Followup on - My DirecTV alternative or How I got rid of DirecTV

When DirecTV sent yet again another price increase notice this year I was not going to pay even more than the $127 a month I was already paying them to watch TV.  I posted a few weeks back how I setup  environment so I did not have to pay DirecTV another dime.  I want to post now the followup ot that.

I had a lot of friends and family ask me why I wanted to do this.  Most people asked me "How can I do the same thing, what about the channels like SyFy and TNT".  I wan't to take a step back here for just one second before I go into this to point out that when I look at service providers I try to weigh the cost of the use on an hourly basis to see what kind of value I am getting out of something.  Let me give you an example.

Rhapsody (a popular and my favorite music service) I pay $14.95 for basically unlimited access to all the music I want whenever I want, wherever I want.  Up to three devices can be linked to it and so my two daughters and myself get to listen to music on our phones and the web for one low price.

So if between the three of us we spend 12 hours a day listening to music at home and work that means in a month (average 30 days) we use around 360 hours of the service.  So at $14.95/mo we divide the 360 hours and $0.042 per hour.  So for an hour of entertainment I'm paying about 8 cents.

If you look at DirecTV for the everything but all the movie channels package and 2 DVR's plus HD service I was paying $127 a month for an SD DVR, HD DVR and one set top box.   Now, the amount of TV I watch in a week is probably around 20 hours given all the kids in the house, etc.  That comes out to 600 hours or $0.212 per hour.

So if you compare the two.  The cost per hour of entertainment from one to another is a 405 % increase over each other.  So that is why I ditched DirecTV.

Now to followup on a few things and lessons learned here.

First I would do this again in a heartbeat. It was a smart move for me in saving a lot of money using technology.  All it took was a few weeks for everyone to get used to the process.  The only complaint that I have heard is that it's not very easy to "Channel Surfing" around and find something.  I do agree with that complaint as instead of channel surfing you have to know what you want to watch on TV.  I've found though that it's still cheaper to buy one episode of something and see if you like it vs. paying the huge cost of entertainment DirecTV was.

Services That Made All This Happen
Hulu Plus - Channels like Nick so the kids can watch SpongeBob
Netflix - Movies and more
Amazon Prime - Lots of prime videos often better stuff than netflix but you also get free 2 day shipping on anything you by there.  $70/year but I make that up alone in what I buy there.
Xbox Video - This is the big winner here.  Xbox video has tons of recent and current TV series.  SyFy, TNT and more.  You can buy season passes for shows you like.  I like "Anger Management" and I'm able to watch all of those.
Vudu - Ultraviolet movies and their own movies.  Rentals and Purchases.  Nice thing here is that you can also watch these movies with Flixster on your phone or tablet.

So I am able to watch just about everything any of my friends are watching.  Falling Skies for example I started watching on Amazon Prime.  Anger Management I get on Xbox Video.

Lessons Learned after doing this
Remote Control - I went out and got a Harmony remote to control all this.  You can probably cheap out and get a universal remote but the Harmony had macros.  Which means I could program the watch TV button to turn on all the devices, Switch the HDMI input on the TV to HDMI2 and turn on the Xbox.  One complaint I heard was how difficult it was remember what device was on what input.  Plus the volume is controlled by my surround sound amp so it was 6 remotes on my end table.  Now I have only one.  You can do what I did and go to Best Buy and tell them the remote is cheaper on amazon.com (which it was) then you can get it same day.  Or buy it on Amazon with your two day shipping ;)  Lesson learned, get a good universal remote.

Xbox centric - First let it be said I hate Microsoft.  However the Xbox as an entertainment device works very well.  They need a Rhapsody app but otherwise it is how we keep from switching around.  The Xbox works very well and we can access the Windows Media Center through the Xbox so there is no real need to use the media center pc except for Skype.  So the lesson learned here is having the xbox as the main tool for watching TV centralizes everything.  Since we have kinect on it we can also just shout "Xbox, Pause" if we're in the other room.

