Author Topic: DirectTV, Dish Network, or ? (Read 1106 times)

SOB · « **Reply #15 on:** January 02, 2003, 02:42:10 PM »

I've had both and I liked them both. For me DirecTV was more expensive...I basically had the everything package with no sports. Just all the cable & movie channels. Also, at the time, DirecTV only had three local stations - ABC, NBC, & FOX - and for some reason could not get the CBS station. I liked the menu system better and the favorites setup I had on my Sony reciever.

Dish Network worked well for me too, and one of the two recievers I got from them had a built in 30-hour digital recorder. Plus their local channel lineup was great - ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, Fox, UPN, & WB.

I think you'll do good either way...digital cable just sucks ass.

SOB

Wlfgng · « **Reply #16 on:** January 02, 2003, 02:50:30 PM »

Quote

digital cable just sucks ass

especially for what you have to pay for it.

DirectTV and all the local channels, no movie channels (I'd rather buy PPV)

Skuzzy · « **Reply #17 on:** January 02, 2003, 02:55:22 PM »

Dish here. Yeah SOB, I got the new 501 PVR system for Christmas,.60 hours of recording.
Nice thing about Dish's recorder is there is not additional fees. You can get it with any package. Oh,..PPV is all day as well. I understand Direct has gone back with one view PPV.

I think they are both fine and far better than cable.

I am glad our local cable went fiber. I would not have known how good the satellite stuff had gotten until the local cable service went south for the winter.

Had to call Dish on Christmas day to activate my PVR and i was all done in less than 2 minutes.

I had originally planned to go DirectTV, but when Dish added all our local channels for free,..it was a no brainer.

So I guess it all boils down to who is offering the best package for your needs.

rosco · « **Reply #18 on:** January 02, 2003, 02:57:44 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by Gman
Stealing DTV in Canada has recently been made illegal, all the shops in Calgary that were doing it (dozens) were raided recently by the RCMP.

I used DTV until the law passed last year, BUT I just used my Coots Montana mailbox as my address, and paid for it like everyone else. I chose to break the grey-area "law" in Canada in order to not "steal" from a US company.

Dumb question, maby.

Grey market satelite... the way dishnetwork works, is when you subscribe a new box, dish sends down a command that writes a number "basicly a combination thats in the ird's software" to the card and in turn activates your receiver, they also send down commands that write channel tiers to the card that tell the receiver what channels your currently pay for. There is no possible way for a dealer to do this himself, the signal comes from dishnet themselves, he doesnt have access to it. If he has the ird in his hands, he could possibly accomplish this, but since all anyone subbed to dish has "or had" to do is call whoever they bought the system from and upgrade or downgrade thier subscription then dishnet had to be sending the commands, and therefor I assume, getting paid for it.

Directv must to work the same way.

Basicly, if you were paying for a subscription, then you werent acutally stealing anything, whether you went through a dealer or Dish themselves, they had to be getting their money either way, or am I missing something? Now if you were paying for a dealer to come into your home and "upgrade" your subscription, then yea you were probably stealing.

SOB · « **Reply #19 on:** January 02, 2003, 02:59:04 PM »

Oh, one other thing my DirecTV reciever didn't have that my Dish Network one did was a search feature...so you could search for a specific program to see when it was on. I don't know if that was just my reciever or if you just can't do that with DirecTV...probably just the reciever.

AT&T Digital Cable in Salem:
Change channel, wait 5 seconds for the channel to pixel in from black. Not what you wanna watch, change channel again and wait some more. Sick of surfing...click on button to bring up programming guide...waaaaiiiit for it. See an entire ½ hour of programming at one time! Wow, I'm glad the rest of the screen is filled with ads tho' (when it first came out it showed 1-½ hours, but they nixed that in favor of the ads). Scroll through menu, if the ten selections shown on the screen you're looking at aren't appealing scroll down to the next page...wait some more for the next page to come up. Forget about the whole thing, throw your remote in the trash and go on the intardnet...also by AT&T cable services, but somehow quite good and reasonably priced.

SOB

Wlfgng · « **Reply #20 on:** January 02, 2003, 03:08:43 PM »

just your receiver, mine does search.. acutally both mine do.

Quote

I understand Direct has gone back with one view PPV.

I'm still getting the all-day thing.

bottom line:
Cable sux
Digital Cable sux

like Skuzzy said, pick a satellite package and go with it.

