We are fortunate to still be able to use an antenna on our roof, and get quite a few channels from it! Those cable/dish bills are astonishing to me.

None of the above appealed to me. When the digital deadline approached, I finally upgraded the TV and kept my advantage of free antenna viewing. 36 channels display more than what I watch, or sleep thru. Not interested in sports or movies (zzzzzzzz). Think movie rentals/returns are a boring effort. Yes, computers are a viable option to obtain viewing items, but again, not for me. Newer TV's have features to increase the options, and flat screen prices seem quite realistic now. Definately keep your money.

I'm another antenna user. Mine sits well above my house, and brings in about 17 channels--often not all at once if the weather is a factor. This includes ABC, CBS & NBC as well as Public TV, etc., and it's more than I need. I can stream movies and shows on Netflix, and I'm more than happy with this setup.

My son & DIL use an antenna, too, and they have Amazon Prime. We can't imagine having cable bills.

We can't use a really large rooftop antenna due to regulations in our development. Something the size of a satellite dish is fine. I remember growing up my parents had a gigantic antenna. I've read that you can buy much smaller ones now that will still work well.

I'm connected with ATT U Verse. Have my phone, internet, tv with them.

I would love to get something different, just to get the price down....We are bundled with Comcast, TV, phone and computer and we pay close to $200.00 a month...But, during the winter my hubby does watch a lot of TV and does enjoy have all these channels, so we just pay the bill...But, sure do wish I could get something cheaper......

We have had direct TV for years, the price kept increasing with no notice and no reason. We love watching TV it's our main entertainment besides reading basically. Some of the shows my husband loves are not on regular channels. Diy shows, home repair, history, etc so to keep those we must have a package with those channels. We are grandfathered in with a package that no longer exists but is cheaper and contains all our channels. But we had all the movies channels and I removed all of those and I eliminated one of the boxes and TV from my office. Doing that drastically reduced the amount of our bill. We are happy with it for now but if the prices start going up again for no reason I will revisit the options.

I do know that several people I know personally have asked att u verse and direct TV for assistance with their bill because they were seniors on very limited income and were no longer able to afford the rates. In each case they did get a reduction of $30 a month. I think this is apparently a set rate deal but they don't advertise it but if you ask for it and qualify they give it to you.
I told my elderly neighbor to try it and sure enough she got $30 off. So definitely worth trying.

In the RV we are currently just using the antenna on the roof and get a pretty good selection of channels. The tv is new and wifi enabled, so I can stream using my portable att wifi unit. But it uses a lot of data. I carry a small blu ray player in the RV so we can watch movies too.

I guess my antenna is pretty big. But I live in a hilly rural area, far from any broadcasting. This one, from the same manufacturer and with equally good reviews, looks quite a bit smaller.

I should have added that although I've never had cable (and for years had no TV at all), my son and daughter-in-law used to have cable but don't miss it with their present setup.

We really get goughed here! We only have a choice between DirecTV and MediaCom for internet and TV. MediaCom proved unreliable with the internet connection when I had it for a couple of years. They also don't get all the ESPN channels I watch for college sports, Therefore, I pay through the nose for DirecTV.

I do not have cable or satellite. Amber and Mike used to but dropped it and now only have had antenna on a tower by their house. My antenna is on a tripod on top of my house. I get some channels but each television can be different and only bring in certain channels and the other ones some other channels. So if you want a certain channel, you probably will have to go to a different room to watch it.

Sue

When I left my husband I also left satellite TV. Yeah, no one around anymore that left EVERY TV in the house on LOUD. :)

Eventually I bought an indoor antenna, and eventually I even got a small TV for the kitchen, also hooked to an indoor antenna. Only cost to me was the purchase of the antennas.

Get plenty of channels, but am not very selective anyway. No HGTV, on DYI no weather channel, but you know, you really can live without all them. :)

I have 15 channels to choose from.. and no, that is NOT counting the Spanish channels I blocked.

