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Old 12-30-2016, 04:14 PM
 
2,385 posts, read 2,719,236 times
Reputation: 2771

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I'm edging ever closer to cutting the cord and giving up Cox cable. At the moment, I'm trying a screw-in antenna which gives a crystal-clear picture, but very iffy signals. That is, I can never get all the available channels (although certainly an abundance of religious and Hispanic channels). The guy at Lowe's, where I bought it, said that it's kind of the luck of the draw, dependent on the position of your television and residence.

But when I was talking to Cox - they had told me to call Retention and promised all kind of things, but in the end offered no inducements to stay - they said that they now no longer have turn-offs by the outside pedestal, but implied that it's really just a matter of plugging in things inside. Can that be true? It would seem to imply that it would be really easy to steal cable if you had the right box. Seems odd.
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Old 12-30-2016, 04:38 PM
 
Location: Rural Michigan
6,341 posts, read 14,701,768 times
Reputation: 10550
Quote:
Originally Posted by Voebe View Post
I'm edging ever closer to cutting the cord and giving up Cox cable. At the moment, I'm trying a screw-in antenna which gives a crystal-clear picture, but very iffy signals. That is, I can never get all the available channels (although certainly an abundance of religious and Hispanic channels). The guy at Lowe's, where I bought it, said that it's kind of the luck of the draw, dependent on the position of your television and residence.

But when I was talking to Cox - they had told me to call Retention and promised all kind of things, but in the end offered no inducements to stay - they said that they now no longer have turn-offs by the outside pedestal, but implied that it's really just a matter of plugging in things inside. Can that be true? It would seem to imply that it would be really easy to steal cable if you had the right box. Seems odd.
Actually the opposite is true - cox has moved nearly all of their programs to encrypted channels that require a box / decoder - while it's no doubt possible to "hack" the boxes, it's not like years ago, when you could buy a $69 pre-hacked box & get all the channels free - the level of encryption isn't something your average enthusiast/hacker is going to be able to beat by just soldering a few wires on the kitchen table.

To me, moving everything to encrypted channels (that require a "box" on every TV in the house) takes away a significant advantage that cable used to have over satellite TV - a garage/basement/kitchen/kid's room tv didn't used to require paying "box rent" with cable, unless you wanted "premium" channels on that TV, like HBO or showtime - now it does. IMHO, if I'm going to have to put a "box" on a lightly-used TV, it'll be a Roku-box that doesn't require a $5/$10/$15 monthly fee.
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Old 12-30-2016, 07:09 PM
 
1,551 posts, read 3,649,291 times
Reputation: 3131
I gave up all the pay tv stuff 6 years ago when I moved here from Oregon. I get plenty of OTA channels with just the cheap rabbit ears from Wally world. I get something like 80 channels and quite a lot of them are pretty good.
I'm fine with what I have. Too much tv means I'd spend far too much time sitting on my ass doing nothing. I'd rather be outdoors doing stuff but that's just me.....
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Old 12-31-2016, 09:58 AM
 
1,699 posts, read 2,435,845 times
Reputation: 3463
Can't rep you , so here you go...
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Old 12-31-2016, 05:29 PM
 
Location: LEAVING CD
22,974 posts, read 27,040,028 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by corydon View Post
Can't rep you , so here you go...
Did it for you, Happy New Year!
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Old 12-31-2016, 10:09 PM
 
2,449 posts, read 2,606,350 times
Reputation: 5702
I ditched cable over 4 years ago and also bought one of those "screw in" antennas. I've got a long co-ax cable running along the baseboard to the nearest window. It faces north and I still get excellent reception on all the channels and even a bunch of channels I never thought I'd get. Buzzer TV, MeTV, M Movies!, Ion, who knew?

Once you get it hooked up correctly you can go in and delete the stations that you're not interested in.

I also have a Roku with Amazon Prime, but there's plenty of free stations on the Roku as well.
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Old 12-31-2016, 11:30 PM
 
Location: Arizona
13,309 posts, read 7,353,468 times
Reputation: 10122
Cox does install filters to block basic cable they used to give you basic with higher speeds of internet no longer. Google these things Kodi/kodi addons, Sabnzbd, sonarr, and couch potato. Kodi is a media player works great on amazon firestick or fireTV box any android device. Amazon Prime I already pay for so I use their service lot of the time so much content online who has time to watch it anyway.
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Old 12-31-2016, 11:50 PM
 
Location: interior Alaska
6,895 posts, read 5,874,158 times
Reputation: 23410
Are there any TV shows that aren't available online for either free or cheaper than cable at this point?
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Old 01-01-2017, 12:21 AM
 
Location: Arizona
13,309 posts, read 7,353,468 times
Reputation: 10122
Even HBO/showtime lot cheaper to just buy their online service while your watching a series then when the season is over you just cancel I used to tell directv about that when they would call me a few times a month or approche me at sams club.
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Old 01-02-2017, 10:59 AM
 
Location: Surprise, Az
3,502 posts, read 9,611,587 times
Reputation: 1871
Cut the Cord. I did it and I won't be going back to Cable

My main TV has a Firebox, Chromecast, and OTA antenna which picks up the big 4 networks. We have Prime (already had it), Netflix, Kodi, and PlayStation Vue. If you are a football fan you might be able to pick up NFL SUNDAY TICKET U for $99 for the entire season (I had no trouble signing up for it).
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