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CES 2015 - Sling TV

3GenClone said:
I love the a la carte theory, but when you break it down:

Netflix - $10

Hulu - $8 (probably will go up)

HBO Go - $20 (just a guess, but probably between $10-$20. If it's less than $10 I would be shocked.)

Sling TV - $20

That's almost $60 a month for less channels than what I can get for a basic (or maybe even a step above basic) package from a Satellite or Cable provider. Not to mention my internet usage goes up, so I will probably have to upgrade my data plan as well.

From a convenience stand-point I love it - cuts out all the channels I will never watch and I am rewarded for cutting the cord years ago and get access to Monday Night Football and Game of Thrones. From a pricing standpoint I don't know if I can justify it quite yet.
Click to expand...
Less channels, yes, but WAY more content overall if you have Netflix & Hulu. Most people have a subscription service like Netflix/Hulu/Amazon in addition to their cable anyway, so I wouldn't factor the cost of those in when comparing this Sling TV to a normal cable subscription.
 
So how are people going to watch FS1 and CBS sports for ISU games?
 
I guess I am a little unclear about this, is this just a box that you connect to your internet to get these channels?
 
SCNCY said:
I guess I am a little unclear about this, is this just a box that you connect to your internet to get these channels?
Click to expand...
It appears you have to use a streaming device, such as Roku or Amazon Fire TV/Stick.
 
dmclone said:
My personal opinion on cord cutting is that it has a long ways to go before I'd be willing to make the move and when it's finally good enough.

I'm well aware of the options out there but right now there are just too many issues for my set-up.

#1 I need HD content sent to at least 3 TV's. It has to be HD quality when you have a 120" screen.
#2 Do I have enough bandwidth to stream to at least 2 of these TV's at once? With Directv I have a perfect picture 99.9% of the time. Am I going to have to pay $50/extra month for the bandwidth?
#3 Right now my audio runs through A/V receiver on two of those TV's. Am I going to get the same quality audio? What's the set-up going to look like?
#4 My one remote runs everything including the lights. How easy will this be.
#5 I only have one service (DTV). Am I going to need multiple services to get all the channels I want? How well with this work. When I change channels am I going to need to launch another app. I already get annoyed having to launch Netflix, Amazon Prime, etc.
#6 My wife needs to be able to run this thing.
#7 What will be the cost for the equipment? How often will I need to upgrade this equipment?
Click to expand...

Lots of great points here, but I'm still stuck getting beyond number 1. ESPN3 is great for the stuff you can't get in your regular programming package, but the picture quality is nowhere near what I get from my HD cable ESPN channels. I could borrow a friend's login for the ESPN app and drop cable tomorrow, but the quality just isn't there. Will this Sling service deliver true HD quality for their ESPN streams? If they win that quality battle, that would go a long way to making cord cutting a reality for me.
 
ianoconnor said:
Less channels, yes, but WAY more content overall if you have Netflix & Hulu. Most people have a subscription service like Netflix/Hulu/Amazon in addition to their cable anyway, so I wouldn't factor the cost of those in when comparing this Sling TV to a normal cable subscription.
Click to expand...

Yep. I currently have Netflix and Amazon Prime in addition to my cable package, so this would not be an added cost when cutting the cord.
 
dmclone said:
My personal opinion on cord cutting is that it has a long ways to go before I'd be willing to make the move and when it's finally good enough.

I'm well aware of the options out there but right now there are just too many issues for my set-up.

#1 I need HD content sent to at least 3 TV's. It has to be HD quality when you have a 120" screen.
#2 Do I have enough bandwidth to stream to at least 2 of these TV's at once? With Directv I have a perfect picture 99.9% of the time. Am I going to have to pay $50/extra month for the bandwidth?
#3 Right now my audio runs through A/V receiver on two of those TV's. Am I going to get the same quality audio? What's the set-up going to look like?
#4 My one remote runs everything including the lights. How easy will this be.
#5 I only have one service (DTV). Am I going to need multiple services to get all the channels I want? How well with this work. When I change channels am I going to need to launch another app. I already get annoyed having to launch Netflix, Amazon Prime, etc.
#6 My wife needs to be able to run this thing.
#7 What will be the cost for the equipment? How often will I need to upgrade this equipment?
Click to expand...

I'm a cord cutter for 3 years now, I'll try to answer some of these.
My current setup is 2 TVs, one 47" and one 60"
7.1 surround sound - sounds great with streaming
i have mediacom 50 meg circuit
antenna hooked up to both TVs to pick up all local channels in he (fox, NBC, cbs, abc, iptv, etc)
ipad and Apple TV or Xbox one to watch any app on TV (watch ESPN, fox sports 1, nbc sports network, big ten network, twitch, etc). It's in hd quality 99% of the time. If you have a good connection, it will work just as well as cable/satellite.

