God willing and the creek don't rise I will be closing on a home next week.

Since I haven't really been paying much attention to any of it recently, I am asking for some TV service advice.

My intent is 6 locations in the home with multi room DVR viewing capabilities.

Cable service is the Comcast/Xfinity monopoly and even though I am a cable guy, I am not thrilled about what I am reading so far. They have a copious amount of hidden fees, $10 a month for each Tv client and $20.00 a month for DVR service. That adds $80.00 on top of the package. Add on top of that their "stellar" customer service...not!

We also have Wave (current service) with similar fees, a little less than Comcast. Wave equipment is older than Comcast.

I will be using cable for internet as they have fastest service in the area.

Back in the day my cable company handed out boxes like candy and didn't charge for them. I miss those days.

For the first time I am considering Direct/Dish.

So what are your recommendations and why?

What are your pro's and cons?

DONT DO IT! Home ownership is a constant headache. Something always needs fixed.

If you want the ability to run all 6 TVs at once with central DVR, Dish is the choice. DTV genie can only do the main genie and 3 clients at the same time. And then it can't record at the same time. It has a 5 tuner max. You can add other receivers like H25's, but they cost and don't have live DVR options. Btw, be warned, if you call DTV up and tell them you have 6 TVs, they will try to set you up with a Genie and 5 clients, with the condition that 2 will always have to be off.

Dish can do 16 tuners at once. My Hopper 3 install with 4 Joeys was free. Not sure what I'm paying monthly for each joey, but I know it's less than the local cable company. I do know that whatever the monthly price was that they quoted me is what we pay. No hidden fees

First and foremost, purchase your own modem. Not only will you be able to use your own router. They won't charge you $10 or $12 a month for their modem, a modem that will broadcast "xfinity" for other people to login and use.

Secondly, you have the option to purchase the set top boxes. And Comcast has to supply you with the needed devices to allow you to use them. However, I do not know the fees associated with that. It could save you a whole bunch, but it could be very close.

I have Dish and they are charging me $15 a month for DVR and $7 for each of their Joey receivers. HD for live is free if paid with a credit card. That is not an option with Comcast, so you'll have to pay for HD channels. Plus there's the fact that there are far more HD channels on Dish than Comcast.

I also have Comcast for internet and TV, package deal, but the TV boxes sit in the closet. I was even an installer for Comcast and did not like the new X1 boxes. Not only did I not like the interface. But I hated the lag they had. In training they tout the fact that each button press on the remote sends the signal from the box, down their network to their servers and back to the box to tell it what that button press is supposed to do. At first I didn't believe it, because it was completely stupid idea. But as I played around with it, because I wanted to learn it, I saw how much it lagged and if pressed too fast it would freeze.

Then there's always the 2 year contract with Dish. However, you can always change the packages during that time with out changing the time frame. However, if you change the equipment, say from Hopper 2 To Hopper 3 system, then that will extend the contract. But they are currently on the Hopper 3 and it came out in Feb, so they won't be changing that for a while.

The Hopper 3 itself has 16 or something like that, tuners. So that is completely feasible to watch 6 shows all at the same time using the Joeys. Plus being able to record 10 more as well.

KOT

Oh, I just remembered something. I have a client that switched out some of his cable boxes for Rokus. Due to some law that was passed making cable companies have to provide another option than renting boxes, Roku now has a Time Warner app. As long as he subscribes to time warner for tv service, he can add as many rokus to his house as he wants and use those instead. I don't know if they have a Comcast app, but you might check.

In my experience, I hate the lag on Directv boxes. Much longer than X1. Is Dish shorter than both?

Now that's interesting. Could you find out what the fees are for that? If they subscribe to TW TV service, it sounds like that they have at least one cable box. But uses the Rokus for the other TVs. Do I have that right? I just can't picture a subscription to a TV service with out at least one box.

KOT

I would assume that's the case. All though, I haven't checked the details on how the law was changed. But with most cable companies, since they went all digital, doesn't the subscription to TV service include 1 "free" box?

[Link: corporate.comcast.com]

If you have a TiVo with multiple tuners, then you'll only need one cable card. So if you go that route, you could have only one cable card, or two if desired.

I am just going by what the second poster said in this thread... [Link: forums.xfinity.com]

KOT

Using the factory remote, Dish is fast. Using a smart remote with IR, well, Dish IR is a bit problematic and can take some tweaking. Using IP control, I've found it's faster and more reliable than IR, but the control system has to send the command up to the Dish server, and then it comes back to your receiver. I guess this is the new thing. Probably has something to do with the phone and tablet apps that give you full access to your tv no matter where you are.

DTV lag is horrible. I don't recall any with Dish. I don't flip stations, but rather flip through the info bar, so can't say 100%. We had to turn our Dish gear in when we sold our house. In my experience, the Dish gear and system is far suprior to DTV. Nothing but problems with DTV gear in my clients houses, and their techs have been mostly pure sh1t. Dish techs were actually very good.

I just went in to Comcasts office last week to ask about cable cards and they said they're going to be discontinuing those in January. I mentioned that to a friend of mine and he said, "Yeah, they've been saying that for years". The cost for those is $10/card/month.

I have a customer who has 12 TVs and wants the whole house DVR situation and despises Comcast, so we're going with Bolts and Minis. I'll let you know how it turns out this week.

They better double check with the FCC. I believe the changes to give customers more options said they can't drop the cable cards.


One more thought on services. The Dish Auto Hop is awesome.

Just wire your new house for JAP :)

You're right, they have been saying that for years... I remember them saying that in 2010.

But with the new law passed, I highly doubt it will happen any time soon. Unless devices like the Rokus will have an app or sorts. With this, you'll have just one device connected to the coax. Then everything else via wifi or cat5/6. The con for this, would be the amount of devices going through that one modem. But there again, I saw somewhere that Comcast is offering 200Mbps in some markets. I pay for 150Mbps, but receive over 175 on average. That's through a Zoom 5345 modem and Apple AirPort Extreme. All devices connected via wifi. I've had this set up for about 5 years now. Couldn't believe all the crap I heard from my Comcast fellow comcast employees about my modem. They hated working with the modem because they fail a lot. Hmmmm, and yet they would replace 3 to 5 of in house modems a day. Sure the ratio is far in favor of in house, but still.

Sorry for the blabbing. My point is, those cablecards could go away in the future with devices with apps. But that's many years away.

A cable card is actually a modem. So even a device like TiVo could have the modem preinstalled and the cable company can just push their firmware. Just like when I took my Zoom modem from one cable company to a different.

KOT