*Snip*

[jducoeur]

As of a few minutes ago, Kate and I have joined the ranks of the cable-free. We do more TV than many of our friends, but we realized some time back that we care a lot more about the shows on streaming, and the cost of the cable was entirely idiotic. So we've switched to (mostly) Internet-only: even with adding a bunch of streaming services, it's going to cost us a lot less than we've been paying.

So far, the only shows we've identified that we care about and don't have a good streaming option for are Top Chef and The Daily Show. Still thinking about how best to deal with those -- especially The Daily Show, which has adapted better to current circumstances than most of its siblings in the Jon Stewart-i-verse. I may have to run an awkward cable to a laptop for those.

The "(mostly)" above is that we've also set up an antenna for the local broadcast networks -- all things come full-circle. I was pleasantly surprised at the high-def quality of broadcast TV these days, and we have a Tablo with a big hard drive hooked to that, so that's how we can watch PBS and, eg, World of Dance.

As part of this, we've also cut the "landline" phone (which was coming in via the same cable) -- it's been 95% spam in recent years, and just wasn't worth the money and annoyance. Those few of you who ever used it, please note that and switch to just using our cells instead.

Comments

[ckd]

Depending on what sort of box/stick/etc you're using to stream the services, it's possible that you can also locally stream from your laptop to avoid the awkward cable.

The AppleTV boxes will, unsurprisingly, stream from a Mac. Chromecast devices will, unsurprisingly, stream from a Chrome tab. I don't know what Roku supports for local streaming if anything.

[jducoeur]

Yeah, I'm pondering the Chromecast. Hadn't thought about AppleTV -- I'm a Mac user, but not a devotee of the Apple ecosystem overall. I don't think Roku has a solution, but that's an interesting point: I should check.

[sporky_rat]

My Roku 4 has a streaming option, I'm not sure how it works.

(I usually cast from Chrome and my Android.)

[jducoeur]

From what I'm finding online, it looks like recent updates from Roku (or possibly Google) broke the ability to cast from Chrome -- at least, the apps seem to be gone, and there's a lot of complaint about this over the past month.

[sporky_rat]

Well that means I'll just stick with my Chromecast and Chrome, I guess!

(The Chromecast worked well when we had MacBook machines, so as long as your streaming stick is acknowledged....)

[jducoeur]

Good to know -- I'm probably going to order a Chromecast for this sort of thing...

[cvirtue]

I believe I have observed that "last night's" Daily Show is available free at the CC website the next day, but not on Day Two.

[jducoeur]

Yeah, wouldn't surprise me. My best guess for most of these shows is to hit them relatively promptly on their websites. (But that reduces to the question of how best to watch a website via the TV, which still needs a lot of research.)