Octopus Overlords

It's an idea we've been tossing around, and we're about to do it. We have Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime already, and we'll get an antenna for football. We don't watch many shows at all... TV is usually on a questionable history show for laughs or Food Network, and we can easily find other background noise. Still, there are some downsides:

* No DVR for our few broadcast shows. We'll have to wait for Hulu since I inevitably work late. Not a biggie, we usually watch everything late anyway, except...

***** The Walking Dead! This is the only show we watch live. Having to wait is going to be a BIG pile of suck.

* The Daily Show. Yeah, it's not the same with Stewart gone, but I like Noah and I've watched TDS the majority of weeknights of my adult life. Not being able to just feels... wrong.

** HBO/etc. We'll probably wind up spending a chunk on newer rentals, but it won't come close to the cable bill. Also, have been dying to catch up on Game of Thrones. Now, if we do, will be super sad not getting to watch the new season right away.

Who else has taken the plunge? Any advice? Should we get a cheap DVR just because we've gotten so used to pausing football to get a beer?

KeriKitKat wrote: * The Daily Show. Yeah, it's not the same with Stewart gone, but I like Noah and I've watched TDS the majority of weeknights of my adult life. Not being able to just feels... wrong.

I'm pretty sure they have their episodes available for free on comedycentral.com.

Also, lots of broadcast shows - stuff that airs on CBS, ABC, Fox, that sort of thing - make new episodes available for free on their websites (with varying degrees of technical glitches and amounts of commercials, but depending on what you like to watch, you might not have to wait for Hulu).

I thought we had a thread on this that had a lot of info but searching is giving me nothing. If you are planning on using a HTPC ( Home Theater Personal Computer ) to help cut the cable you should look into a program called KODI. Its a free open source HTPC program that can give you access to tons of stuff, including pretty much anything you can get on TV.

I think we have more than one thread. I know I've talked to Zax and a few others here about it several times.

/Looking

Start here

http://octopusoverlords.com/forum/searc ... mit=Search

The big thread:

http://octopusoverlords.com/forum/viewt ... =5&t=81250

I know I am in similar boat as Keri and CL. I still haven't cut the cord and probably won't until I get everything I want a la carte. By then cable may be a la carte. They may have to go that way to stay competitive.

As of today, to get everything I want in lazy fashion cable is still cheaper. I keep watching for VUE service to go national and for it to come down in price. VUE or a service like it will probably be that last straw for me.

https://www.playstationnetwork.com/vue/plans/

They aren't as a la carte as they were. Now they're more like traditional cable.

Or if Hulu/Prime/Netflix manage to get the spectrum of TV I want to watch when I want to watch it.

Thanks! If I could only find an AMC solution, I'd be 100% cool with cutting it off. Chances are we'll do it anyway.

KeriKitKat wrote:** HBO/etc. We'll probably wind up spending a chunk on newer rentals, but it won't come close to the cable bill. Also, have been dying to catch up on Game of Thrones. Now, if we do, will be super sad not getting to watch the new season right away.

HBO Now

I'll research myself later, but is HBO Now available on non-Apple products yet? We have zero Apple tech.

Yup. I had it on my Roku 4 for a month or two. But I dropped it. I probably won't subscribe until Game of Thrones comes back. Or I feel like catching up on any HBO shows I've missed.

It does have a crappy interface though. You can't even add an entire series to a watch list. Just individual episodes. Hopefully they'll look at Netflix and improve it.

KeriKitKat wrote:Thanks! If I could only find an AMC solution, I'd be 100% cool with cutting it off. Chances are we'll do it anyway.

I haven't tried it out, but it looks like you can stream from amc.com if you set up an account.

Max Peck wrote:

KeriKitKat wrote:Thanks! If I could only find an AMC solution, I'd be 100% cool with cutting it off. Chances are we'll do it anyway.

I haven't tried it out, but it looks like you can stream from amc.com if you set up an account.

Ad far as I've heard yes, but only 1-2 days after airing. That's a long time to avoid spoilers for me.

KeriKitKat wrote:Thanks! If I could only find an AMC solution, I'd be 100% cool with cutting it off. Chances are we'll do it anyway.

Internet says Sling TV or Vue

http://www.cutcabletoday.com/amc-live-stream/

Vue says Core package = $54.99 a month for 60 Channels that may or may not fill other needs.

SlingTV says = $20 a month for best of live TV which says 65 channels that may or may not fill other needs but I only about 25.

Another $15 gets HBO

https://www.sling.com/

Oooo. Thanks LM, and everyone, I'll check into all this more closely.

KeriKitKat wrote:Ad far as I've heard yes, but only 1-2 days after airing.

That's where I fall down. When a season of TV is on that I want to watch, I want to watch it when it is available. For instance, Archer on FX is hard to get into all of the packages people buy.

OTOH, I am currently missing out on all of the Netflix, Hulu, Amazon programming everyone seems to rave about. Maybe it's time to let some of my programs go entirely and let them be just like all of the rest of the things I'm missing.

Oh my god. I forgot about Archer. We don't watch that one live, but would be sorely disappointed if it isn't available somewhat soonafter.

I've used SlingTV on and off over the last year. It is nice to have during the winter months here. The interface on the Roku is nice. Most channels have a lot of on demand, A&E is one of them.

