Getting Rid of Cable- What am I missing?

[KI4MVP]

It will be interesting to see how these streaming tv services will add channels in the future. Viacom pulled it's channels from Sony Vue and it's content from Hulu, they said they are going to make their own streaming service this year. I thought it was odd YouTube didn't have Comedy Central and was sure it was included in some form with Sony Vue and Hulu when I did the trials.

I don't actually think these streaming TV services are going to be how we watch TV in the future. I think it's going to evolve one more time to where we are just buying from the actual channel or content provider. I think Viacom and Disney have already set themselves up to do this.

What I don't understand is what Fox thinks they are going to do. They sold all their regional sports, fx, and stake in Hulu to Disney. Unless they are giving up subscription base programing to a pure ad based broadcast model, I don't understand how they think they can survive with just Fox, Fox news, and FS1.

I'll probably be some combination of the two. Some networks instantly put all of their content online if you subscribe to streaming and/or let you watch the live feed. That's better than recording because you don't have to know in advance you want to record the show. Some networks you have to watch live.

An inexpensive service like YouTube TV with the core channels bundled for a reasonable price that also supports DVR + individual subscriptions to a handful of other channels is going to be cheaper than cable. The only time I actually watch cable myself is live sports.

 

[el_capitan]

I switched to DirecTV Now when that came out about a year ago, it’s been great so far. I got locked into the $65 package for $35/month lifetime. The picture is great, my friend has ATT Uverse and to me it’s much clearer than that. It gets blurry for a second or two every once in a while, but that’s pretty rare. I know some people have had trouble with it, but for me it’s worked out great.

 

[KI4MVP]

I switched to DirecTV Now when that came out about a year ago, it’s been great so far. I got locked into the $65 package for $35/month lifetime. The picture is great, my friend has ATT Uverse and to me it’s much clearer than that. It gets blurry for a second or two every once in a while, but that’s pretty rare. I know some people have had trouble with it, but for me it’s worked out great.

What do they do for DVR? And can you skip commercials?

 

[Akron330]

What do they do for DVR? And can you skip commercials?

I think most of these services offer some sort of a cloud DVR. I have Hulu Live and we can’t skip commercials for everything, we have a DVR as well. The service has been pretty solid. My buddy has Vue, its pretty solid as well. I’ll never go back to cable, we have a great internet connection and Hulu is cheap- spending less than $100 a month. We were easily dropping twice that with cable and internet

 

[ajz20]

It feels like a wired time. Most people are starting to buy 4k TVs but only prime and Netflix are producing 4k content and there is no indication it is comming soon on the network side. They don’t want to invest in the tech? Is there still no hunger for 4k content. Seems like we are still 3 to 5 years away, and it is moving slowly. Then cable and fios continue to raise prices, but all the streaming services still have issues to work out too.

Also not a huge fan of being 30 to 60 seconds behind with live sports.
Serious question for tech people . Can this be fixed so it is on time with fios or cable or will that always be an issue with streaming. Plus with espn and Disney having thier own streaming... are they going to pull content from all other places too?

 

[inliner311]

It feels like a wired time. Most people are starting to buy 4k TVs but only prime and Netflix are producing 4k content and there is no indication it is comming soon on the network side. They don’t want to invest in the tech? Is there still no hunger for 4k content. Seems like we are still 3 to 5 years away, and it is moving slowly. Then cable and fios continue to raise prices, but all the streaming services still have issues to work out too.

Also not a huge fan of being 30 to 60 seconds behind with live sports.
Serious question for tech people . Can this be fixed so it is on time with fios or cable or will that always be an issue with streaming. Plus with espn and Disney having thier own streaming... are they going to pull content from all other places too?

I don't know much about how they actually encode this stuff but with my tech knowledge and how I view all the stats from these streaming services, for it to be good quality there has to be some sort of delay.

They have to encode it on multiple resolution levels and the app or server needs time to react if one level has a problem. YouTube is really the only provider to have a large amount of experience live streaming before coming to market. They encourage people to live stream on YouTube for a long time now. It will take the other companies time to catch up.

As for Disney, they have already pulled some content from Netflix. For their sports stuff it will take a while till they can actually make their own streaming service. They have contracts with cable companies and sports leagues that will have to expire and renegotiated so they can be added to their streaming service. The streaming service for ESPN will just be an add on with extra coverage and new sports at first. They want it in place though so they can slowly take over the market as cable/satellite companies get out of the tv business.

