Diary Of My Switch To Internet TV

[thiggins]

If they do it right, $50-$90 a month beats the +$125 I'm paying AT&T Uverse now...and if it inter-operates seamlessly with my Macs and iPhones, I'm in!

Given the way that they have operated in the mobile phone space, Apple could be just as bad as the cable / satellite providers.

 

[BiggAW]

Unfortunately, DISH's sats sit too low for me to get a shot at them from my heavily wooded lot. And taking down trees isn't an option. Besides, that just trades one ball and chain for another.

That doesn't make much sense. If you're on the east coast, Dish's satellites are higher, since they are farther east, on their newer "Eastern Arc" service at 61.5/72.5/77. If you are farther west, you'd use Western Arc, which is at 110/119/129. Older setups in the east use 110/119 for the main programming, and a wing dish on 61.5 for locals, BUT they cannot receive all the programming, as newer HD channels on Top200 and up are on 72.5 and 129, NOT 61.5. For DirecTV, you have to be able to see 99/101/103 in all markets, and in some markets, you also have to be able to see 110/119.

The biggest dishes with the biggest satellite fleet out there is the DirecTV Slimline 5-LNB, which hits 99/101/103/110/119. It's possible that you can barely see DirecTV's sats, but if you have a decently clear shot at DirecTV, you can get Dish. The only likely situation where you can get one not the other is if you are in the east, and can hit Dish Eastern Arc but not DirecTV.

That's pretty much what I'm seeing. Although I haven't explored what's available on Torrents yet.

Everything. And more. eztv.it is a good starting point. I download Colbert and Stewart off of there. The quality is between SD and HD, but let me say, the encoding is incredible. Since they are downloads, not streams, they throw a lot of CPU power at the xViD encoding, and they look gorgeous. There is some stuff available in 720p, which is really the sweet spot for file size vs. quality, and the SD stuff that is ripped from HDTV is usually around 540p, which looks fantastic, even though it's not HD.

Just be aware that ones that have HDTV in the filename mean they were ripped from HDTV, not that they are HDTV. They are the 540pish ones, if they say 720p in the filename, THEN they are HD.

If you are downloading network shows, I'm sure the content providers have cooked the law books to figure out some way to make it illegal, even though it shouldn't be since it's freely available. I don't know the exact status, but I consider downloading Comedy Central to be legal for me, since my parents subscribe to it at home, as does my university on our craptasic cable system. It's unquestionably illegal if you don't subscribe to the channel in the first place.

The big issue here is that torrents will not get you live events (sports). Some sports are on the networks, but a lot of it isn't, like most baseball games, which are RSN territory.

Torrents are useful even if you have a subscription service, it's a lot easier to torrent a show than to suck it off of a TiVo or whatnot if you want to watch it on a computer, and there is a lot of foreign, recent archive, limited reach, etc content out there, plus its a nice recovery for when your DVR has a brain fart and doesn't record something, or its gets deleted or whatever.

Given the way that they have operated in the mobile phone space, Apple could be just as bad as the cable / satellite providers.

The problem is that they still aren't likely to handle live streaming. AT&T's U-Verse is the closest we have gotten to a full TV service over IPTV, but you could argue it doesn't count, since it runs on a closed, private network, and cannot roam off of that network. If you're going to subscribe to a full video service for your RSN, you've already subscribed to everything else, so that pretty much kills an Apple TV subscription.

 

[AlterEcho]

The big issue here is that torrents will not get you live events (sports). Some sports are on the networks, but a lot of it isn't, like most baseball games, which are RSN territory.

I have been using this site for viewing sports.

http://www.myp2p.eu/

Not always the best quality, but allows me to go to another room and stream a game.

 

[flamaest]

Gosh, I expected so much more from Boxee. I love XBMC and it is still getting updates for the XBOX v1.

Here are the latest interfaces..

http://www.youtube.com/v/bLlUiYhPQLU&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0&hd=1&autoplay=1

http://xbmc.org/skins/confluence/

F.

