Time Warner vs. DirecTV?

[sp44again]

I'm not converting til all channels on TWC are digital. How long does it take? Directv has had this for years! By the time TWC has all channels digital Directv will have locals in HD. I don't know what people are smoking either when they say that TWC will not charge more for HD channels like Directv does now. Wait til they add more.

[FreQi]

I know a guy that does tech support at RR, so he gave me some dirt on the cable side of the company.  According to him, TWC intends to cut the analog cable in order to recoupe some of the bandwidth and reallocate it to digital cable.  The problem apparently is the large number of customers they have that are still strictly analog cable subscribers (those who tune with their vcr's or tv's and don't have a cable box).  He said that the idea was to give those customers a "free upgrade" to digital in order to keep them, but the process of switching them up is slow.

Keep in mind he told me this like 6 months or more ago, so what do I know.  But getting every channel in digitally would be very nice indeed.  It's one thing I do envy of sat subscribers.  Those sub-channel-100's on TWC are really crappy looking.

[borghe]

here is my dilema in switching over.. first, just in subscription fees alone I will end up paying around $9 more with TWC when not compared to the HD package, and only $2 more on DTV with the HD package, which includes a bunch of channels I can't get on TWC. then you have receiver fees.. I would effectively still need 3 receivers from TWC to mimic what I currently have (two DirecTivos and an HD box). That is $21 in box fees vs. the $10 in fees I am currently paying now. Then there is the intangible that going to two TWC DVRs will only give me a total of 70 hours of recording time whereas my two Tivos currently give me a total of 212 hours. Not to mention that the HD DirecTivos will likely cost me $800 a piece, but at the same time I will likely be able to slap an additional 250, 300, or even possibly 500GB drive in their by the time they come out in spring.. 75 hours of HD recording is much more tempting than bering limited to 25 because you can't tamper with the TWC box. Finally, with the HDTivos I will be able to ditch my directv locals once and for all and scoopan extra $2/month there.

I have thought about switching to cable many times, but in the end it always comes to that I am paying more for less in my case.. But it is something that everyone should certainly look at.. competition is great.

[sp44again]

You forgot to mention that Tivo is superior to the TWC DVR. Not just with adding recording time either. I'm talking features.

[dclutter]

Guys:  both side have good points, and i two have gone back and forth between DTV and TWC, but being a gigantic Football fan, the only way to get Sunday ticket is thru DTV at least for a couple of more years:

[borghe]

you know.. the one feature that I couldn't live without on Tivo is the suggestions... what it comes down to is that cable has VOD and Tivo has suggestions.. both are just a random sampling of programming available instantly.. the difference is that TWC is a random sampling of what they feel like providing me that week.. Tivo is a random sampling of what tivo thinks I would like based on the shows and movies I watch.

It is really invaluable, however if the cost were right, I don't think it would matter.. the bottom line is that I don't have a ton of time during the week to watch TV.. mainly just the shows I watch and a little more. As much as I would love to give some of those suggestions a viewing, I usually don;t have the time..

However the one thing Tivo has the TWC DVR doesn;t is the wishlist.. being able to autorecord based on title, actor, director, genre (or a combination of any of those with backdoors turned on) has come in handy many times.. so yeah.. that might be a little harder to give up..

[gparris]

Then point is that there is more competition now more than ever otherwise this thread would never have occurred.

Satellite has better  PQ on the some of the channels TWC has (1-99) even from its "digital" box , even with those subscribers who have 32" screens as I also have a SONY WEGA 32" screen for a guest room and the PQ is easy to distinguish that worse picture than sat on the 48" Mits  to the 32", room to room, same channel, on TWC.
When I had DTV, the PQ was noticibly better on both. Hopefully, the analog will go away sooner than later, maybe a free upgrade will entice them.
Tivo is a great product and maybe future DVRs will embrace its fine programming features like "suggestions".  TheTWC  DVR has a way of looking up genre and such, and this can get you a lot of future recordings and I DO use this feature. I never used the suggestions or favorite actor, etc., much the years I had Tivo.
 Both cable and sat are great - it is just that many of us out there cannot get both or cough up the cash for new equipment to get the latest and greatest in sat technology. Cable lets you do it  - almost for nothing-even over time with rental charges. The best example is the with free upgrades in boxes like when TWC customers went from the SA3100HD box to the 3510 Pioneer...for no extra charge or new equipment to buy.
Just to see how much fun DTV service is, I recently called DTV for my "moving charge"-- that offer they have and had a bad experience!
:bang:

I may wait on the DTV  "movers clause" and just keep my cable-only solution, especially with my location for  OTA and the TWC HD PVR coming out soon.:cool:  
I really do not need the DTV if its going to be such an expense and hassle.
My guess is that DTV has enough subscribers not to have me as a renewal!:mad:

[sp44again]

One other thing not mentioned is customer service. Hands down DTV is better. Even with this big customer service setup that TWC just opened. It's soooo much easier to get a hold of someone at DTV. The other awesome option that DTV has is changing your programming online without having to call up and go through the TWC loop. I like that very much and it's something nobody mentions.

[Matt Heebner]

I too have pondered and thought long and hard about switching from Directv to TWC. It is very tempting sometimes. But there is quite the discussion going on at AVS
 Directv New Satellites

regarding DTV's future. Next summer DTV is launching new satellites with massive bi-directional capacity. This could possibly mean local channels in HD.

According to the Boeing spec sheet, the aggregate throughput of the 3 satellites is 30GB per second (at least, I assume GB means gigabits, not gigabytes). If that's correct, with each HD channel requiring 20 megabits/second (allowing for some overhead), that's enough capacity for 1500 HD channels.

I'll hang out with DTV for a little while longer anyways. I kinda wanna wait and see if this pans out....could be a massive cable killer!

Matt

[dapinger]

I have to believe that DirecTV cannot let themselves be outdone by cable.  I suffered the arrogance of TWC for 11 years.  I don't want to go back.  I'm putting a lot of faith in the fact that DTV will be competitive with TWC.

People that I know that have both prefer to watch DTV.

[dapinger]

One other thing, I just finished replacing my Winegard GS1000 with a ChannelMaster 4228.  Use to get 4, 10, 12 & 51.  Now add to that 24, 36 & 58.  58 runs between 36 - 63% but (so far) the picture is steady.:rofl: