Got this email today:

Thank you for enjoying DIRECTV. We appreciate your business and are proud to offer the ultimate entertainment experience. We realize getting maximum value is a top priority for you, which is why we work hard to provide choices you want at rates that make sense.

Due to increased costs of programming, an adjustment in the price of our programming packages is necessary. New rates will be in effect on January 20, 2019, as indicated at att.com/2019pricing.

We've had dtv since 1997 but this is the final straw. Not sure what to replace it with. Any recommendations appreciated.

Anything but Verizon.

What do you watch?

These days, cable-cutting is all the rage. Got an Internet connection? There are plenty of services that provide television over the 'Net.

I'm joining you & others that cut the cord. We don't have a smart tv & going to get a Roku + express I thinks it's called. We'll take what we can get to eliminate the greedy bastards.

quote:

Originally posted by fpuhan:
What do you watch?

This ^^^^^

Tell us what you like to watch, what you absolutely must have, what you'd like to have but can live without, etc.

If you don't like Direct's pricing you will hate Uverse.

If you go with Dish be prepared for a fight over everything. And as a bonus six months after you return your equipment they will try to bill you for it saying they never received it. And when you counter with a UPS tracking number they will argue that they cannot verify that they ever got it back and it is the customer's responsibility to make sure it was received! Really! I'd put up rabbit ears and tinfoil first before ever signing on with those idiots again.

This might be helpful...I am in the same boat of deciding on a streaming TV service

https://www.cnet.com/news/dire...v-channels-compared/

I left DirecTV due to constant customer service issues. They can be flexible on things when you threaten to leave. But by then I needed a Mandarin language package for the in-laws that DirecTV didn't have and Dish did. So far Dish has ben fine.

Someone's gotta pay for that multi-billion dollar merger with AT&T!

They plan to make YOU pay for that.

Comcast is raising prices for 2019 as well but these bastards are sneaky as hell, if you are in a contract your price doesn't change but they are raising the cost of "fees" on everyone.

ive' not paid for a TV/cable service since we got married 10 years ago. We just pay for netflix and amazon prime, and call it good. We had HULU for a while, but we recently cancelled it since we really weren't watching it much.

internet is included in our rent, though. I understand the "benefit" of bundling through cable or whatever, but that's not an issue for us.

TV watching is mostly FNC/FBN, occasionally local channels. Otherwise it's Netflix/Amazon. Thinking about Direct Now but AFAIK no locals & questionable recording cabability

We moved a couple of months ago and ditched DirecTV. Switched to ATT Uverse (for now) because our options are limited (apartment living). First year pricing is fantastic where we are ($85 for a boatload of channels, including Starz and Encore, AND we get 300Mb fiber internet). I know it will go up a LOT after a year, but we'll have moved into our new house by then. My plan (I doubt it will work, however) is to keep the Uverse but get the cable company (Time Warner) to at least bring the coax up to the house so I can switch easily.

OK - I know they won't bring the cable up from the street without a contract, so I'll just have to let them dig up the yard when/if I want to switch. I just want to be able to pit the two against each other going forward.

The TV and Internet service from ATT have been fantastic - no outages and the internet speed has been consistently faster than we need. Gigabit service is available, but I could probably save a few bucks by dropping down to 100Mb since it is just my wife and I, only using one TV and hardly ever streaming video.

I ditched cable a long time ago.

I already have a good internet connection for gaming and such at about $88 per month.
Someone can be on a multi player game and everyone else streaming something and not have an issue.

I started with just the PS4 in the living room and an Amazon Firestick for $30 in the bedroom before smart TV's came out and a couple of digital antenna's for local stuff.

At that time I was paying $2,136 a year for cable.
With Netflix for two devices and Amazon Prime I'm around $375 a year and can watch them where I want to.

quote:

Originally posted by RogB:
TV watching is mostly FNC/FBN,

I don't know where you'd get those. There might be a streaming package you can get that includes them. Fox products are among the hardest to get economically. (That's part of the reason I watch no Fox content. Want to play hard-to-get? Fine: Screw you.)

You can get OAN on FireTV, AppleTV and Roku for $5/month.

quote:

Originally posted by RogB:
occasionally local channels.

Throw your street address into TV Fool and see what your Over-The-Air (OTA) prospects are. If you're lucky, you might get by with as little as a patch antenna.

quote:

Originally posted by RogB:
Otherwise it's Netflix/Amazon.

Anything and everything can stream Netflix. For Amazon you'll have to rule out Android TV, due to the fight between Alphabet and Amazon. (Not a big deal, because most Android TV streamers pretty much suck, anyway.)

Here is my thread on cutting the cord. I ultimately chose Hulu Live (happy with my choice) but if I wasn't a Big Ten football nut I could've saved $10/month and chose SlingTV.

Become a Slinger, the freedom is exhilarating

I am canning DTV after 5 years because of numerous issues including; poor picture quality, hard sales tactics and the icing on the cake was a notice that if I cancel then they refuse to prorate.

What's funny is they used to have great customer service until ATT got involved and now getting a human that speak without an accept so thick you need a translator is next to impossible yet when i call the ATT side all is well?

I am going back to Cox, who seems to finally "get it" and are offering me a great package with no contract and guaranteed pricing for 2 years

The streaming options are for the most part very good but takes a little more fanegaling to get to where you want. It's not just turning on your TV, looking at the guide and punching up a channel.

We have the base Uverse package for local channels and the few non premium channels it comes with, mostly because we get internet which we are grandfathered in at $30 a month. This is augmented by DirectTV Now with HBO added in along with Netflix and Amazon Prime. Plenty of stuff to watch, but again switching between the various services is a bit of a PITA. I think the streaming service will get better as more people opt out of the cable solution.

As a Dish TV customer, just be aware that there is a major disagreement going on between Dish and HBO/Cinemax (owned by AT&T) over the streaming of shows over the Internet, this includes the “Sling” feature.

It started on Nov 1 and shows no sign of ending soon. Other cable systems will probably be affected too soon. This all goes back to the mega media mergers and possible govt anti-trust actions.

https://www.bloomberg.com/opin...-will-only-get-worse

Retention department pretty good at least last time I checked