 

[Okosisi]

Its simple: use Media Center 7

Windows Media Center 7 is the ticket. It gives backwards support to the cable/satelite rat race and future support for the internets.

Here's how I do it:
*Windows Media Center 7 - fantastic UI. Uses Win 7 libraries/Homegroups, great UPNP server/host. Can support 4+ QAM tuners. Now supports CableCard natively (Ceton InfiniTV FTW!)
*2QAM + 2 NTSC tuners + basic cable - All major shows in HD for $13 before tax. No ESPN. Or HBO. But you can get those as media if you know how (not encouraged).
*K-Lite code pack - Plays all video and audio codecs in God's green earth and WMC7 goes along because it support directshow.
*Boxee integration app - this launched Boxee from WMC7. When you exit Boxee, WMC7 opens again. You never have to deal with a keyboard, just your remote.
*Hulu integration app - same as above for Hulu Desktop. Again pure remote navigation. No fiddling with keyboards.
* Hulu Desktop for Windows
* Boxee for Windows

WMC7 has some internet TV integration (which is rumored to get upgrades), but its not pluggable like Boxee and not social. The Boxee integration is therefore key.

Hardware - its really cheap. Head over to Avsforum and check out the definitive thread by 'Renethx'. You can find configurations to match your budget. The Clarksdale (i3/i5) chips that were announced at CES really make HTPCs affordable for those willing to get their hands a bit dirty. Of course you can always buy off the shelf but where's the fun in that?!

Finally, NAS. Lots of solutions out there, but I recommend WHS (you can build your own for $200 based on Atom D500; with e-sata ports, minus WHS software). Why the recommendation? It integrates beautifully with Windows 7 libraries (I could rhapsodize but suffice it to say that WHS has a special connector for WMC 7 that makes TV watching in a networked house positively futuristic). Plus bittorrent integration is powerful and unfettered. Additionally with upcoming Windows Home Server v2, there is a rumored feature that allows you to stream your recorded TV across the tubes. No need for Slingbox.

With this setup you can go from all the way from paying your cable provider gabillions for restricted cable, to paying for limited cable, to weaning yourself off it altogether and relying on the internet. Because it supports the whole continuum of cable and iTV (in this case WMC is actually a launch pad for current and future innovative iTV front ends like Boxee, so you have iTV choice), you can also wean your household (um, wife) gradually as well . And it lets you scale your 'cable avoidance' speed as internet content becomes better and more organized over time. iTV is still immature. In many ways DVRs are better

 

[balbushka]

Thank you

Thank you for that great article... if there are any flaws, you gotta name it and you did!

Thanks and good luck to boxee to fix all of em!

 

[thiggins]

Thanks for the comments BiggAW. Maybe things have changed with Dish since the installer visited over 2 years ago to try to install Dish. I've found that the quality of the installer really matters a lot.

The first DirecTV guy who installed HD service completely botched the job and didn't even have the dish set to receive HD channels. Took two other visits, with a supervisor and a complete dish location move to get installed.

Again, at this point, I'm not interested in being chained to another two year commitment. But I'll keep your input in mind.

I agree Apple won't do live streaming. But if they decided to do a subscription service a la Netflix, that would be a good start.

Fortunately, I don't care about sports programming at all. Never had any interest in it!

 

[thiggins]

Thanks, okosisi. Getting off satellite and downgrading to basic cable would be a good interim step. But the cable company won't extend service a couple of thousand feet or so to me (in subdivision with buried lines). I'm more likely to upgrade to a better HD antenna for more reliable OTA.

 

[convergent]

I just read your latest installment on Boxee and your intent to look at Windows Media Center next. I predict that you are going to find that it blows Boxee away in its ability to integrate the DVR and live TV stuff into the picture, but is a big disappointment in how it handles internet TV. The little bit that it does include is integrated really well, but it is only a small amount. You can tie Hulu and Boxee to the WMC menu so that you can easily jump back and forth to them, but its not seamless and means you are into different models of behaviour which is bad for the WAF.