The nice thing is that there are no contracts. You can use it for just a month and then cancel. If you prepay for 3 months of service you can either get a Roku 2 for free or a Roku 3 for half price.

I consider the Roku to be the best cable cutting tool for those who don't want to deal with setting up Kodi and/or deal with p2p. Add Plex and you've got almost a full cable cutting solution. Plex even has the ability to add channels that stream content from quite a few network tv web sites (sy fy, cbs, bbc, etc.).

KeriKitKat wrote:I'll research myself later, but is HBO Now available on non-Apple products yet? We have zero Apple tech.

I thought Sling was going to have HBO GO for an additional fee. Sling is probably what will rid me of the cable box as it also has ESPN.

Devices

Amazon fireTV
fireTV Stick
Apple TV
Android TVs
Chromecast
Roku
Android and Apple phones/tablets
fire tablets
HBONow.com

Scuzz wrote:

KeriKitKat wrote:I'll research myself later, but is HBO Now available on non-Apple products yet? We have zero Apple tech.

I thought Sling was going to have HBO GO for an additional fee. Sling is probably what will rid me of the cable box as it also has ESPN.

HBO gets its own add-on box.

Roku + Sling looks like exactly what we need. I had no idea. Thanks, Hivemind.

Edit: It has Xbox One support? Even better!

Edit2: Except doesn't solve the Archer problem. Oh well. If that's one show we have to be behind on, that's fine.

Sling has a deal right now if you prepay for 3 months of Sling they will give you a new Roku 3 for half off ( Thats around $50 for the Roku I believe ) Not too bad if thats the combo you want.

https://www.sling.com/devices/roku

LordMortis wrote: SlingTV says = $20 a month for best of live TV which says 65 channels that may or may not fill other needs but I only about 25.

It looks like there's only about 16 channels in the 20 dollar package, as far as I can tell. It's still a bit light for my tastes.

23 listed at the site.

Still a far cry from 65.

Yeah, LM misread it.

OVER 65 CHANNELS AVAILABLE

Plenty of them are available. For an additional fee.

I was just disappointed because I saw "65 channels" and immediately went to their page to subscribe.

hepcat wrote:I was just disappointed because I saw "65 channels" and immediately went to their page to subscribe.

The one thing Sling has that nobody else has is ESPN. And for many of us (real men who need manly sports) that is why we still have cable.


Also as I understand it one problem with Sling is that you can only have it running on one device at a time.

Does it have the Knitting Channel? Us wimps love the Knitting Channel.

You'll have to settle for HGTV in the base package, and the Lifestyle Extra package with Cooking, diy, truTv, fyi, We, and lmn (Lifetime Movie Network).

From food to home, enjoy all the best tips and tricks for better living. Featuring Rehab Addict, Restaurant Redemption, Marriage Boot Camp, and more.

We only have one TV, so Sling has worked well for us. Before cutting the cord, I had to find a way to have access to ESPN, and Sling gives me that.

So now between it, an over the air antenna for the network channels, and Netflix/Amazon, I pretty much have everything I need. My Time Warner cable bill dropped from $150 to $35. Even factoring in the $20 a month for Sling, I'm still saving a ton.

I almost picked up an XBox One over Christmas because it's going to be adding OTA DVR capabilities (with an external drive attached) at some point in the near future.

hepcat wrote:I almost picked up an XBox One over Christmas because it's going to be adding OTA DVR capabilities (with an external drive attached) at some point in the near future.

That would be nice.

I've been using Sling TV as well and it's been pretty nice (although I use it almost exclusively for ESPN). One word of warning, however: I first was using sling on the Amazon Fire Stick and it really had problems. It took forever to change channels, would drop to the main Fire Stick menu pretty regularly, and often displayed in low resolutions. I have since bought a 2015 Roku 2 and works great. The Roku 2 is wired while the Fire Stick was not, which may have been the problem. Or it could have been that the Fire Stick just didn't have enough memory to work smoothly. In any case, my point is that Sling TV works great as long as you have the proper equipment to run it on.

Does anyone run Sling on Xbox One? How's it do?

What about Sling vs Hulu? Any thoughts?

Personally, I love Hulu Plus. I pay the extra 3 bucks a month or so for ad free broadcasts and it works great. The only downside is that they recently updated the app on Roku and it destroyed the way the app handled the watch list function. Previously, I'd open it up and click on the watch list icon and viola, there was all the latest episodes of shows I had added to my queue. All in chronological order. Now it just lists all my shows and I have to click on each to see if there's a new episode. It was 12 steps back, imho.

As you can tell, I'm still miffed about this.

Does SlingTV allow you to watch shows from those 20 channels on-demand? We would love an option to watch Chopped and the HGTV shows, but we haven't watched shows at the time they're actually on in years.

I looked into it over the summer and it was impossible since I can't get OTA HD channels where I live. That meant no football, and that is a deal-breaker.

With HBO apparently becoming available and a lower-cost subscription box for The Filipino Channel, most of my bases would have been covered if only I could have gotten the OTA channels.

Most cable companies offer a locals only option. You'd still have a cable bill but it would probably be minuscule by comparison to what you pay now for everything else.