Cut the Cable & Dish

[PBCCowboy]

Did you download Kodi on your firestick? That's how you get all the free channels and movies.

There are many youtube videos that show you how to do it.It is very simple.

 

[jimmy40]

Well this weekend I got a small antenna that I ordered through Amazon.
View TV VT-366 Digital.
I hooked it up in my attic and pointed it south.
As I'm North of Fort Worth.

75 channels. All great quality on the TV - better than Dish.

My friend lent me his old Fire Stick and I got all the movies also.

So goodbye Dish at $100 per month.
Antenna was under $50.
Upgraded fire stick is about $95.

Great deal.

you can get 75 high def channels on an antenna? I didn't even know you could get high def on an antenna

 

[greatwallofdallas]

Fire stick is good cause it's free once you got it all set up.

But if you have a Roku you can add the Machtv channel which is about $20 a month but you get all the live cable channels and premium channels like :
espn's, NFL Sunday ticket, MLB, NBA league pass, NHL ,HBO, Showtime, PPV, etc...

It also has movies and tv shows on demand.

For $20 is not bad.

Or you can get a Mag 254 box with an iptv set up which is almost the same thing as the Roku with Machtv installed.

 

[Longboysfan]

you can get 75 high def channels on an antenna? I didn't even know you could get high def on an antenna

Yes. Almost all are sent in HD now.

Yes. I think I showed the type of antenna I got. It's real small.

 

[DanteEXT]

you can get 75 high def channels on an antenna? I didn't even know you could get high def on an antenna

Depending on your area yes. I live in the rolling hills of southern Indiana about halfway between Indy and Louisville. I can get about 46 stations total with my current set up. The the terrain was flat from Indy to the 'ville I'd probably get about 60-70. Some channels are duplicates (CBS & FOX which works out great for football season plus PBS), 5 are strictly Christian broadcasting and a couple are hit and miss on the reception.

One of the best parts of OTA is the sub-channel networks like MeTV, Comet, LAFF, COZI, tec.

 

[blindzebra]

PlayStation Vue is a good value if you want some of the cable channels.

 

[pjtoadie]

Fire stick is good cause it's free once you got it all set up.

But if you have a Roku you can add the Machtv channel which is about $20 a month but you get all the live cable channels and premium channels like :
espn's, NFL Sunday ticket, MLB, NBA league pass, NHL ,HBO, Showtime, PPV, etc...

It also has movies and tv shows on demand.

For $20 is not bad.

Or you can get a Mag 254 box with an iptv set up which is almost the same thing as the Roku with Machtv installed.

Is the Machtv channel legitimate or is it like Kodi?

 

[greatwallofdallas]

Is the Machtv channel legitimate or is it like Kodi?

It's like kodi, you can probably find more info on a YouTube search.

 

[pjtoadie]

It's like kodi, you can probably find more info on a YouTube search.

Cool, thanks!

 

[viman96]

Recently bougt a 4k TV that has chromecast built-in and comes with a bunch of apps and ps4 games. Looking to cut DirectTV. Perfect timing for this thread.

 

[Seven]

Congrats on the change! I just cut the cord with Spectrum yesterday...cancelled my cable/internet/phone bundle for internet only. I ended up paying almost exactly what you did for internet, just under $58 monthly including taxes.

That, an antenna for local channels and a Firestick is my setup for the moment. It'll save me about $100-120 per month, depending on which streaming services I stick with after trying them out.

It's nice that Hulu, Sling TV, etc., almost all have a free trial period. I'm in Hulu's free trial at the moment and am leaning to keeping it. It's cheap at $7.99 per month.

Do yourself a favor and spring for the 11.99 for commercial free Hulu and Netflix......If you don't you'll see the same commercial over and over and over again. Worth the extra 4 bucks a month.

 

[vlad]

so cutting the cable but not really the cord? That's the catch 22 I find myself in here in the NY area where endless regulations you'd expect in these parts minimize competition and therefore options. I'm paying close to $200/mnth for cable/internet/phone where I haven't used a landline in close to 10 years. If I were to go with just an internet service, the savings would be minimal and wouldn't justify the loss of convenience. It's frustrating.

Where in NY do you live? I was paying some stupid amount like $180 for cable/internet, after years of threatening to cancel to get whatever deals I could. I finally went to the TWC shop, sat down w/a kid going through their archaic interface and got myself down to 100mbps internet for ~$55. That is in NYC. They even kicked in a free Roku 3 for the same channels you'd get on antenna

In any case you can threaten to cancel and they should take care of you. I have to admit I've been shocked that when TWC said they'd improve customer service, they really did. Now that it's Spectrum I have no idea.

 

[Hardline]

The great thing about Kodi is they also have a phone app. You can watch free movies on your Android phone. I don't know if Kodi has an iPhone app.
My $40 I spent on my Firestick was a great investment. You can watch entire seasons of your favorite TV shows and there's music channels for every type of music.

 

[Doc50]

Recently bougt a 4k TV that has chromecast built-in and comes with a bunch of apps and ps4 games. Looking to cut DirectTV. Perfect timing for this thread.

What does Chromecast include?

 

[Longboysfan]

I'm still waiting on delivery of the Amazon Fire - Streaming Media player.
Some time next week.

When I get it going I'll reply back.

 

[haleyrules]

Well this weekend I got a small antenna that I ordered through Amazon.
View TV VT-366 Digital.
I hooked it up in my attic and pointed it south.
As I'm North of Fort Worth.

75 channels. All great quality on the TV - better than Dish.

My friend lent me his old Fire Stick and I got all the movies also.

So goodbye Dish at $100 per month.
Antenna was under $50.
Upgraded fire stick is about $95.

Great deal.

Interesting! Old fashioned Antenna??

 

[Longboysfan]

Not really. It's a new smaller one that can go in attic or outside. IT's and HD antenna.
It is the same connection as Dish or cable wires.
In fact all I did was assemble antenna - took 15 minutes. Went in attic with a 10 foot black round cable for the TV. Found the splitter and removed the line from outside to the new line that connects to antenna and then into splitter.
From where I am I took out my iphone and put the app on for compass. Pointed it south as Fort Worth city is south of me.
First time a charm when I went and turned on TV. Got 75 channels right off it.
The picture quality is better than I was getting with Dish.

I'm still trying to figure the stations out to watch.

But I mostly watch movies - that is why the second box to link - house Wi-Fi to box into TV.
So stream movies into TV and other things from the internet.

I'll report back when I get it all going.

Savings for this is the cable bill at $100 per month.

 

[Vtwin]

Interesting! Old fashioned Antenna??

Don't know how they compare to a new one but I have two setups using old antennas. One a traditional rooftop model and one a set of rabbit ears that go back to the seventies. I seem to get all the same channels other people I know are getting with their newer antennas.

The digital signals are much less forgiving regarding direction than uhf/vhf. If you are using a traditional rooftop directional antenna it has to be pointed pretty close to directly at the tower.

 

[Longboysfan]

O.K.
They delivered the Fire TV box yesterday.
My friend installed some software on it yesterday afternoon - Kodi I think.
It's up and working. Movie I watched yesterday was very sharp image.

Simple plug and play. Find your internet connection - put in the password and it starts talking to you.
You can also use Amazon to order shows with but this software bypasses that for what's on the internet.

 

[viman96]

What does Chromecast include?

Have not played around with it yet but planning to soon. Here is link to what should be included.

https://www.google.com/chromecast/built-in/tv/