Media Center PC/Xbox Conflict - One reason we also use the Xbox is because the media center PC remote and the Xbox remote are identical.  (It's this kind of stuff that make me hate Microsoft).  So what I ended up having was the PC doing weird things or the Xbox doing weird things depending on if I was on the MCPC or the Xbox.  So ultimately I covered the sensor on the MCPC and just use the Xbox as an extender.

Skype! - I got a webcam that clips onto a monitor and now I can Skype my parents in Florida through the bigscreen.

Pay as you go - Put a budget together.  I took the approach of I was spending $120+ a month on DTV.  So with pay as you go you can get a whole season pass for a show for $20 or less.  So if you get even one new season pass a month you're still way ahead.  So don't be afraid to spend some money on a show you like.

Amazon Rentals - Lots of $1.99 rentals.  Redbox is $1.20 and I don't have to get off the couch.  Big savings here because there is no late fees and I dont have to spend gas getting there.

Roku - With the Roku the kids can have their own wireless TV.  This works great plus with Plex you can stream your windows media saved files to the Roku.

After several weeks this process works very well.  For everyone that was curious about how I did it all here it all is.  All of these services I've subscribed to like Hulu and Netflix still save me well over $100/mo.  If you dont have an Xbox, you can buy one for $99 with a 2 year commitment to pay $14.95/mo to Microsoft for Xbox live.  While this is a bit more expensive than buying the xbox outright and paying for Xbox live you can get a working setup with low cost.

So far I've saved now $250 not having to pay this bill.  :)

Mighty Text - Text from your PC

If you're like me you get a lot of text messages in a day.  I almost never look at my phone at work and see that someone sent me a message like "Can we eat the bagel bites in the freezer".  My friend Kevin introducted me to Mighty Text which allows you to link your phone to your PC and send text messages from a web browser.   It works very well.  It's also great to be able to text what you mean vs. the shorter "Im in a hurry" text like "c u l8r @ da game".  :)  Give it a shot.

See ya DirecTV! Hello Windows Media Center and Online Media.

