Cut The Cord: Drop Cable TV
If you’re willing to take a deep breath and drop your cable, you can survive without it and still keep up with chatter in the office.
For about a year now I have been without cable or satellite TV service. Not until recently I have felt like I’m “back in the TV game”. Why? I’ll tell you:
I hooked my computer to my TV…that’s it.
The Hook-Up
A few months ago I stepped into the flat panel TV era. My TV has 3 HDMI inputs on it. This allows me to hook up digital inputs to the TV.
The first HDMI unit I bought was my DVD player. If you have a service like Netflix you can use my DVD player to catch up on all of the episodes, or whole series, of “Lost” or “Hereos” I want. And I can also watch movies on it too, go figure.
PC on TV
Let’s get back to the purpose of this article. For about $50 I bought a video card for my computer that had an HDMI output. This allowed me, with one cable, to get video and sound to my TV. While I was at it I hooked up a wireless keyboard and mouse. That allowed me to sit on the couch and watch “TV”. Once my hook up was complete I was ready to watch TV.
The Web: TVs New Friend
If you subscribe to cable and use TiVo, don’t fret. There are many sites like hulu.com, ovguide.com, and youtube.com that you can watch videos on. Some streaming video sites now offer HD videos. I’ll tell you write now that the quality of streaming video is not as great as HD cable, but for the price you pay it’s worth it.
Live TV is Still Free
If you feel like you’ll be pushed from the water cooler at work because everyone is talking about the latest episode of “American Idol” you can still watch it live on broadcast television. With a purchase of a digital converter box (if your TV doesn’t have a digital tuner) you can not only watch live TV but also get the side-channels most major broadcasters are offering. There are kids channels, Spanish channels, news channels, and even local weather channels that go beyond what you can see on your analog TV line-up. I use titantv.com to look at my growing line-up of channels. Just plug in your zip code and select “over the air” to see what’s available.
The Price
This is the best part…it’s free, you still need broadband cable though. I have DSL and it has not effected my viewing. Just think of saving $100 a month…attractive isn’t it?
I just read a terrible article from computerworld.com and have to write something about the subject.