Lastly I think the slow push for 4k content is because cable and satellite companies cant justify upgrading all the equipment to provide 4k with the way the market is heading. That massive investment may never payoff and could bankrupt them. Also you need a 60" or larger tv to really see the difference between 1080p and 4k. I have a 40" 4k TV and to tell the difference it has to be a movie I've watch multiple times and it such small differences that don't matter to the experience.

4k will come with ATSC 3.0 tuners in broadcast TV. Those aren't even offered in TVs in any country other than south Korea. They should be available in the next year or 18 months. If you are thinking of upgrading wait till they come with it. With data caps and net neutrality, you might not want to rely on a streaming service for all your 4k content. If my TV didn't break I wouldn't have bought a 4k TV.

 

[KI4MVP]

I don't know much about how they actually encode this stuff but with my tech knowledge and how I view all the stats from these streaming services, for it to be good quality there has to be some sort of delay.

They have to encode it on multiple resolution levels and the app or server needs time to react if one level has a problem. YouTube is really the only provider to have a large amount of experience live streaming before coming to market. They encourage people to live stream on YouTube for a long time now. It will take the other companies time to catch up.

As for Disney, they have already pulled some content from Netflix. For their sports stuff it will take a while till they can actually make their own streaming service. They have contracts with cable companies and sports leagues that will have to expire and renegotiated so they can be added to their streaming service. The streaming service for ESPN will just be an add on with extra coverage and new sports at first. They want it in place though so they can slowly take over the market as cable/satellite companies get out of the tv business.

Lastly I think the slow push for 4k content is because cable and satellite companies cant justify upgrading all the equipment to provide 4k with the way the market is heading. That massive investment may never payoff and could bankrupt them. Also you need a 60" or larger to really see the difference between 1080p and 4k. I have a 40" 4k TV and to tell the difference it has to be a movie I've watch multiple times and it such small differences that don't matter to the experience.

4k will come with ATSC 3.0 tuners in broadcast TV. Those aren't even offered in TVs in any country other than south Korea. They should be available in the next year or 18 months. If you are thinking of upgrading wait till they come with it. With data caps and net neutrality, you might not want to rely on a streaming service for all your 4k content. If my TV didn't break I wouldn't have bought a 4k TV.

I think streaming is going to beat broadcast/cable tv to 4k. The big jump will happen when HBO starts streaming 4k, which I hope is before the final season of Thrones, or even before Westworld season 2. They already are filming shows in 4K, see the 4K release of Westworld season 1.

 

[inliner311]

I think streaming is going to beat broadcast/cable tv to 4k. The big jump will happen when HBO starts streaming 4k, which I hope is before the final season of Thrones, or even before Westworld season 2. They already are filming shows in 4K, see the 4K release of Westworld season 1.

I don't doubt streaming will beat broadcast to 4k. It will be alot easier to implement. The problems will come when we will have to pick and choose 4k content to streaming vs view over broadcast tv. 4k takes approximately 7gb an hour to stream. With a 1tb data cap that some providers have put in, a 4 person family will get alittle over hour of 4k tv a day each before they hit their data limit.

Data caps might be the reason people stay with cable or bundle with their internet provider. Unlimited data might not be cost effective with 4k streaming tv vs cable.

 

[KI4MVP]

I don't doubt streaming will beat broadcast to 4k. It will be alot easier to implement. The problems will come when we will have to pick and choose 4k content to streaming vs view over broadcast tv. 4k takes approximately 7gb an hour to stream. With a 1tb data cap that some providers have put in, a 4 person family will get alittle over hour of 4k tv a day each before they hit their data limit.

Data caps might be the reason people stay with cable or bundle with their internet provider. Unlimited data might not be cost effective with 4k streaming tv vs cable.

Data caps will go away eventually. AT&T doesn't have any caps on their gigabit internet (gigabit both ways). 5G wireless shouldn't have caps either, otherwise what's the point. And if SpaceX gets their gigabit satellite service up and running, they aren't supposed to have caps either.

 

[inliner311]

Data caps will go away eventually. AT&T doesn't have any caps on their gigabit internet (gigabit both ways). 5G wireless shouldn't have caps either, otherwise what's the point. And if SpaceX gets their gigabit satellite service up and running, they aren't supposed to have caps either.

At&t doesn't have data caps for gigbit internet but for 99% of people gigbit is overkill. You only need 15mbits for a 4k stream, 50 or 100 mbit internet is more than enough for most families. Both those plans have 1tb data limit and $10 for every 50gb you go over. Yes you can pay twice as much for gigabit internet to get no cap but wouldn't that defeat the purpose of cord cutting. You wouldn't be saving any money.