I have had it with DirecTV.  I have been a customer for 8 years and they are again raising the price of my service.  This time 8 dollars.  I understand there are costs involved with contract negotiations and DirecTV is so nice to absorb part of that fee.  The latest bill from DirecTV told me this: "Each year the owners of television channels increase the programming fees they charge to DIRECTV for the right to broadcast their movies, shows and sporting events to you. As a result, DIRECTV must periodically adjust the pricing and channel lineups of our programming packages so we can continue to deliver these channels to you. In 2013, the programming fees we pay to the owners of these television channels will increase about 8.0%, but DIRECTV is adjusting the prices our customers pay on average about 4.5%. By holding firm in programming negotiations, we have been able to keep price increases below our cable competitors’. New prices take effect February 7, 2013, and will appear on billing statements issued after that date. See the detailed information below as it relates to your service." I feel so good that they are absorbing 3.5% of the increase but makes me wonder why it's not 100% given I see 20 DirecTV commercials a day on TV!  Seriously guys?  Do you think I'm an idiot and think these advertisements during prime time TV are cheap?  Nope, its just their way of screwing the consumer and making it sound like it's the bad old networks.  Well I have had enough.  I pay over $100/mo to watch TV maybe 8 hours a week?  I just can't justify that cost anymore.  Just for grins I called Mediacom who I have my internet through.  They couldn't do any better than direct TV.  They told me I could take "Advantage" of the offer to have Internet and Cable TV for $94 a month.  I told the woman it's only an "Advantage" if it's saving me money and it's an offering that is to my advantage.  The humor of that was lost on her.  In any case Cable was not a viable alternative. So now what?  How do you leave DirecTV, Dish Network and Cable companies in the dust?  Sure, you can watch TV over the air but you miss out on so much.  Or do you? Sit down and really analyze your usage on TV.  First, I found out I really only watch maybe 1-2 hours a night.  When I do, I watch shows like Big Bang Theory, How I Met Your Mother, Two Broke Girls and NOVA.  All of those shows are available with an HD antenna.  The rest of the TV I might watch is either movies (Netflix, Redbox, VUDU) or shows like Pawn Stars or some other show.  My kids watch Nick and Disney.  So when I think about it, I'm not watching 98% of the stations I'm paying for. So I have decided that I am no longer paying for any of this and I'll get my media elsewhere.  I have been a long time Netflix customer and my kids watch that a lot.  I have Amazon prime and love the free shipping and I get Prime Videos for free.  I decided that for $8 a month I will add Hulu and now can watch virtually everything I want.  I did however have one hole and that was regular network TV.  So I have decided to build a Home Theatre PC running Windows Media Center to solve that final problem.  It's an investment that will pay off in less than 6 months and won't have any costs associated with it month to month. Before I proceed in how to do this I want to say I sat down and had a family meeting with the kids.  I explained that we would no longer have the Dish, but we would have Netflix, Hulu, Amazon and Over   the Air (OTA) shows through a new DVR.  I said lets try it out and if we dont like it, then we can keep the dish.  I also said though they have to tell me why whatever they want to watch is worth $100/mo.  I also told them that for $70 I can get them a DVD player in their room to give them full access to everything.  All but one was in favor of this.  I am sure though she will come around. So now how do I fill in the OTA broadcasts in my house.  The rest of this is How To Build A Home Theatre PC quickly and easily. I was shocked to find that there is so little information about building a windows media center PC out there. Being in IT I deal with hardware and software every day but I wanted to get a Windows Media Center PC up and running with minimal effort. While I could have built it myself and put all the components together I wanted something that looked nice in my cabinet vs. a PC. This is a rather economical setup and you get a lot of bang for the buck. First of all you'll need to have a PC to run windows media center. This affects the cost a lot and if you buy something like a Zotac box Zotac ZBOX-ID80-PLUS-U ZBOX Intel Atom D2700 2.13 GHz (Google Affiliate Ad) you'll find it doesn't come with windows 7. This is a real downer because you'll need to spend around $100 on Windows 7 which brings the cost up to nearly $400. This device also has a 250GB hard drive in it. The reviews also highlight people had issues with getting the video resolution right. After a lot of searching on Amazon I found the perfect box for Windows Media Center. Asus US EB1503-B008E Atom D2700 Nettop (Google Affiliate Ad) the ASUS EB1503 EeeBox Compact Desktop comes with a 500GB hard drive, NVIDIA graphics (NVIDIA Rocks!), HDMI port and comes preinstalled with Windows 7 Home Premium. This has everything you need to get your own Personal Video Recorder for OTA HDTV. Not only will you be able to record TV, you can surf the web. What it doesn't say in the product description is that this also comes with a Remote, Wireless Keyboard and mouse! I almost bought a $27 remote but did not need to with this purchase. It's an excellent value. Now, you'll need to order two ATSC tuners so you can record HDTV. These are certified to work with windows 7 and as you can se from the reviews people just plug it in and it works.Avermedia MTVHVMXSK TV Tuner Kit For Windows 7 (Google Affiliate Ad) two of these allow you to record two shows at once. Then you'll be ready to turn this PC into a high performance PVR! So how do you drop cable and satellite? Easy, with Services like Hulu, Netflix, Amazon Prime Video you can watch all of them with this box. Most of what you want to watch is available online! I was able to drop my Satellite provider and save over $115 dollars a month. This means this box paid for itself in the first 6 months and I no longer pay to watch TV. You can do it too! I realize this wont work for everyone.  Some people are really in areas where they can't receive over the air HD.  If you can though here is the cost breakdown. DirecTV Choice Ultimate with 3 Boxes (2 being DVR's), DVR service all came to $114.98.   Dropping DirecTV, adding HULU is 7.99.  So the savings there $106.99.  I was already a Netflix customer but clearly the savings here are huge.  The PVR setup cost me around $550 but in 6 months, it paid for itself AND I can do so much more with the media center than I can with the DirecTV Box.