Direct TV?

[KillBill]

Who has it? Who likes it? Who hates it?
How is the reliability?

Verizon FIOS is what I'd like but it's not offered in the Holden, MA area.

Currently I have Charter for Cable, Phone and Internet.
The HD selection sucks. I get about 10 channels....that's it.

The internet is average - gets the job done.

It seems like you get a lot more for your money with Direct TV.

[KillBill]

Wow, no one has Direct TV??

Maybe that's why they advertise like crazy

[Speed Demon 828]

I have it. Love it! Speed in High def. it rocks! only problem is when it rains really, really heavy or it's windy we lose the high def channels. Otherwise it's good. I recommend it!

[typeone]

we have it up in Princeton, no choice here, and hate it. its expensive and sucks. signal can bug out for no reason, snow cover can interrupt signal or knock it out completely until you climb up to get snow off (yeah, i feel like doing that in Feb), no on-demand, DVR fucks up A LOT, PPV options are lame.

for reference, our last service in Worcester was Charter. we're not sports watchers except for bike stuff and we're not into HD stuff. movies we dig but go through NetFlix (love that shit)

any other questions, post up. we have WiFi through the town for internet so I cant compare that portion of DirecTV services.

[DuncanMoto]

Did you expect a huge response in just 3 hours?

I have Dish and I love it, except...... I went to a friend's house the other day and they have Direct TV. He had Dish before and likes direct tv better.

I am now considering changing to Direct tv because Costco is offering a $50 gift card, about $20 off per month for the 1st year and new equipement.

[snowborder]

Have Dish Network and every year we look to see about the comparison vs. cable and every year we stay with dish because it is about $40 to $60 a month less!...
Quality is excellent, especially the HD versions. They now have a dual tuner dvr which we have which is awesome. Best part is now you can back up your recorded shows on a USB hard drive. Dish now has 1080p Blue Ray quality On Demand Movies PPV (just a few a month)

Directv and Dish are very similar... only Directv seems just a bit marginally more expensive. Dish network has better receiver options.

Added note, I live in NH and hardly ever have problems with snow / signal (once in 3 years) Just have your installer put the dish someplace reachable with good signal. The better the install the better the signal quality and lessens chance of losing signal.

[BigShel]

DTV was kickass until they did away with the magic cards.LOL, other than that its good when the weather is clear. Always have a back up when the heavy clouds roll in.

[DuncanMoto]

Have Dish Network and every year we look to see about the comparison vs. cable and every year we stay with dish because it is about $40 to $60 a month less!...
Quality is excellent, especially the HD versions. They now have a dual tuner dvr which we have which is awesome. Best part is now you can back up your recorded shows on a USB hard drive. Dish now has 1080p Blue Ray quality On Demand Movies PPV (just a few a month)

Directv and Dish are very similar... only Directv seems just a bit marginally more expensive. Dish network has better receiver options.

Added note, I live in NH and hardly ever have problems with snow / signal (once in 3 years) Just have your installer put the dish someplace reachable with good signal. The better the install the better the signal quality and lessens chance of losing signal.

Actually from what I saw yesterday at Costco, the Direct tv is now cheaper than dish and has better equipment. Tape 2 watch any 3rd channel and 100 hours HD-DVR.

[bfriend]

I have it. The service is pretty good, but the HD DVR sucks ass. I'm hoping they bring back TiVo...

[DuncanMoto]

I have it. The service is pretty good, but the HD DVR sucks ass. I'm hoping they bring back TiVo...

Oh Crap!!! That changes everything. My friend's system has TIVO and I thought that was just the standard for Direct tv. I will have to look into that before I tell dish to f off.

[VinceF2]

We had DirecTV when we first moved in... never any real complaints about it other then price and being unable to easily and cheaply expand past two rooms... although sat. TV in general isn't great in that respect... I never used their HD or DVR so I have no experience there...

I switched to Dish Network a few years ago and love it... I have the top of the line HD DVR receiver ViP722

Dish Network Vip722 PDF

The main reason I switched was because I can run two TV's independently from one receiver giving me four rooms for the same I was paying for two on DTV... I ask DTV every time they call if they can do that yet and they have yet to say they can...

DNW picture quality on my Samsung LCD is awesome... the DVR works great and the interface works well... the only DVR I have compared it to is my folks who have Charter... no comparision IMO...

We have briefly lost signal here and there over the last few years but it has to be a killer storm... I figure it's the cost of having Sat TV and will be had with either since we lost it occasionally with DTV as well...

We just got a bunch of new HD channels added as part of their new "Turbo HD" some are cool some not so much... Overall I love it... and have no plans on switching back...

Enjoy!

[snowborder]

Vince, you and I have the same thoughts and commments exactly...

Compare the price of Directv and Dish and your local cable.. Directv and Dish are very competitive.

Oh yeah and Dish is now mpeg4 if you have 622 and 722 receivers.

We had DirecTV when we first moved in... never any real complaints about it other then price and being unable to easily and cheaply expand past two rooms... although sat. TV in general isn't great in that respect... I never used their HD or DVR so I have no experience there...

I switched to Dish Network a few years ago and love it... I have the top of the line HD DVR receiver ViP722

Dish Network Vip722 PDF

The main reason I switched was because I can run two TV's independently from one receiver giving me four rooms for the same I was paying for two on DTV... I ask DTV every time they call if they can do that yet and they have yet to say they can...

DNW picture quality on my Samsung LCD is awesome... the DVR works great and the interface works well... the only DVR I have compared it to is my folks who have Charter... no comparision IMO...

We have briefly lost signal here and there over the last few years but it has to be a killer storm... I figure it's the cost of having Sat TV and will be had with either since we lost it occasionally with DTV as well...

We just got a bunch of new HD channels added as part of their new "Turbo HD" some are cool some not so much... Overall I love it... and have no plans on switching back...

Enjoy!

[KillBill]

Thank you for all of the feedback.

I think i will look into Dish network a little more since it seems
like most people like it more than DirectTV.

[DucDave]

Interesting thread....

...but no one addressed the question of Internet Access...cost, performance.

If I'm going to dump Comcast I need both...

...and phone would be nice too.

If it's not hijacking this thread does any one have Fios?

[KillBill]

Interesting thread....

...but no one addressed the question of Internet Access...cost, performance.

If I'm going to dump Comcast I need both...

...and phone would be nice too.

If it's not hijacking this thread does any one have Fios?

That's the thing -
It seems like Dish and D.TV outsource their internet services.

A land line we can do without......

[snowborder]

we have Cable modem services separately and it is stilll cheaper to get Dish TV separately. We cant get DSL, if we could I would go with that option.

Comcast triple play seems attractive, but read what you get and all the fine print.

[VinceF2]

Verizon DSL here and still cheaper then cable options...

[bfriend]

Oh Crap!!! That changes everything. My friend's system has TIVO and I thought that was just the standard for Direct tv. I will have to look into that before I tell dish to f off.

They used to offer TiVo, but dropped it when they made the swtich to MPEG4. They did announce that they made a deal with TiVo to offer it again later this year, but they have a history of announcing things and delivering way late or not delivering at all.