[intoflatlines]

My girlfriend and I are moving to a new apartment in a month or so and I am debating on whether to go with cable (Comcast) or satellite (Dish or DirecTV). I have looked at prices, and it looks like satellite costs more but also has many more HD channels. However, I have heard lots of horror stories about getting no signal during storms and such.. doesn't sound good. What is your experience with satellite? It might be helpful to include what city you live in and maybe how your dish is positioned or what type of building you live in. Thanks for any advice!

 

[MfiveM]

I have had DirecTv for 7 years and have not really had any issues with signal during storms, right now we are getting really it hard in a bad storm but the tv's are still on.

The HD selection is great and the only down side is they make you now pay to lease the equipment which makes no sense and if you want to add another room they now charge for installation, make you extend your contract and still pay an additional monthly fee, I would recommend getting all the rooms done that you want when they are there installing it at your place but besides that I have been happy with DirecTv.

 

[Redo]

1) Get DirecTV
2) Gooooo White Sox!!!!

 

[gilency]

I would not get satellite again due to their poor customer service (dish
network). I paid for hi def and did not always have it.
Can't recommend it at all.....

 

[ronnielee54]

I just went back to cable (Cox) after 5 years with Directv. Had lots of problems during storms and picture quality is better on cable (IMHO).

 

[micaela]

We've had directv since almost its beginning (15 yrs or so) & have been very happy w/them. We live in the desert where it only rains twice a year - so storms are not really a problem

However we do get some intense winds & it does occasionally go out with the strong winds. I have had very good experiences with their customer service. And when I've asked - they have often waived some the extra fees that they try to add on -- I think you just need to push the envelope a little. The hi-def selection is really good - much better than our cable offerings.

 

[Hardwired]

I've had DirecTV for about 4 years now. Our digital cable would go out every night about the same time and Time Warner couldn't figure it out, so I got NFL Sunday Ticket.

We've had the signal go out for about 10 minutes on 4 occasions and 10 minutes later we got slammed with ferocious storms so it's a great warning system.

 

[F107plus5]

We have cable, and there are lots of people who are involved. There are cables under the ground and their stuff in our house that they fix or update for us, and an office a few miles away with real people in it, and trucks in the lot and we can really see that our(too many, really)bucks are actually going to lots of local folks.

The more cable subscribers, the more effort and expense on the Cable Company and the more local folks they have to employ.

With Satellite, ya can't see a soul. And the more subscribers they get; the more profits they accumulate cuz it doesn't cost them a cent more to send out a signal to bunches more people.

Plus; we get our cable and our phone and our internet through the same happy local folks with real faces!

Is one better than the other?

I dunno.

But at least more of my money stays around here for my friends and neighbors instead of a scant few investors who are happily charting their positions on the Forbes Wealthiest Individuals rating chart.

 

[caek]

My experience with DirecTV has been fantastic. Other than the odd outage during severe summer storms, we've never had the slightest problem.

 

[tpc41]

i have had directv for 8 years and i think there have been probably less than 10 times when a storm caused a loss in signal. Its not really that big of a deal to take a night of from tv. Overall its been a positive experience

 

[Kilane]

As long as we're talking about TV and not internet it doesn't make much difference

 

[tiggers]

I've had Direct TV for a while now. In my area, it's cheaper than cable. I've rarely had problems with dropped signals. Maybe once/twice a year for a few seconds. Once for about 10 minutes.

 

[santiclaws]

I just switched from cable to DirecTV a couple of months ago and it is considerably cheaper. You can check out satelliteguys.us forum for the latest deals. I got a half a dozen discounts as a result of doing some reading over there. MANY more HD channels, and most of them look better than on cable. I'm quite happy.

 

[intoflatlines]

Anyone from Chicago that can tell me how reception is during storms and wind?

 

[jilgiljongiljing]

I am quite content with free ATSC HDTV. Don't want to waste money on cable for a 100 crappy channels and two channels I will watch.