More People Watching Over The Air TV?

I quit cable a few years ago. As for the over the air digital tv, I have problems with the reception.. The image often freezes up an pixelates making it frustrating to watch, but I think the problem is that I've only tried it with rabbit ears.. Been meaning to order one of those special little antennas I keep seeing advertised, cause I really want the local channels

My solution as a cable alternative has been the $40 Ruko devices.. One time buy, no subscription cost for hundreds of available channels, it's wireless, self contained, and it also gives me the ability to stream from my computer to the tv wirelessly..

I don't miss cable at all. Or the bills

Constant attemptes are made to sell me cable TV, but the answer is a big fat NO!

However, cable and telephone comes in by cable, and although it's expensive, the internet speeds and quality have been excellent. The cable phone is stupid, because I almost never use the phone, and I've been meaning to switch to something like Majik Jack, which is cheap.

Previously I had DSL but the quality was from hell with constant dropouts and low bandwidth. The provider was earthlink but the phone lines are AT&T, and whenever I called the earthlink people they always told me my computer was at fault. My telephone from AT&T had a religious radio station's RF so loud I couldn't hold a conversation (very nearby tower).

Some viewing gets done on the internet, and the public library has all the DVD movies for free.

I refused to make the digital switch to local TV because I think the program quality of TV in general is not worth any effort.

Not knowing what "people" are doing it is difficult to project much beyond my experience and that of those near me. We dumped cable TV some time ago. It was not only the huge yearly price hikes that prompted this but also only my wife watched it and only a few channels. All the programming she wants is available over the air.

For movies we had DirectTV which worked well but the cost was too high for just the movie channels plus they added network logos plastered on the screen which was the deal breaker.

We now use subscription streaming video service. Three immediate family units have also dropped cable TV and are streaming video programming.

As for digital OTA, there is a simple to build stacked dipole with a reflector antenna which solved our dropout problems. A web search will reveal the plans.

As with radio a major problem with TV seems to be the programming. Actually, life is good without that annoyance.

Neil

There are constantly stories in the news about "cable cutters" ditching the high cost of cable and using online services and OTA TV for their viewing needs. This is fine if you live in a city with solid, fast internet, and any OTA television.  Where we live, know what you get on TV without cable?  Nothing. Big fat ZERO.  We used to get 2-3 stations, although somewhat fuzzy, over the air.  Since digital came in, Zero. I tried expensive antennas with amplifiers.  Once I managed to get one channel for a few minutes with the "weak signal" warning on the screen. But if I so much as moved the antenna a millimeter, zero.  Oh, and this worked only on the third floor of the house, wiht the antenna out a window.  digital TV pretty much eliminated TV in this area, unless you have cable or Dish. 

My DSL peaks out at 1.6 Mbps. Just enough to watch standard resolution TV. But it's more trouble than it's worth. 

I'm sure I've ranter here about my daughters TV reception in Minneapolis.  When I was a kidk living in the same hours she nows lives in, we got all three networks, an independent, and two PBS channels.  Since digital came in, she gets 2 networks OK, one on occasion, a crapload of pointless stations, and no PBS reception. These are the very same stations we watched for 30 years in that house, that suddenly became useless with digital TV. She's to cheap to buy cable, so she settles for what OTA she can get, and watches what's available free online.

Tim in Bovey

Yes, one of my co-workers ditched cable and put a small digital antenna on roof, looked up on line his exact location and there's a site to tell you the best direction the antenna should be pointed. He get's 20 channels(here in Toronto) and can watch anything else (well, almost anything else) on-line. I am seeing more antennas on roofs as I drive around.

Mark

I am constantly re-considering this whole issue.

At the moment I have a Comcast "Digital Starter" cable package including a DVR that is very easy to set up (even using a web browser).  It automatically adjusts to changing program schedules, which has been a nice benefit.

This DVR can record two HDTV programs in the same time period.  At first I thought that was not very important, but there have been quite a few times when that has been useful.

I also installed a moderately-directional high-band VHF+UHF TV antenna in the attic of my home, connected to the antenna input of my living room HDTV set.  Fortunately all of the local, OTA HDTV broadcast station transmit sites here are located in about the same direction from my home.  So that gives me a backup (NBC, CBS, ABC, PBS, Fox and quite a few others) if the cable crashes -- which is almost never.  My Comcast cable feed also drives another HDTV set and two other (STV) sets in my home.

I haven't gone for the Internet, and VOIP telephone services that Comcast constantly pitches to me.

A few days ago I ordered a Roku 3 system to stream HDTV video from the Internet.  At this point I don't know if that could be ~equivalent to my Comcast cable service or not -- at least for non-local sources.

Anybody know?  Maybe I can ditch Comcast and their $$$.$$ monthly rate.

I don't know about the Ruko 3, I have an Ruko LT and a HD.. tiny little boxes about 6" square, you just plug it in your tv imput. For the intitail setup you do need to got to their website to enter a number to activate it, but after that there's no need for a computer unless you want to stream your personal library (movies, music, or images) to it.

I can't recall ever having any streaming issues. the picture and sound is always sharp and in sync, I've never had it stop and have to buffer, it uses almost no electricity, no subscription cost, and it's only depenency is a TV and a wireless signal.

There are 100's of free channels to subscribe to. My personal favorites would be Crackle, Popcorn Flix, and Classic Cinima for movies (unedited and uncut, but does occassionally interupt for comercials) You can get the exact same content via your computer but it's a slightly different interface.. (One example http://www.crackle.com/chromewebapp/ ) The major difference is the TV interface, the simpler access and the remote.

