2013-04-28, 01:08
Hello All -
Despite my low post count I have been an avid XBMC user for many years since modding my original Xbox years ago. I have always simply used it as a front end for my multimedia collections but since the introduction of Live TV/PVR support has been added I am becoming increasingly interested in cutting the cord and saving myself from my $120/mo cable bill. I have been browsing the forums for a few hours reading lots of threads and even looking for other forums that discuss these sorts of things but I have found myself quite overwhelmed still.
I know all the usual stuff, cut the cord and turn to downloads, netflix, hulu, amazon, etc. but my questions are more specific to the live TV side of things. Cutting the cord and turning to the standard streaming services wont work for me as myself and my family are avid channel surfers so getting Live TV for "free" is really what I'm asking about. When it comes to Live TV though I am getting really confused and overwhelmed by the extremely large amount of information related to this stuff and I need someone to kind of break it down for me.
Figuring out all of the pros and cons to over the air (antennas), satellite, IPTV, using what comes in free over the existing cable line without a subscription, and all of the associated hardware needed is a swamp of information I am having a lot of trouble wading through.
I am not sure about the forum rules, despite looking around so I am going to try to be extremely careful about my wording with respect to legality issues. If I am way out of bounds here please let me know and if someone could point me in the direction of a forum a bit more geared toward this sort of discussion (via PM) I would really appreciate that.
Some years ago I used to receive DirecTV through clever use of a smart card programmer, when that got increasing inconvenient to do I turned back to cable TV. It appears as though this sort of thing is still possible. I have seen some talk around the forums of software like oscam and others that lead me to believe there are still ways to receive premium satellite TV broadcasts if you have the right tools. The reason I stopped doing that to begin with was due to the inconvenience of having to obtain new cards and having my cards get fried every 2-3 days toward the end, so ideally if this sort of thing is still possible I would only really be interested in it if it were somewhat reliable.
So far I understand that it is possible to use a cable card equipped tuner to integrate my existing cable plan into XBMC's Live TV support but that doesn't allow me to cancel my subscription so my first question, I suppose, is with respect to what ways are people integrating live TV into their home theaters without paying a cable or satellite provider? I am willing to make whatever investment I need to make into hardware so long as it guarantees I will get the live TV I want without ever having to pay monthly bill again (excluding nominal monthly bills for things like netflix).
Can someone try to break down for me the best or most commonly used ways that people are integrating actual live TV into their media center setups? I only really require a few channels so even something as simple as HDTV OTA Antenna might work but my wife would probably argue otherwise. I am getting confused about a lot of things with respect to OTA broadcasts, IPTV, Satellite DVB and the various subsets of DVB and all of the various hardware and software needed to get it going.
I am extremely computer savvy so I am not intimidated by the setup of a solution but the end result should ideally be very user friendly and reliable so that my wife and family can use it without any desires to go back to paying Comcast for our television.
For what its worth my wife gave me a list of channels she can't live without if this helps anyone with recommending what sort of solution would work for me: Discovery, Discovery Health, Lifetime, Speed, Local Professional Sports, Animal Planet, A&E, Food Network
Thanks in advance!
Despite my low post count I have been an avid XBMC user for many years since modding my original Xbox years ago. I have always simply used it as a front end for my multimedia collections but since the introduction of Live TV/PVR support has been added I am becoming increasingly interested in cutting the cord and saving myself from my $120/mo cable bill. I have been browsing the forums for a few hours reading lots of threads and even looking for other forums that discuss these sorts of things but I have found myself quite overwhelmed still.
I know all the usual stuff, cut the cord and turn to downloads, netflix, hulu, amazon, etc. but my questions are more specific to the live TV side of things. Cutting the cord and turning to the standard streaming services wont work for me as myself and my family are avid channel surfers so getting Live TV for "free" is really what I'm asking about. When it comes to Live TV though I am getting really confused and overwhelmed by the extremely large amount of information related to this stuff and I need someone to kind of break it down for me.
Figuring out all of the pros and cons to over the air (antennas), satellite, IPTV, using what comes in free over the existing cable line without a subscription, and all of the associated hardware needed is a swamp of information I am having a lot of trouble wading through.
I am not sure about the forum rules, despite looking around so I am going to try to be extremely careful about my wording with respect to legality issues. If I am way out of bounds here please let me know and if someone could point me in the direction of a forum a bit more geared toward this sort of discussion (via PM) I would really appreciate that.
Some years ago I used to receive DirecTV through clever use of a smart card programmer, when that got increasing inconvenient to do I turned back to cable TV. It appears as though this sort of thing is still possible. I have seen some talk around the forums of software like oscam and others that lead me to believe there are still ways to receive premium satellite TV broadcasts if you have the right tools. The reason I stopped doing that to begin with was due to the inconvenience of having to obtain new cards and having my cards get fried every 2-3 days toward the end, so ideally if this sort of thing is still possible I would only really be interested in it if it were somewhat reliable.
So far I understand that it is possible to use a cable card equipped tuner to integrate my existing cable plan into XBMC's Live TV support but that doesn't allow me to cancel my subscription so my first question, I suppose, is with respect to what ways are people integrating live TV into their home theaters without paying a cable or satellite provider? I am willing to make whatever investment I need to make into hardware so long as it guarantees I will get the live TV I want without ever having to pay monthly bill again (excluding nominal monthly bills for things like netflix).
Can someone try to break down for me the best or most commonly used ways that people are integrating actual live TV into their media center setups? I only really require a few channels so even something as simple as HDTV OTA Antenna might work but my wife would probably argue otherwise. I am getting confused about a lot of things with respect to OTA broadcasts, IPTV, Satellite DVB and the various subsets of DVB and all of the various hardware and software needed to get it going.
I am extremely computer savvy so I am not intimidated by the setup of a solution but the end result should ideally be very user friendly and reliable so that my wife and family can use it without any desires to go back to paying Comcast for our television.
For what its worth my wife gave me a list of channels she can't live without if this helps anyone with recommending what sort of solution would work for me: Discovery, Discovery Health, Lifetime, Speed, Local Professional Sports, Animal Planet, A&E, Food Network
Thanks in advance!
