Television Entertainment Reception Method?

[Robin]

What route do you receive your television programing? I only watch television very rarely maybe once a month for an hour probably less... But when I do watch TV I am connected visa vee my "Comcast" Cable High Definition decoder receiver connection.

I mostly watch DVD movies 80% of the time. When I was a kid growing-up in Camarillo (Southern California) my parents had excellent TV reception with an antenna / ariel located on the top of our house, for free...

 

[SteveInNC]

I pull hi def over antenna, and normal stuff over satellite. DirecTV has had some issues with their hi def TiVo sat receivers, so I've been holding off on that, plus my local channels are not one of the markets that they carry in hi def yet. I have a number of OTA local hi def channels that I receive - WRAL-HD was the first to apply for and start broadcasting in hi def in the US.

 

[tonyc]

I watch HD mostly OTA. Dallas has about 15 channels (nearly half are Spanish). I also get HD over my Dish 921 and also watch SD on Dish. I especially like Rave which Dish acquired from VOOM. Do those of you with both choices notice that OTA is better than on sataellite? I think the stinkers are downrezzing to get more channels squeezed into the same space!

 

[SteveInNC]

I watch HD mostly OTA. Dallas has about 15 channels (nearly half are Spanish). I also get HD over my Dish 921 and also watch SD on Dish. I especially like Rave which Dish acquired from VOOM. Do those of you with both choices notice that OTA is better than on sataellite? I think the stinkers are downrezzing to get more channels squeezed into the same space!

Hell, even with SD, they compress it so much that the quality sucks. That's another reason I haven't bothered with satellite HD yet. DirecTV has a couple of birds coming online in the near future which may or may not help with the compression. I suspect that they may just try to stuff more channels in there.

 

[TomDac]

DirecTV has had some issues with their hi def TiVo sat receivers, so I've been holding off on that, plus my local channels are not one of the markets that they carry in hi def yet.

What issues? I've had HD Tivo for over a year and it's worked flawlessly.

 

[SteveInNC]

What issues? I've had HD Tivo for over a year and it's worked flawlessly.

In particular, they seem to have had issues with the HDMI output circuits failing. If you're running component, you wouldn't see this, or you may also have a "good" HDMI box. Some of the problems were related to bad solder joints on the HDMI daughter card and in other cases the card has just apparently crapped out. A 3rd-party market has sprung up to fix these problems.

There has been a problem with the HDMI handshake with certain models of hi def TVs, which DirecTV has recently released a patch for. There also seems to be a rash of hard drive failures too.

DirecTV is dropping TiVo in favor of an NDS-designed PVR box, and will be moving to MPEG4 datastreams in the near future. There is also some rumbling that after March, you will no longer be able to purchase a receiver - they'll all be leased like a cable box. This means you won't have the option of upgrading disk capacity, etc.

Look over in www.tivocommunity.com under "HDTV Tivo Powered PVRs".

 

[twich54]

Dual reception

Robin, I couldn't check both so I choose cable but I have both since i subscribe to the NFL Tickect on Direct TV. I'm like you, outside of Football and auto sports, I watch very little TV. I couldn't name three network programs !! I do enjoy, A&E, History,Discovery and TLC.

 

[Robin]

Sorry about that...

Robin, I couldn't check both so I choose cable but I have both since i subscribe to the NFL Tickect on Direct TV. I'm like you, outside of Football and auto sports, I watch very little TV. I couldn't name three network programs !! I do enjoy, A&E, History,Discovery and TLC.

twich54,

I screwed-up, I should have made a fifth column "Dish & Cable", Oh well, I will try to do it better next time, sorry...

I know what you mean though, regular network programing leaves something to be desired. Although I have six seasons of "Sienfeld" and all three seasons of "Kung Fu", along with all the seasons of "Star Trek - The Next Generation" as well as "Star Trek Voyager" on DVD, so I guess I watch some TV programing vesavee - DVD...

 

[68sting]

My wife and I watch lots of tv. We have 20+ season passes set up in our tivo. I tivo everything in HD with my HR10-250. No commercials, great picture, on my schedule-one of the best inventions ever!

 

[rrayda]

I actually gave up watching television about 10 years ago. It was more of a necessity of the times than a conscious decision (I was too busy partying/studying/listening/sleeping/reading/fishing/etc...). But it has probably been the best (non)decision I have ever made.

Now that I probably have time to watch TV, I no longer really want to. I listen to music, enjoy the outdoors, and read in my spare time and find my life much enriched because of it. I do get some television fixes at times at relative's houses or whatever, and every time I do I remember just how little I am missing. The only problem I have found with this arrangement is that when I do get near a TV, I become quite entranced. I'm like the kids you see watching cartoons, just totally dead to the world, you could light the room on fire and I wouldn't even notice. I just always have to sit with my back to the TV when we go to a restaurant that has them.....

 

[Reverb2009]

I have Time Warner Digital cable with the HD package. I get over 1000 channels with about 20 of them being HD. Quality can very from day to day, but it typically is very good.