FTA "free to air" satellite receivers, worth buying?

[jbivy]

So ive been debating picking up one of these receivers and a used satellite dish. Im becoming truly tired of comcast continually jacking up their prices.

So do any of you use one of these and what are your impressions of them?

[ChrisW6ATV]

Think of them as a TV equivalent of shortwave radio. Not at all a substitute for commercial paid TV services, but can be a fun hobby. I have a couple of dishes and receivers, but they are for occasional use, not a constant or complete entertainment source.

If you live where you can use a real TV antenna, just dump the paid TV service and put some of the money saved into Blu-ray movies or even Netflix-type disc-rental or maybe streaming-video service. I dropped satellite TV in December 2005 and have now saved at least $6,200.00 assuming the rates would have never gone up since then.

[tubetwister]

Netlflix is good lot of stuff only 7.99/ mo for streaming

[andy]

...

[Nick_the_'Nole]

I have a FTA setup, but I don't even have it hooked up anymore. There are a few interesting things out there, but it's not something I'd use as a primary source of TV. The vast majority of the programming is foreign language and religious. I'm not even sure if it's really worth the investment in time and equipment... to be able to pick up the weaker satellites, you're looking at $400-500 in equipment and quite a few hours getting settings dialed in. If you're into DXing, that may be fine, but if entertainment is your goal, well, you could buy quite a few months of Netflix for what you'd pour into FTA.

TBH, the main reason I set it up in the first place was for the... um... other use of FTA equipment. But most of that has gone away now.

[wkand]

I agree with the above comments, and in addition to Netflix there is a service consolidator called Roku that you might enjoy. It consolidates streaming services into one device, and gives you a menu-driven way to access them. It is available in WiFi only and WiFi / Wired versions for about $100. Another service that can be accessed from it is Hulu Plus for about $10 a month. This gives you access to many of the cable series.

[Hemingray]

I have a Viewsat Platinum Lite box I scored second hand, sadly, no decent dish to use.

As for streaming, I use Netflix with a WD TV Live STB. Decent that I can also stream DVD rips (right from ISO) from off my main PC over the LAN.

[tvtimeisfun]

The best way to go is Direct Tv comcast sucks dish network is not a bargain as well..

[Hemingray]

Originally Posted by tvtimeisfun

The best way to go is Direct Tv comcast sucks dish network is not a bargain as well..

Don't even have cable as an option at my house.

[Ed in Tx]

Originally Posted by tvtimeisfun

The best way to go is Direct Tv comcast sucks dish network is not a bargain as well..

Please elaborate.. the difference between Dish and D¡recTV that makes DTV a better deal.

[tubetwister]

They are all screw jobs once you are off of promotion rates. I have Dish now but have had DirectTV and Viacom, ATT then Comcast (Viacom successors ) the the past . I Also have Netflix that's OK and cheap $7.95 for streaming . I think like Wkand
says Roku box with ,Netflix,Hulu is the thing to cut your cable /sat with been thinking about it myself. Roku has couple of different models of boxes even free Hulu on the PC in't bad . All the networks have a lot of web content as well especially PBS .

[dewdude]

Hulu has been letting people cut the cords from cable....and cable complained enough Hulu is changing. Soon, you will have to confirm you have a cable subscription in order to have a Hulu subscription. Its possible they could lock it to just cable, leaving satellite and fiber people in the dust...but I haven't heard about that.

The FTA stuff doesn't have much from what I can tell. I haven't had a chance to look lately. Lyngsat has a chart with all known FTA stuff. I'd say its a novelty at best, but your milage may vary.

I, like some people, was ruled out of the cable market. We've got the line from 20 years ago, but due to the fact I live in the woods, its very lossy. Comcast condemned the line 7 years ago. We tried to get cable again and they came down, hooked up, and told us nope....our line failed to qualify for both analog and digital. Did they want to do anything? Of course not, that'd cost them money. They offered to upgrade the line, off setting the install cost (estimated at about $600) to us. We promptly told them no, but they *still* send us junk mail.

I dumped satellite because I live in the woods, and just SD was not enough. I couldn't get *any* of the satellite for Dish...and DirecTV was almost as difficult.

Needless to say, when Verizon showed up offering a big jug of Kool-Aid called Fios, I not only drank it, but let the kool aid man bust a hole through the wall. 2 weeks later, Verizon has run 1500 ft of fiber, to my house. All I had to do was sign the two year agreement. Vastly superior to cable...not quite the HD channel selection, but excellent picture...and it goes down less often than cable (try never) and no more rain-fade...or being in every IAD flight path, plane-fade. The internet is also a dream.

I'm paying a lot...more than I would with cable, but I'm getting a quality of service that backs it up....I mean, comeon, excellent HD picture *and* roughly 40 megabits of bandwidth? I'm happy with that.

I still use Netflix though, except we can have about 5 streams going, in HD, at once.

But big cable is working to make sure the free/low cost services are no longer attractive as alternatives.