Eagler · « **Reply #21 on:** January 02, 2003, 03:19:56 PM »

you guys haven't seen REAL digital cable

we have it here in Tampa - one of the few places the $$$ were spent to correctly construct it

when you do, you'll drop your satellite

rain fade helps here as well but true digital cable with Icontrol - pause, ff, rw - your basic TIVO comands - HBO on Demand, SHowtime on Demand, Video on Demand - interactivity the sats can't bring you. 5.1 audio over 800 possible channels - when more analog channels convert to digital (you get 6 to 8 digital channels for each analog you drop) all the local HD channels

problem with digital cable is many/most cable cos are cramming 10+ digital channels in the 6mhz space they created by removing an analog channel and wonder why their customers complain of digital artifacts/blocking
add to a properly designed and construction as well as maintained digital cable platform, Road Runner - it'll beat Satellite hands down. Our new 8000 series Scientific Atlanta boxes has DVR built in. Gives P in P on any tv set. They are beta testing them now.

what has given sats growth is the ease of stealing everything after you pay for only basic & porn

the NFL package adds to it too, cable should have outbid the sats when it came to that. they have NBA and some college, NASCAR & others but the NFL ticket would have been sweet.

-ammo- · « **Reply #22 on:** January 02, 2003, 03:24:52 PM »

Eagler,

That must be some kind of cable company.

here is an example of what I got from TW in Eastern NC when I called asking for the History channel to be added to the channel line up.

"We dont offer that sir"

me "I know, that is why I am asking for it"

them"well, I am so sorry, we don't offer that"

And here in SA, Tx, the cable is just like SOB described. It is terrible. I will say though that I am satisfied with roadrunner though:)

SOB · « **Reply #23 on:** January 02, 2003, 03:24:52 PM »

I guess that's great if you live in Tampa, but...

Hell, my digital cable reciever didn't even have an S-video out or any kind of audio out beyond RCAs, much less Dolby Digital.

Also, rain (and I live in Oregon) never had any affect on either my DirecTV or Dish Network recievers. Once when it hailed real hard I briefly lost picture on my DirecTV dish.

Sounds like you have a nice setup down there tho'.

SOB

Wlfgng · « **Reply #24 on:** January 02, 2003, 03:27:00 PM »

Quote

pause, ff, rw - your basic TIVO comands - HBO on Demand, SHowtime on Demand, Video on Demand - interactivity the sats can't bring you. 5.1 audio over 800 possible channels - when more analog channels convert to digital (you get 6 to 8 digital channels for each analog you drop) all the local HD channels

actually we can do all that with Tivo (different receiver)
and have 'new' fiber only network for the digi-cable.. it's out all the time. That's what originally prompted me to switch.

the quality is no comparisson

the only time I've had a loss of signal was during a blizzard of ice/snow/sleet.. lasted about 20 minutes.

Snow doesn't affect it, rain doesn't ...
cold doesn't.. but it does affect our fiber (the cold/freezing)

funkedup · « **Reply #25 on:** January 02, 2003, 03:55:46 PM »

I have DirecTV with TiVo built in to the tuner. It freakin rules.
They are now calling it "DirecTV DVR" but it's the same product. Highly recommended.
It has two tuners built in so you can record two shows at once.
Dolby digital 5.1 sound, etc etc.
I stuck a 120 GB drive in there and have been sucking massive quantities of movies out of the airwaves.

Eagler · « **Reply #26 on:** January 02, 2003, 04:19:10 PM »

you guys in the midwest and left coast will not have rain fade as we have here on the east coast due to the satellites footprint (broadcast pattern/strength)

dishes here point almost horizontal as the birds are sw of us near the horizon

ppl here still swear by DSS even with the rain fade/blocking.

SOB is right - my cable isn't yours, it is just what is possible tommorrow but sat is about the same for all TODAY

wow ammo, that is sad. we have just about every history, discovery. movie, shopping

channel God created then some..

Discovery Wings is the best- well when they air Wings of the Luftwaffee anyway

marketing will push improvements - ad sales wants a targeted market. digital cable allows them to sell commercials for specific products to specific ppl at "discounted" rates.

digital viewing - sat, tivo or our SA box allows/will allow marketing research at a whole new level...

so how many of you guys with sat have a "special" card??

Wlfgng · « **Reply #27 on:** January 02, 2003, 04:44:00 PM »

(raises hand) yeah, they monitor my viewing habits

and if they follow my lead we'll all get to see more Hockey and Boobies

(I do my part)

funkedup · « **Reply #28 on:** January 02, 2003, 04:50:59 PM »

We had (by our standards) torrential rain a couple of weeks ago (3 inches in a few hours) and I didn't get any rain fade. I'm in CA so that backs up what Eagler said about the footprint.

lord dolf vader · « **Reply #29 on:** January 02, 2003, 04:53:00 PM »

have had both systems

digital cable in 90% of places is inferior the good kind is super rare.

dish is cheaper but not as well thought out.

( cant se where you can auto control the volume thru your reciever rather than the tv sound like direct can)

i have dish but will probly go with the best deal with a dvr with time is up.