Nightwchtr
join:2001-09-10
Falls Church, VA
 ·Verizon FIOS
| Not worth the money
Digital Cable is not worth the money to alot of consumers. Basic is just as good. If they came down in price I think alot of people would upgrade to it but not will its so high. To me there is no difference except you get a couple of more channels and music. |
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pnh102
Reptiles Are Cuddly And Pretty
Premium
join:2002-05-02
Mount Airy, MD
 ·Comcast
|  Maybe its because digital cable sucks?
Let's see...
•You have to pay more per month for the base cost
•The picture isn't all that much better
•You have to pay to rent special converter boxes for each TV
•You have to have a separate remote from your TV remote
•All those extra channels they keep talking about are just different feeds of the same actual channel
•You have to have someone "professionally install" it
Do the works "F**k that" come to mind?
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Pissed off at traitorous, ungrateful musicians? Don't just boycott them! Trade their MP3s and really screw them over! And don't forget, 2 out of 3 human shields agree! Saddam really is evil! |
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Karl Bode
News Guy
join:2000-03-02
Host:
Road Runner
PC gaming GAMES
PC gaming Tech
| Yeah I agree.
Here in Time Warner Country we've recently gotten the DVR's, and they make all the difference. It's Tivo, but without the phone line, and it uses the digital program guide to simply let you click on a program name, and record....or pause live TV, etc....well worth it I think.
Though there's certainly still bugs. |
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pnh102
Reptiles Are Cuddly And Pretty
Premium
join:2002-05-02
Mount Airy, MD
·Comcast
| said by Karl Bode  :
Here in Time Warner Country ...
Do you have to get digital cable if you want cable TV service at all or can you still get basic cable?
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Pissed off at traitorous, ungrateful musicians? Don't just boycott them! Trade their MP3s and really screw them over! And don't forget, 2 out of 3 human shields agree! Saddam really is evil! |
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rds24a
Teach Your Children
Premium
join:2000-12-13
Springboro, OH
clubs:
·RoadRunner Cable
| reply to pnh102
Add in:
* You can't program out the shopping channels, advertising channels, etc. from the flipper rotation on the cable box.
* I already have 75 channels....how the &^(*&^@ many channels do you think I need?
* What used to be unnoticeable static on the old analog system becomes video stalls and loud audio screeches on the less-than-perfect cable signal (which TWC classifies as "within normal operating parameters").
Perhaps if they let me pick and choose which channels I want, then it might be worth messing with the box and the price. If I could drop the 20 channels of QVC in favor of Speed and the Fox Sports Nets, I might think about it....
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»www.brittanyrescue.org |
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pnh102
Reptiles Are Cuddly And Pretty
Premium
join:2002-05-02
Mount Airy, MD
·Comcast
| said by rds24a :
* You can't program out the shopping channels, advertising channels, etc. from the flipper rotation on the cable box.
A friend of mine has DirecTV and he has a small group of "favorite channels" set up that he can jump to directly from the remote... I think its pretty cool. I stick with basic cable because for the number of watched TVs we have in the house, its actually worth the money (of course I've split the connection into oblivion, but that's a whole different story).
The major thing for me though is the necessity of a second remote. I can't explain to people how much I hate this. When I want to watch TV, I don't want to fumble through a bunch of remotes, and I don't want to use a universal remote that lacks the functionality of the original remote, I just want to sit down and watch TV. I do enough "rocket science" at work, I don't need to do it at home.
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Pissed off at traitorous, ungrateful musicians? Don't just boycott them! Trade their MP3s and really screw them over! And don't forget, 2 out of 3 human shields agree! Saddam really is evil!
[text was edited by author 2003-03-31 09:46:58] |
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Vericima
Beautiful But Deadly
Premium
join:2003-01-07
Manchester, CT
| reply to pnh102
You don't always have to have someone install it, it's just like a VCR. It isn't really worth the money though. The only reason I subscribe at the moment is because that box boosts the signal a little so my husband can capture perfect shows with his TV tuner card. Before it was a little grainy.
What Comcast does with the pay per view movies is great though, the picture goes out at least once per movie so if you were recording it, it wont be perfect. If you ask me it just ruins the movie, I'd rather rent if they're going to be like that.
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AHHH! You're wasting CPU cycles, Go crunch something! |
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Karl Bode
News Guy
join:2000-03-02
Host:
Road Runner
PC gaming GAMES
PC gaming Tech
| reply to pnh102
It's all based around that program guide, so you need to upgrade to digital....
I bundle it all, Cable, digital, DVR, for a little over $100 a month....
And amazingly, there's still not a lot on worth watching.  |
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footballdude
Premium
join:2002-08-13
Imperial, MO
| reply to rds24a
said by rds24a :
Perhaps if they let me pick and choose which channels I want, then it might be worth messing with the box and the price. If I could drop the 20 channels of QVC in favor of Speed and the Fox Sports Nets, I might think about it....
I've always wondered about that. How about creating an ala carte system where you can pay maybe fifty cents a month for whatever channels you want? For providers that force channel bundles, just offer them as a bundle. Maybe the ESPN channels could all come together for five bucks a month? Certainly the hurdle to creating that kind of TV service can't be the technology. Anyone know why there's no provider anywhere that's doing that? |
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ehow
join:2000-11-11
Palm Beach, FL
| reply to pnh102
said by pnh102 :
The picture isn't all that much better
For me this was the major turn off.
All of the lower channels, say below channel 80, were still analog with the digital cable from Adelphia. I was expecting every channel to be digital, but they weren't. Mostly just the movie and PPV channels that were digital. I canceled the cable service and kept my satellite service.
Previously I had both analog cable and satellite so I could keep some of the local programming, but now that is no longer a reason with the locals being carried by satellite. About the only local channels not available are the government access channels and a few other small networks that the cable carried.
Adelphia ran a free promotion for digital cable upgrade, so I tried it out. After a week I returned the box and at the same time canceled cable completely. Now that felt nice... since over the past 13 years, my cable bill has doubled with no notable improvement.
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BJ -- Up Fixin' Der Porsche |
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cbyrd
Where's The Any Key?
join:2001-07-11
Murfreesboro, NC
clubs:
| The Product differs too much from the Marketing
All of the cable companies market Digital Cable as having "better picture quality" than regular cable, and being equal to or better than satellite. It simply isn't true.
While the Digital tier does not have the static etc that you see with regular cable, half of the channels are still analog, meaning you only get a partial improvement...if you call artifacts due to over compression such as pixelization, gradient "banding", motion studder etc an improvement.
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Sometimes it's easier to beg for forgiveness than ask for permission |
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jonnyzor
join:2002-07-28
San Jose, CA
| That is a very good point about the analog channels. I had analog and the picture quality sucked. So I switched over to digital cable hoping that would fix my problems but I found out that those same channels were still analog. So I switched over to Direct TV. Plus they have much better programming packages than cable |
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vfpguy
Alias Dotnetguy
join:2001-07-21
Wayne, NJ
| reply to footballdude
Re: Maybe its because digital cable sucks?
Because then no one (or very few) would subscribe to channels like Oxygen, We, ABCFamily, etc. If a cable company wants to provide ESPN or Disney, they have to take the 'lesser' channels as well.
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"...a great, serene and peaceful future can slip from us quite as irrevocably by neglect, division and inaction, as by spectacular disaster." -- H. Truman, 6/21/56 |
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vfpguy
Alias Dotnetguy
join:2001-07-21
Wayne, NJ
| reply to pnh102
I switched to digital cable because Cablevision was getting ready to add the Yankees and was going to switch the New York sports channels from family to premium. I was also able to get HBO without having to use a box and CV was getting ready to change that too. After doing all the math it was a toss-up between DirecTV and digital cable and a satellite install for me would definitely have been non-standard.
After I did the install I discovered that my HT remote wouldn't talk to the cable box and the cable box's remote wouldn't talk to the HT or the TV. Spent about $80 for a Sony programmable, learning remote. Now one button turns on the TV, cable box, and receiver and tunes to the news channel. Of course, I get off on the rocket science stuff.
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"...a great, serene and peaceful future can slip from us quite as irrevocably by neglect, division and inaction, as by spectacular disaster." -- H. Truman, 6/21/56 |
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panth1
The Coyote
join:2000-12-11
Boca Raton, FL
| ZZzzz....
I don't know why people constantly think that all their channels will suddenly become digital by subscribing to digital cable. It must be bad marketing by some cable companies because I personally haven't been led to believe that they all become digital.
The main problem that I don't like with digital cable is the lack of processing power by the set top boxes. Many of the Motorola, SA, and Pioneer boxes are first/second generation and are slow at deciphering the qam signal and rendering the onscreen graphics.
Also these companies spend millions on upgrades and forget that it requires maintenance. One leak or bad component can cause ingress and kill multiple carriers.
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Total Modems On This Upstream Channel : 485 (457 active)
Avg upstream channel utilization : 98%
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stet
Volitar Prime
join:2002-03-08
Warren, MI
| reply to ehow
Re: Maybe its because digital cable sucks?
When I tried out Comcast Digital Cable a few years ago, I dropped it after a month because the digital channels actually looked worse then the analog. They just took they same low res feed they were using for the analog channels and introduced digital artifacts on top of it.
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Hey everyone! I'm a WEB HOG! |
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nasadude
join:2001-10-05
Rockville, MD
·Comcast
| dropped digital like a hot potato!
Comcast digital might be worth it if you have an HDTV, but isn't that an additional charge on top of the charge for "digital"? I don't know, since I have been enjoying satellite HDTV (including over the air HDTV) for some time now.
The other thing about digital is that the transmission is digital; if the source started out as analog, it's just converted to ones and zeros to send it over the cable. That doesn't change the fact that it started out as analog. If a program looks crappy in analog (assuming it's not an analog transmission problem) it will still look crappy when it is converted to digital. |
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juilinsandar
Texas Gooner
Premium
join:2000-07-17
San Benito, TX
 ·AT&T DSL Service
|  reply to Karl Bode
Re: Maybe its because digital cable sucks?
said by Karl Bode :
Yeah I agree.
Here in Time Warner Country we've recently gotten the DVR's, and they make all the difference. It's Tivo, but without the phone line, and it uses the digital program guide to simply let you click on a program name, and record....or pause live TV, etc....well worth it I think.
Though there's certainly still bugs.
Time Warner recently upgraded my area to digital cable, and I've currently got everything they offer except for Roadrunner. I've talked with some Time Warner reps, and they tell me that VoD and DVR services should be available by May at the latest. They already have some early adopters using a few of the new cable boxes that have come in to Time Warner for the new services. I'm looking forward to getting these services and hopefully a new upgraded cable box with a better IPG.
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Always remember you're unique...Just like everyone else. |
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trparky
Bite My Shiny Metal Ass
Premium,MVM
join:2000-05-24
Cleveland, OH
clubs:
·AT&T U-Verse
| reply to stet
Yea, I have seen the pictures that they claim is quality digital picture over a friend's house. Quality my @ss. It looks horrible.
I have Dish Network and the picture quality is far far better. Dish Network gets the highest quality feeds from the networks, cleans up the already high quality feeds, then encodes them.
I don't even notice the digital artifacts unless I go up to the TV screen and be 5 or 10 inches away from it.
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WedgeAntilles250 |
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footballdude
Premium
join:2002-08-13
Imperial, MO
| reply to vfpguy
said by vfpguy :
Because then no one (or very few) would subscribe to channels like Oxygen, We, ABCFamily, etc. If a cable company wants to provide ESPN or Disney, they have to take the 'lesser' channels as well.
Agreed, but why does the cable or satellite company care what channels I watch, as long as I'm paying them? |
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