Moni

Highway robbery..that's what I sumbit to every month..lol...
Comcast...our neighborhood never converted the phone lines for high speed...so it's cable or satelite...I am not giving up "highspeed" for satelite...

So I too pay through the nose.

We currently have 12 wireless devices..oh wait 14 including phones..

We can have everything on and streaming...not sure satelite would handle that load anyway..

I have DirecTV, the least expensive tier, and this is my second year. I started with their new customer deal, plus the $10 a month off by signing in with my neighbor. Now that is gone and my cost is $61.25 monthly. I don't watch any sports, just 4-5 favorite channels. I begrudge every dollar of it when I pay the bill. This will be my last year with TV. For me, even the shows that I watch are getting more and more decadent, and I don't want to pay for that.

Over the years I have had ComCast, and Dish. I'll say this for DirecTV: it is the best reception I have ever had, and the fact that it resets itself when there is a problem with the weather, etc. is great. Customer service is very good for online questions. It is just not worth the money any more. I guess I will miss it... for a while.

Sue

So far, our Midcontinent cable has been great for me. I love Prairie Public TV and some of the other shows. Can't get Direct, because of the satellite being too low in the sky, and not much on Dish I really want.

I have cable - $78 a month. I don't like paying so much for tv but it isn't a hardship for me. One of my sons lives with me and he likes the history and discovery channels, I like hgtv. An antenna wouldn't work for us due to the geography of where my house is - down in a valley and very poor reception in this area.

I got rid of my cable over 12 years ago. Best decision I have ever made. I just use an antenna. I have to have a digital to analog converter box because my television is older but with digital tvs now you just need an antenna. I use rabbit ears and get up to 32 stations, sometimes more or less depending on the scan. If there is something on a cable station I want to see I watch it on Youtube or the tv station's website where allowed.

$70 per month cable bill over 12 years of not having cable has saved me a lot of money.

I've not ever had cable or DirectTV even when basic cable was only $20 a month. Now that the cost has ballooned to $80/month (or even more) I can't even image it. We have a rooftop antenna and since all of the local stations are nearly the same direction from my house, a smallish directional rooftop antenna works quite well.

When I last looked into it years ago, cable companies were required to provide low cost "basic cable" but the cable companies would, as a general practice, avoid telling any of their customers about that option. I think that since then the cable companies have managed to get that regulation changed to be more in their favor.

Also for kittiemom, when I lived in a development with HOA rules I also looked into the rules about rooftop antennas and found that at that time there was a federal law that overrode and rendered invalid and unenforceable all (most ? many ?) HOA regulations governing rooftop antennas.

My sister cancelled her cable and only uses Netflix and a few websites to watch tv. I've wanted to do that forever, but I do love my pvr. I have a smart tv with Netflix and the web on it so I could still use it to watch anything. My cable/internet/phone bill is crazy expensive. I've wanted to cut back on the cable by getting rid of some channels, but if I get rid of a certain block of channels, I'll lose one that we watch frequently, which is how they get you. This is what I owe for one month. I think there is one rental on there which is $5.99. But this is my average bill which rarely if ever has long distance on it. I would get rid of the landline but you get a deal when you bundle. Again, this is how they get you.

Oh my g0d, that is way high. do you realize, it is $2979.60 a year? No way in he double l would I pay that to watch one channel frequently. I would investigate another way to watch the programs, or just do without.

just my opinion

Moni

That includes my landline phone, cable and internet. Not sure what they would cost if I paid them separately. I used to get 3 bills, one for each. The only advantage to bundling these, is now I only worry about one bill. But I do need to squeeze out some channels. I just can't find the lists of packages on their website to see which ones we can weed out to lower our bill.

But, Deb, are you sure, you need a landline? After I left my ex, I started using my cell exclusively. Works great. and my internet... well, I keep changing it, when ever they raise my prices. Right now, uverse, just under 20 bucks, phone, just under 50 bucks.

