am doing pretty well. I have Netflix, Hulu CBS All Access, PBS, HBO Now. and several others I cannot immediately recall. I pay a bit extra for "no commercial" on Hulu and CBS.

For the most part I am not missing anything. Most of the shows I used to DVR are available on Hulu and CBS. I am not a sports fan so don't miss that. I tried Sling for about 6 weeks but canceled as I found I was not really watching it much.

I was paying DTV 120/month (no premium channels). Mu current TV costs are about $55.00 so a good deal for me.

 

[Batman]

^ I'm mostly in the same boat... I have sling for the ESPN (for MNF during the football season) and will most likely drop is after the football season is over until next season starts. Since I'm recording the 6 major networks off air I have managed to avoid signing up for CBS All Access. Even if we miss a recording, most of what we watch comes on Hulu within 24 hours.

 

[Haywood]

Since I'm recording the 6 major networks off air I have managed to avoid signing up for CBS All Access. Even if we miss a recording, most of what we watch comes on Hulu within 24 hours.

This is how we are set up. Are you using an OTA DVR? I have a quad-tuner Tablo, but am keeping a close eye on the Plex DVR as it develops.

 

[Batman]

^^ Yup, TiVo.

 

[Towen7]

DirectTV Now launches soon
$35
100+ Channels

 

[Batman]

Expect Sling (Dish Network owned) to counter? Their blue and orange packages comebine for $40 but I don't think have anywhere close to 100+ channels....

 

[Haywood]

My problem with skinny bundles is that I hate watching linear television and I despise ads. If I absolutely have to get programming from a traditional television source, I would much rather get it via DVR so I can watch it on my schedule and skip the ads. Nothing pissed me off more about cable before I cut the cord than shelling out a ton of money every month and still getting 20 minutes of ads shoved down my throat every hour. I would much rather pay a bit more, get the content on demand and have no ads.

 

[mzpro5]

My problem with skinny bundles is that I hate watching linear television and I despise ads. If I absolutely have to get programming from a traditional television source, I would much rather get it via DVR so I can watch it on my schedule and skip the ads. Nothing pissed me off more about cable before I cut the cord than shelling out a ton of money every month and still getting 20 minutes of ads shoved down my throat every hour. I would much rather pay a bit more, get the content on demand and have no ads.

Yep. that is the reason I am willing to pay a bit more for Hulu and CBS without commercials. Even though I can watcch CBS live I usually wait a day to watch so I don't have to see commercials. I also have the CW channel for Roku but they really cram alot of ads in their programs, but then again it is free.

 

[Haywood]

Netflix + Ad-Free Hulu + Amazon + OTA + Premiums Channels on an on-again/off-again basis works out to around $50/mo on an annualized basis.

Yep. that is the reason I am willing to pay a bit more for Hulu and CBS without commercials. Even though I can watcch CBS live I usually wait a day to watch so I don't have to see commercials. I also have the CW channel for Roku but they really cram alot of ads in their programs, but then again it is free.

I thought CBS All Access had ads. Do they have an ad-free option now?

 

[jomari]

DirectTV Now launches soon
$35
100+ Channels

thanks for this Towen, I will have to look into this. recently downgraded my 250 bill from uverse to try to get it to 97 bucks. my internets been acting up last night, even at 24mpbs, im hitting 3mpbs.

appreciate it tho.

 

[mzpro5]

Netflix + Ad-Free Hulu + Amazon + OTA + Premiums Channels on an on-again/off-again basis works out to around $50/mo on an annualized basis.


I thought CBS All Access had ads. Do they have an ad-free option now?

Yes I think it is about $4/month more. that is for shows that have aired and are in their archive, if you watch it "live" you have to watch the ads.

 

[Haywood]

Yes I think it is about $4/month more. that is for shows that have aired and are in their archive, if you watch it "live" you have to watch the ads.

Given how much smaller their catalog is than Hulu's I think CBS tends to over-value their content.

 

[jomari]

does hulu do local stuff too tho? sorry, im not familiar with hulu.

 

[Haywood]

does hulu do local stuff too tho? sorry, im not familiar with hulu.

No, but they have most of the major shows from most of the channels owned by Comcast (NBC Universal), Fox Entertainment (21st Century Fox), Disney/ABC and Time Warner (Turner Broadcasting). Shows typically show up the day after they air. Hulu does not keep the entire season catalog for every show, because sometimes older seasons have already been licensed to other parties (i.e. Netflix or Amazon). They generally have at least the five most recent episodes, if not the entire current season. They also have a growing catalog of originals and they picked up a bunch of the movie contracts dropped by Netflix (i.e. Starz). They also have a decent amount of Anime, Asian Drama and other niche programming. In total, it is a LOT of content.

 

[Flint]

What I hate about CBS All Access is they limit the timeframe that old episodes are on the service. I signed up, watched a few shows, then started binge watching the previous season of "Elementary". After about half the season was viewed, I got a little burned out on that one show, so I watched other stuff. After about two weeks I was ready to get back into Elementary so I could start watching the current season and have some idea of the larger story arch. That was when I discovered they had removed the entire 2015-2016 season of Elementary from the service and I would have to pay to see it on Amazon - the only place I could find it. So now I don't want to watch the current season until I can get through the old ones, so I am likely to never see this show again until it is classic material and about two or three years old and free on all the services.

I am pretty angry about that. The name of the service is "All Access" and not everything is on the service AND older shows are not all on the service. I find that very aggravating.

 

[Haywood]

What I hate about CBS All Access is they limit the timeframe that old episodes are on the service. I signed up, watched a few shows, then started binge watching the previous season of "Elementary". After about half the season was viewed, I got a little burned out on that one show, so I watched other stuff. After about two weeks I was ready to get back into Elementary so I could start watching the current season and have some idea of the larger story arch. That was when I discovered they had removed the entire 2015-2016 season of Elementary from the service and I would have to pay to see it on Amazon - the only place I could find it. So now I don't want to watch the current season until I can get through the old ones, so I am likely to never see this show again until it is classic material and about two or three years old and free on all the services.

I am pretty angry about that. The name of the service is "All Access" and not everything is on the service AND older shows are not all on the service. I find that very aggravating.

I know you are going to really hate this and I already know the lecture by heart, but this is why I use Sonarr despite the fact that I pay for a ton of streaming services. In fact, I know a number of people who subscribe to big cable packages, but actually consume all of their content via Sonarr, simply because it is way more convenient.