Klueless
Very Senior Member
I’m in the US. In my area we only have a choice of cable or DSL for Internet. My DSL is 6 (and I’m told I’m one of the lucky ones) Mbps. Cable Internet around here is expensive unless you get one of the “packages”.
Direct TV costs have been climbing. I hung on as long as I could because the service is great and I love the “Whole House DVR” system but the combined costs of TV, Internet and phone are just crazy, close to $200.
I bluffed; I called Direct TV a couple of times to tell them I was cancelling. They knocked $8 off my monthly so I called Spectrum for their $99 combo (voice, TV and Internet) package. This would cut my monthly bill by almost half.
On the plus side my Internet is now 60 Mbps and we can actually stream more than one TV show at a time (there are five of us and five TVs). On the downside we only have one DVR. Sure do miss that “Whole House DVR”. The higher speed Internet allows us to compensate some by using “On Demand”.
This time when I called Direct TV to really cancel they offered to knock $50 off of my monthly. If they had done that in the first place I would have stayed. It’s like they already knew I had switched and were now trying to get me to come back.
Spectrum told me I need a "Spectrum Box" for each TV. 5 boxes times $6 comes to an extra $30 per month. I asked why I can’t plug the cable directly into my TV like you could with Time Warner? Long story short it does work but come January when they start upgrading their service it will no longer work. Wow! Then, if true, come January their phones are going to be ringing like non-stop!
So my plan is to:
Direct TV costs have been climbing. I hung on as long as I could because the service is great and I love the “Whole House DVR” system but the combined costs of TV, Internet and phone are just crazy, close to $200.
I bluffed; I called Direct TV a couple of times to tell them I was cancelling. They knocked $8 off my monthly so I called Spectrum for their $99 combo (voice, TV and Internet) package. This would cut my monthly bill by almost half.
On the plus side my Internet is now 60 Mbps and we can actually stream more than one TV show at a time (there are five of us and five TVs). On the downside we only have one DVR. Sure do miss that “Whole House DVR”. The higher speed Internet allows us to compensate some by using “On Demand”.
This time when I called Direct TV to really cancel they offered to knock $50 off of my monthly. If they had done that in the first place I would have stayed. It’s like they already knew I had switched and were now trying to get me to come back.
Spectrum told me I need a "Spectrum Box" for each TV. 5 boxes times $6 comes to an extra $30 per month. I asked why I can’t plug the cable directly into my TV like you could with Time Warner? Long story short it does work but come January when they start upgrading their service it will no longer work. Wow! Then, if true, come January their phones are going to be ringing like non-stop!
So my plan is to:
- Replace ($99) my old “N” router with “AC” and relocate it to a better part of the house.
- Buy a dual-band Roku stick ($39) to test with. AC for the nearby TVs, N over 2.4 GHz for the upstairs TVs.
- Roku has a "Spectrum app" that supposedly will make my TV look like it’s on a “Spectrum box”.
- Remove the “Spectrum box”. ($39 divided by $6 per month equals a 7 month break even.)
- Plug cable directly into TV. (Backup for Roku and if Spectrum kills it next year I’ll still have the Roku.)
- If this all works then I’ll convert a couple more TVs.
- Replace my phone service with “Basic Talk” VoIP for $10 per month.
Second year is when the prices go up. Spectrum is claiming they will only go up 10% a year until they hit list price. We’ll see. Long standing custom has been to jack everything to list prices come year two.
By year two I should have effected $24 in savings by swapping out four “Spectrum Boxes” with Rokus. Rokus will have been fully paid for with savings in year one.
By year two I should enjoying another $25 in savings by implementing “Basic Talk” VoIP. I’m leaning towards “Basic Talk” because they supposedly have help lines and implement QoS (which might be moot if I do it right with my router) for voice?
60 Mbps Internet should handle five HD TV streams and splitting TVs over two bands should insure adequate bandwidth over WiFi. Backup plan is to use SD as needed (or the cable connection until it actually does disappear).
And, who knows? Maybe by year two the family will have adapted to some of the Internet services such that I can disconnect cable and just add a few antennae for local channels?
By year two I should have effected $24 in savings by swapping out four “Spectrum Boxes” with Rokus. Rokus will have been fully paid for with savings in year one.
By year two I should enjoying another $25 in savings by implementing “Basic Talk” VoIP. I’m leaning towards “Basic Talk” because they supposedly have help lines and implement QoS (which might be moot if I do it right with my router) for voice?
60 Mbps Internet should handle five HD TV streams and splitting TVs over two bands should insure adequate bandwidth over WiFi. Backup plan is to use SD as needed (or the cable connection until it actually does disappear).
And, who knows? Maybe by year two the family will have adapted to some of the Internet services such that I can disconnect cable and just add a few antennae for local channels?
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