I hope 5g doesn't have any data limit but the Verizon CEO was talking about a cap of 200-300gb when he was talking about it to the press a couple months ago.

 

[KI4MVP]

At&t doesn't have data caps for gigbit internet but for 99% of people gigbit is overkill. You only need 15mbits for a 4k stream, 50 or 100 mbit internet is more than enough for most families. Both those plans have 1tb data limit and $10 for every 50gb you go over. Yes you can pay twice as much for gigabit internet to get no cap but wouldn't that defeat the purpose of cord cutting. You wouldn't be saving any money.

I hope 5g doesn't have any data limit but the Verizon CEO was talking about a cap of 200-300gb when he was talking about it to the press a couple months ago.

AT&T only charges $90/month for gigabit internet with unlimited data. Why would unlimited bandwidth very high speed internet be overkill? Cut all download times by a factor of 10. Cut upload times by a factor of 100.

And the 100 mbit internet services are generally "up to 100 mbit", meaning they get throttled during peak demand, are generally about the same price (after promo offers expire), and are not bidirectional at that speed.

Google Fiber is another bi-directional gigabit internet service, it's $70/month.

 

[inliner311]

AT&T only charges $90/month for gigabit internet with unlimited data. Why would unlimited bandwidth very high speed internet be overkill? Cut all download times by a factor of 10. Cut upload times by a factor of 100.

And the 100 mbit internet services are generally "up to 100 mbit", meaning they get throttled during peak demand, are generally about the same price (after promo offers expire), and are not bidirectional at that speed.

Google Fiber is another bi-directional gigabit internet service, it's $70/month.

I would say it's overkill for most families. 100mbit internet allows you to stream 6+ 4k streams at a time. I actually think most families would be fine with 50mbit internet. The unlimited is nice but in the context of cord cutting, if you are playing $40 extra a month for unlimited data to stream 4k videos, then it might end up being better to just keep cable or satellite.

I personally have 30mbit internet and have no problems with it. The bandwidth is steady no matter when I use it.

The internet providers are going to try to price out the tv streaming services with data caps and paid priority. It's basically the only way they are going to survive as tv providers in the future. Until we get internet providers that don't sell tv, I think data caps are going to be a part of the future. My cable modem provider doesn't have data caps but I fully expect them to implement them in the future, unless they only plan to be a internet provider in the future.

What are you doing that you feel you need bidirectional gigabit internet?

 

[ajz20]

Thanks for all the info. Basically it could be well over 4 to 5 years or longer before we see games in 4k on a regular basis.
Also I disagree about needing a 60 inch tv to see a difference. Watching 4k on YouTube in both 42 and 55 inch you see the difference big time. There are some soccer games in Europe in 4k posted on YouTube. It is a pretty decent upgrade in pic quality thst is obvious.

 

[el_capitan]

What do they do for DVR? And can you skip commercials?

They don't currently have a DVR but they've been testing a beta version of their updated app for the past few months, and I recently got access to that so I've been playing around with it. I believe the new app is scheduled to release in April with the DVR functionality. So far the DVR has worked fine, you can fast forward through commercials and stuff. The only negative about it is you can't fast forward if the recording is still going on. So you can't start a show 15 minutes after it airs, and fast forward through commercials until you are caught up and live near the end. But that's not really a huge deal breaker for me. I don't watch a ton of shows religiously, so the DVR isn't a priority for me. And they have a lot of on demand options for shows, so that helps.

 

[inliner311]

Thanks for all the info. Basically it could be well over 4 to 5 years or longer before we see games in 4k on a regular basis.
Also I disagree about needing a 60 inch tv to see a difference. Watching 4k on YouTube in both 42 and 55 inch you see the difference big time. There are some soccer games in Europe in 4k posted on YouTube. It is a pretty decent upgrade in pic quality thst is obvious.

I went to watch some soccer clips in 4k and you are right it does make a difference. I think that's because the ultra wide angle that soccer is traditionally shot at. The guys look like actual people now and uniform numbers were much easier to see because of the resolution. It makes sense that it would help because the players were such small parts of the screen.

Don't get fooled though by some of the clips that are that highlights that look real cinematic in 4k. The first one that came up was a Panasonic promo 4k video. You can't those kind of shots on a regular basis with the current technology with autofocus and the speed it needs to track for sports.

I watched Dunkirk in both 1080p and 4K and truely I only saw small stuff that was different. I also watch alot of vlogs on YouTube and the ones in 4k just make the people look older, you see every wrinkle and line of their face.

You got me interested in seeing 4k sports and the difference with basketball and football.