I would encourage you to look at XBMC and (if you have access to a Mac), Plex. Boxee and Plex are both forks of XBMC. Boxee has taken it to the social networking and simplistic model, but because they've lost seamless connectivity with Hulu they are going to have a hard time.

I've found Plex to really excel in some areas that Boxee doesn't. For one thing, its seems to perform better on video playback. I have not had great playback experience on the Revo or Mac Mini with Boxee... its close, but seems to lag a bit. Perhaps they are optimizing it for their own hardware. With Plex and a plug-in called PlexFlix, it will aggregate your Netflix instant queue, your Hulu subscriptions, and your local media into two beautiful selections choices... Movies and Television. When browsing, the organization, cover art, etc. is all seamless so you can't tell until you hit play whether the Movie is local, on your NAS, on Hulu, or on Netflix. Same goes for TV. There is also quite a bit of work going on to integrate EyeTV's DVR and live TV so that you can easily jump back and forth from Plex to LiveTV. It is definitely not easy and there are still a lot of holes in this strategy, but to me this one has the potential to get me to the WAF I am looking for. I'll keep you posted as I progress down that path.

 

[thiggins]

I have been looking at XBMC, too, convergent. I'm just choosing to write about WMC next.

Boxee should take some lessons from WMC. I think WMC makes a much better use of screen real estate.

Main drawback for XBMC is no Netflix. Or is there a workaround? I haven't found any.

 

[Rigolo]

The nice thing about XBMC is the new pvr2 plugin that is in the works. That will allow you to connect your XBMC to a backend that can do live tv streaming, dvr etc.

Ofcourse I am a little biased about tvheadend (http://lonelycoder.com/hts/tvheadend_overview.html) but that will give you live TV within XBMC and also a DVR backend to record your shows. And those recordings can then be played back again via XBMC. a nice little combo

 

[BiggAW]

Fortunately, I don't care about sports programming at all. Never had any interest in it!

Ah, that will help with things quite a bit. You haven't really mentioned what content you actually do watch. That will to a large degree decide what direction you are headed. If it's Discovery channel, you're keeping the Dish or getting cable, if it's CBS and NBC, then OTA might be the way to go, and then work with streaming movies and other types of feature content.

Thanks, okosisi. Getting off satellite and downgrading to basic cable would be a good interim step. But the cable company won't extend service a couple of thousand feet or so to me (in subdivision with buried lines). I'm more likely to upgrade to a better HD antenna for more reliable OTA.

Basic cable is similar to OTA plus PEG and a couple of other random channels.

They will service you, its just a question of how much they are going to charge to install. Also, if you have an interest in cable (it seems that you really want to get away from paying, but if you do) you should read their franchising agreement, as they are legally required to provide service under certain conditions.

The local incumbent in Meredith, NH, Metrocast, had to run cable to an island with 10 subscribers, which included laying an armored fiber-optic cable under the water, and installing a full cable node plus coax to each resident, because their franchise agreement required them to. Their franchise agreement read that if they had 10 subscribers of any kind in one cable-mile, they were legally required to provide service. For them, that franchise agreement and losing money on the island was a small price to pay to serve the four hotels across town and many large waterfront homes.

Do you have DSL for your internet? In an area close enough to a CO to get DSL, I am shocked that the incumbent cable company wouldn't have wired everyone up pronto. How much bandwidth are you getting over the DSL? Usually DSL isn't very good for streaming HD video to a TV, especially in regards to buffering times.

 

[thiggins]

We tend to watch a mix of broadcast network shows, which we can get OTA and stuff from USA, SyFy, HGTV, Bravo and TNT.

Interesting thought about checking the cable company franchise agreement. But, again, that's just trading one pair of handcuffs for another (Comcast, in this case).

I do have DSL and have asked Comcast about installing service. It's only a couple of 1000 ft run. But it has to be underground all the way and I'm sure as hell not paying them a buck a foot to install it.

