Cutting the Cable Guide

Huntn

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We're doing NBC via Peacock, and CBS/FOX via the antenna :)
I discovered on Superbowl Sunday that my wife could watch it on the NBC app on her iOS device without a subscription If she wanted to. But Airplay was not available to transfer it over to the TV.
 

MEJHarrison

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I cut the cable a few years back. The problem now is I'm starting to get too many subscriptions. If it was just me, I could have 1-2 services at a time, then cancel and move on to the next when I'm ready. But with 5 people in the house I've found that it's easy to pick up a new cheap streaming service, but a lot harder to dump it. Just because I'm done with Service A, doesn't means others are ready to see it go. Or I want to see content on Service B, while someone else wants Service C (Star Trek vs Star Wars for example).
 

Huntn

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I cut the cable a few years back. The problem now is I'm starting to get too many subscriptions. If it was just me, I could have 1-2 services at a time, then cancel and move on to the next when I'm ready. But with 5 people in the house I've found that it's easy to pick up a new cheap streaming service, but a lot harder to dump it. Just because I'm done with Service A, doesn't means others are ready to see it go. Or I want to see content on Service B, while someone else wants Service C (Star Trek vs Star Wars for example).
Hit and run subscribing. I’m trying to talk my wife out of Disney, I got a deal on HBO for a year at $10/month but will mostly likely drop it. Ted Lasso on Apple, have not seen it, but I might subscribe to Apple for a month with the intent of watching 3 seasons.
 

Citysnaps

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4 months later and zero complaints regarding my Fiber optics cable by Tachus (Houston). :D

In the San Francisco Bay Area after having Comcast/Xfinity for two years, we switched to 1Gb/sec fiber through Sonic, a much smaller localish company. It's much faster and costs less. And more reliable; Comcast would have daily 10-15 minute dropouts; with Sonic I haven't encountered any.
 

Cmaier

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In the San Francisco Bay Area after having Comcast/Xfinity for two years, we switched to 1Gb/sec fiber through Sonic, a much smaller localish company. It's much faster and costs less. And more reliable; Comcast would have daily 10-15 minute dropouts; with Sonic I haven't encountered any.


I hear good things about sonic, but they’ve never been available at full speed at my address for some reason.
 

Citysnaps

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I hear good things about sonic, but they’ve never been available at full speed at my address for some reason.

My sense is they're working their way south with fiber. And relying on partnering with AT&T to backstop with Uverse-cable/DSL until that happens.

Speaking of AT&T DSL... before moving to where we are now from five miles away, the best AT&T could do for us with DSL was around 1.5 Mb/sec. So jumping to fiber (after enduring a year with Comcast) has been huge.
 

Cmaier

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My sense is they're working their way south with fiber. And relying on partnering with AT&T to backstop with Uverse-cable/DSL until that happens.

Speaking of AT&T DSL... before moving to where we are now from five miles away, the best AT&T could do for us with DSL was around 1.5 Mb/sec. So jumping to fiber has been huge.
A few months ago AT&T showed up and got ready to tear up our cul-de-sac. We put a stop to it - private property and they don’t have an easement and had no permission from the HOA. We asked them what they were doing, and they said they wanted to install fiber. They wouldn’t guarantee the HOA a price or a speed, so we told them to go away. Service is pretty good via other means here, so having AT&T dig up the drive we just paid $14,000 to have paved and repaired was not something the 7 homeowners here were willing to put up with.

That said, I’m on the corner, so I’m guessing I could probably get service without them tearing up the drive if I was willing to pay.
 

Huntn

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Suddenlink the company who has been owned by someone else for a long time (Altice I think) whose cable and internet I dumped says they will be back as Otpimum will be offering fiber in the near future in the N. Houston suburbs.
 
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Citysnaps

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A few months ago AT&T showed up and got ready to tear up our cul-de-sac. We put a stop to it - private property and they don’t have an easement and had no permission from the HOA. We asked them what they were doing, and they said they wanted to install fiber. They wouldn’t guarantee the HOA a price or a speed, so we told them to go away. Service is pretty good via other means here, so having AT&T dig up the drive we just paid $14,000 to have paved and repaired was not something the 7 homeowners here were willing to put up with.

That said, I’m on the corner, so I’m guessing I could probably get service without them tearing up the drive if I was willing to pay.

For service, it's my understanding Sonic taps into AT&T's fiber network with some kind of infrastructure/device/whatever, that then distributes fiber throughout a city, in most cases sharing telephone poles with other utilities. Not sure what happens in newer developments where all utilities are underground.

We get our fiber drop from a pole across the street. Installation was fast and without a hitch. Hooked my laptop directly into an RJ45 port on my router and was getting 980 Mb/sec - guessing the router's rules/inefficiencies, or the source or my laptop caused the small hit. That was mice-nuts after enduring 20 years of 1.5 Mb/sec AT&T DSL at our previous home. :)
 

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We've had AT&T U-verse for many years, most recently their 1Gb fiber service in two locations. It's been reliable, with very few outages or other problems in almost four years. Our last move was to a new development with all cables underground, though it was unclear whether AT&T, Spectrum, or both would be available. We chose AT&T because Spectrum had a poor reputation around here and because of our good experience with AT&T.
 
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