Moni

I think I may get rid of the landline. We all have cell phones. I really only keep it for the bundle price and I can fax using it. But we do have a fax machine at work I can sneak onto. For the amount of times I fax anything, I really don't need the landline. I really should dig deeper into my account. I did message my sons friend on FB. He works for Shaw. I asked him to help me find the part of their website that shows all the packages so I can weed out what I don't want. I hope to cut my bill in half.

Sons friend just got back to me. Even he says I'm paying too much..... I'm off work next week, so I think we will go to the cable company to sort out our bill and get a new cheaper package, less the landland. All the calls I get on it lately are telemarketers anyways.

We have Fios Verizon's fiber optics sevice. Our bill is $160 a month but that includes fast internet service on all our devices, all phone calls within US, and hi definition TV to three sets. We get a gazillion channels which of course I don't watch, but husband NEEDS? all those sports ones and TV is my entertainment. We can afford it, so it is what it it is.

We've never paid for cable. We can't get channels with an antenna anymore, but we get all we want streaming off the internet. We use either an old laptop, my Kindle Fire, or a Roku for streaming....there are lots of options for streaming.

It's my understanding that if you call your provider and tell them you're paying way too much and are thinking of switching, they'll suddenly tell you they can lower your bill. It's certainly worth a try! I wouldn't just ask for another 'package'--be a little aggressive if you possibly can.

I want to go into the office and see their bundles and get a better understanding of the new pvr's and listings. I do want the HD channels and the time shifting. But we don't need the sports bundles. I'm pretty sure we don't get them right now anyway. I'm just afraid if I threaten to go to the competition they'll call my bluff. Shaw has free wifi all over the city, and I use it at work. The data on my phone is next to nothing now. LOL

The times I have called my provider and told them I couldn't afford their service anymore, they lower my bill by $10-30/month which really doesn't help much. I have friends who don't pay for cable or satellite and are able to get the 3 networks from Des Moines with no antenna. The land is flat between Ames and Des Moines. I am giving serious consideration to either switching companies again or canceling my cable right after March Madness and then getting it again in the fall.

We have Dish. Have had them for 14 years. We upgraded to the Hopper w/2 joey's. So satellite on 3 TV's. The bill was going to be $100 a month.

We called and said we are on a fixed income and CANNOT afford that. They lowered our bill by $30 for a year. Our bill is $66.77 a month. We have 250 channels. We can dvr any show, anytime, and watch it only any of the 3 tv's we have. I have to say, I do love having a dvr. When the year is up, I'll call them again.

Our problem is all the channels we like are on the satellite. The only show I really do not ever want to miss on regular channels is Survivor. And if push comes to shove, I can watch it online the next day.

Oh, and we dropped our landline years ago. Were very unsure about doing it, but absolutely no regrets at all. We both have a cell phone so our house phone rarely even rang.

Our DISH bill is about $240/month. That includes our satellite internet (only option) at $60/month. We do have the big packages - HBO, Cinemax, etc. Plus HD and DVR charges.

We didn't always have this much -but we do like watching TV in the winter and now that the kids are pretty much grown - there isn't a whole lot going on at night.

It is one of those things we consider as our entertainment and it's worth it. DH works long and hard outdoors - he likes to come in at night and veg. I don't watch a lot, but I do love having my "shows" on the DVR when I feel like watching something.

I got rid of cable TV except for the $13 per month to have network TV reception. Everything else I stream. A lot of things are no additional charge with Amazon Prime. Some things we pay per view. Even when we pay it's far less per month than cable was and it's a much more pleasant viewing experience. We watch what we want when we want and spend no time looking through hundreds of channels that have nothing we want to watch. I saved about $100/mo by dropping the rest of cable.

I SO want to drop cable TV, but the rest of the family isn't on the same page. I already watch much of what I want to see online or on Netflix, and I'd be happy to pay Apple or Amazon for the series I want to see, as it would be cheaper than the regular cable bill.

If I could stream any video - I would re-evaluate my satellite package, but I cannot use NetFlix, Amazon or any of those. Bummer.