 

[BiggAW]

We tend to watch a mix of broadcast network shows, which we can get OTA and stuff from USA, SyFy, HGTV, Bravo and TNT.

Interesting thought about checking the cable company franchise agreement. But, again, that's just trading one pair of handcuffs for another (Comcast, in this case).

I do have DSL and have asked Comcast about installing service. It's only a couple of 1000 ft run. But it has to be underground all the way and I'm sure as hell not paying them a buck a foot to install it.

Quite true, they are a commercial provider too, and much worse than DirecTV or Dish for video services. Cable internet would help for internet video, since its a lot faster, but if you have to pay 3 grand then that would really defeat the whole point of this project.

 

[cptmds]

Hi Alek and thanks for your post.

OTA will be explored later in the series. I manage to get all the Networks, some better than others. I suspect I need to upgrade from Winegard SS 2000 SquareShooter panel antenna to a real UHF reflector.

I'm in Canada (Montreal) and I pick up all the US networks, with the exception of FOX and ABC with an old 1970's indoor rabbit ears antenna I salvaged. At my cottage, I get everything with a proper UHF antenna (Channel Master 4228HD, RG6, and no preamp) despite being behind mountains and a lot of big trees.

So you really shouldn't have any problems with antenna reception. There is no legality to worry about, and if you have properly designed equipment (ex. Tivo or something) there won't be any hardware/software/network issues to deal with either, which usually helps the WAF.

 

[thiggins]

So you really shouldn't have any problems with antenna reception. There is no legality to worry about, and if you have properly designed equipment (ex. Tivo or something) there won't be any hardware/software/network issues to deal with either, which usually helps the WAF.

That's what I thought too. But I'm only around 12 miles from where the antennas are and HD reception frequently breaks up when it gets windy. Turns out HD signals are a lot more problematic than the old analog signals.

I higher gain UHF antenna will probably fix my problems, though.

 

[BiggAW]

That's what I thought too. But I'm only around 12 miles from where the antennas are and HD reception frequently breaks up when it gets windy. Turns out HD signals are a lot more problematic than the old analog signals.

I higher gain UHF antenna will probably fix my problems, though.

At 12 miles, you have some serious antenna issues. A good, properly sized antenna with quad-shield RG-6 and high quality splitters will get you a good signal. At that range you have to be careful, as you could overload the receiver. Sounds like you may have multipath issues, you may actually benefit from a smaller antenna or sticking some splitters in there to burn off some power so that the additional reflections are too weak to see. Do you have a lot of trees in the area that could cause multipath?

Next time its windy, try an indoor antenna or 2 or 3 splitters in series to lose the reflections.

 

[AlterEcho]

Saw this and I am seriously going to check it out:

http://www.cetoncorp.com/products.php

-=AE=-

 

[BiggAW]

Saw this and I am seriously going to check it out:

http://www.cetoncorp.com/products.php

-=AE=-

Those are pretty cool, not applicable to the OP, but interesting for a discussion of media convergence to the PC. I'd like to know how well the extenders work, however.

The big variable is if you have a local incumbent that is capable of providing a good HD service, so this is fairly geographically limited.

This thing would be INSANE to pair with Fios, as you'd have twin-channel QAM with a 15 or 25mbit internet for the online components of MCE.

They wanted to release it as a 6-tuner card, as that is what the M-Stream CC's support, but M$ limits any one type of signal to 4 tuners, which sucks, since modern PCs can easily support 6. The upside, however, is that you can use this plus 4 OTA tuners (since the big 4 networks tend to create a lot of conflicts with their "prime time" scheduling), and have an 8-tuner monster that can suck in 8 streams and spit out 6 all at the same time.

I would definitely consider this if it weren't for my area's outdated Comcast cable plant that doesn't have enough HD to actually need this card.

 

[vnangia]

Have you seen this, Tim?

http://lifehacker.com/5515398/set-up-a-geeky-media-center-that-non+geeks-can-actually-use

Probably things that you already know, but it might be helpful from a usability perspective.