I also like the History Channel, National Geographic, PBS, amonst others. Also the network news channels and the enternainment news.. There used to be one to watch youtube but they discontinued that due to too many infringment rights.

You can opt for premium channels such as Netflix and the like, for only a couple bucks if you want.

About the only thing I miss with Ruko is not being able to get local channels, but suspect eventually they too will be abvailable.. it already is in some locations.

I don't know if that answers you questions, and no, it doesn't offer everything cable does.. Still, I'm real happy with it. I can only the Ruko's I have have been well worth the $40 (or was it $50?) price tag!

I enjoyed all the different replies!

I'm just wondering where everything

is going.

Thanks so much!

Very best wishes,

Bruce, DOGRADIO

I too ditched cable TV a few years ago and went OTA.  You have to get the antenna as high up as possible - with a decent height, no obstructions and a good gain (Yagi) antenna, you can get reception of up to 70 miles, maybe a bit more.

The quality is excellent, much better than cable (there's no additional compression).

Many broadcasters also have subchannels in addition to their main channel (and the cable companies don't tend to carry them, at least in Canada).

Bruce's question, "Where are things going," is probably the number one question throughout the TV, cable and video distribution industry, since things are changing continually. I'll bet companies try very hard to be the first to anticipate what's next, but it's probably just a gambling game.

We're experiencing the same uncertainty in radio, and all we have is a lot of speculation with no solid answers.

Come to think of it with climate chaos we don't know where WE are going!

DSL out here is horrible and our cable provider is only slightly better. 
The best we can muster for our speeds is 6.0 Megs download and 512 kbps upload for $50 a month. The highest speed we can get  without going all out for a business class internet package is 10.0 Megs download and 1.0 Megs upload for $80 a month.

So unless i stream Busy FM at a very low bit rate, streaming online is not an option.
I miss living in London,Ky for 15 Megs down and 3.0 Megs up at $50 a month and because other things were also cheaper as well. Watching tv isn't important to me so i could care less about that. 

I was over at the Worldwide TV FM DX

Assocation website.

Some guys have logged humdreds of

HDTV DX stations.  But I think this DX is almost always

had by DXers with antennas on towers, and

with special receiving equipment.  Also, being in

the southern half of the U.S. where ducts

and E-skip are the most common - that

must help a lot.

For me in Connecticut, the days of getting

Iowa on both channels 2 and 5 on a black

and white portable with rabbit ears inside

the house on the first floor - well - those

days are over. 

U.S. HDTV is certainly inefficient.  What I

mean is:  I can see lots of HDTV digital

carriers on my scanners S-meter, and I can

hear the quieting in the speaker.  These signals

are strong.  The video carriers are 310 kHz up

from the bottom of the channel.  So, for instance, HDTV

RF channel 2 has a video carrier on 54.310 MHz.  

So anyway - I have looked at carriers of local HDTV

stations on my ICOM IC-R2 handheld scanner's S-meter. 

A strong carrier that is 30 or 40 over S9 on the IC-R2 -

gives me NOTHING on my handheld battery powered

HDTV.   Nothing!  And you can't have a casual HDTV receiving set-up

unless you are virually line-of-sight from the

transmitting tower.

My battery powered HDTV is very good in

emergency situations - such as when

power is lost in a storm.  BUT I have to

walk 1000 feet up the hill from my house

in order to get anything.  Then I get 5 or 6

TV stations - each with a few subchannels. 

I think handheld portable HDTVs will

never ever work as well as regular converter

boxes iwth TVs and large antennas.  Hnadheld

HDTVs (like mine) have dinky little whip antennas.

And these antennas are placed right next to

the HDTV display and picture generating circuitry -

which has got to generate lots of RF noise. 

So a handheld HDTV can never work very well,

and mine doesn't.  An external antenna can

be attached - but I haven't gotten around to

geting an adapter cord yet.  The plug on the

TV is REALLY teeny.  I don't even know what

the jack is called.

I heard Mexico is going over to HDTV in a

few years.  But they will be using a better

system of transmitting - that works better

than ours in the U.S.  That Mexican system

is also incompatable with our HDTV system.

So I don't like HDTV very much.  But with

some work - I  luckily am able to get a few channels

inside the house.  It's good for local news and

weather.  It's hard to get that on local radio -

especially when it's not drive time. 

I have to run so I can't proof-read this.

I hope it's OK.

Bruce, DOGRADIO

I've been on antenna since day one. I use an amplified RV antenna. Looks like a flying saucer on a pole. I get 54 channels. Some of them are the same programming but from different locations. I recieve analog and digital.

No way will I ever pay a bill to watch TV. If I want to mix things up, I'll find a Red Box and get a DVD.

I watched a Pink Floyd concert on PBS a few nights ago. It was great.. and FREE!

We haven't had cable since 1987.  We got it for the kids and they only watched the local channels.  At that time HBO was the movie channel and they ran the same two movies for weeks at a time.  We had cable for about 2 years.

Today we use a simple outdoor antenna on a rotor.  The DTV picture is crystal clear.  One of the stations reception occasionally drops out due to weather or time of year but the rest are great.  More DTV stations are coming along.  Currently we get a dozen stations and most have 3 or 4 side channels.

Regarding the future, a friend that worked in commercial radio/tv ad sales for 25 years tells me the TV networks are considering pulling out of the affiliate business.  The plan is to go internet streaming and leave the local stations to do their own thing.