#1 and 2 I think you can only stream Sling to one TV at a time. That's NOT how watchESPN, Netflix, fox sports go works, but in the q and a for sling, they said one TV at a time. I stream to 2 TVs at the same time and have no loss of quality, but I'm not a sling user at this time. I have a 50 mb connection, which runs me $59 a month
#3 no audio trouble
#4 if your remote can control a roku, fire stick or Xbox, those are all ways to use sling
#5 some app switching is necessary unles you only want to use sling app to watch ESPN, hgtv, etc
#6 shouldn't be an issue if she can use a smart phone or dvr (similar interfaces)
#7 depends on what type of device you want to use to utilize sling. Fire stick and roku are cheap, Xbox isn't, but you can do a lot with it. Might need a more powerful dual band router depending on what you have currently
 
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aeroclone said:
Lots of great points here, but I'm still stuck getting beyond number 1. ESPN3 is great for the stuff you can't get in your regular programming package, but the picture quality is nowhere near what I get from my HD cable ESPN channels. I could borrow a friend's login for the ESPN app and drop cable tomorrow, but the quality just isn't there. Will this Sling service deliver true HD quality for their ESPN streams? If they win that quality battle, that would go a long way to making cord cutting a reality for me.
Click to expand...

What is your connection speed? Also what device do you use for watchespn? Interestingly, watch ESPN looks like trash if I watch it on Xbox or on my phone using wifi. However, if I use my iPad and AirPlay it to and Apple TV, or just use an Apple TV or chrome cast, it is fantastic quality. Try a couple devices if you can, and plug in with a wire to the network if you can as well, it might make a difference. If not, I tried :)
 
One thing to keep in mind - will sling truly be a month to month thing or do you have to sign up for a year? Because if you just want sports, you could sign up just from September to April and get college football, basketball (including march madness on TBS and TNT!) and then dump it during the summer. That sounds nice!
 
3GenClone said:
I love the a la carte theory, but when you break it down:

Netflix - $10

Hulu - $8 (probably will go up)

HBO Go - $20 (just a guess, but probably between $10-$20. If it's less than $10 I would be shocked.)

Sling TV - $20

That's almost $60 a month for less channels than what I can get for a basic (or maybe even a step above basic) package from a Satellite or Cable provider. Not to mention my internet usage goes up, so I will probably have to upgrade my data plan as well.

From a convenience stand-point I love it - cuts out all the channels I will never watch and I am rewarded for cutting the cord years ago and get access to Monday Night Football and Game of Thrones. From a pricing standpoint I don't know if I can justify it quite yet.
Click to expand...

HBO is, $19 right now so I don't see it less than $25 standalone. But that's still $60 for essentially the same channels I watch that I would pay $120 right now.

To me, the lack of DVR is the deal breaker. Hopefully they wouldn't lock it down to the point that you couldn't setup a computer to run as a DVR.
 
Clonehomer said:
HBO is, $19 right now so I don't see it less than $25 standalone. But that's still $60 for essentially the same channels I watch that I would pay $120 right now.

To me, the lack of DVR is the deal breaker. Hopefully they wouldn't lock it down to the point that you couldn't setup a computer to run as a DVR.
Click to expand...

Do your figures include the internet access?
 
Clonehomer said:
I already have sufficient bandwidth with no data caps. No reason to change for me.
Click to expand...

We know the content providers won't go down without a fight. Are we going to see the price of internet access jump to make up for lost earnings on the content side?

I hope this over-the-top type of model works, but I'm sure big media will get their cut
 
Read an article last night that says if you get Sling, you can use the Dish Network user name and password for the WatchESPN app as well. That opens up the opportunity to share the login with your friends, charge them a couple bucks and then you call get ESPN and ESPN2 for a few dollars a month. WatchESPN lets more than one user stream at a time on the same login (at least at the moment it does)
 
We have another year and a half left on our directv contract but if the offerings on these get better (I want EPSNU and possibly ESPNNews as well), there is a way to record, easy channel changing and it beats DTV I would probably switch.
 
huntt26 said:
What is your connection speed? Also what device do you use for watchespn? Interestingly, watch ESPN looks like trash if I watch it on Xbox or on my phone using wifi. However, if I use my iPad and AirPlay it to and Apple TV, or just use an Apple TV or chrome cast, it is fantastic quality. Try a couple devices if you can, and plug in with a wire to the network if you can as well, it might make a difference. If not, I tried :)
Click to expand...

I have a 20MB connection, and I have viewed games via my 360, XBox One, Roku, and laptop. They are all very watchable, but certainly not at the level of picture quality I get via cable. I'm not sure if that is due to a limitation of the live stream, or if it is limited by the connection on my end. Sure, I could pay to buy up a couple tiers on my internet plan, but when you factor that in along with the additional charges for not doing the tv/internet bundle, I really wouldn't be saving much money and I might as well just keep the cable.
 
aeroclone said:
I have a 20MB connection, and I have viewed games via my 360, XBox One, Roku, and laptop. They are all very watchable, but certainly not at the level of picture quality I get via cable. I'm not sure if that is due to a limitation of the live stream, or if it is limited by the connection on my end. Sure, I could pay to buy up a couple tiers on my internet plan, but when you factor that in along with the additional charges for not doing the tv/internet bundle, I really wouldn't be saving much money and I might as well just keep the cable.
Click to expand...

Okay, appreciate the response! 20 MB should be more than enough, unless another device is taking up bandwidth. I do think on the xboxes and laptops they are pulling other things (friends lists, software updates, etc) so that can impact it too. Like I said, for some reason my xbox one doesn't stream espn very well - but the other apps stream great. 360 does a solid job streaming for me, but not as good quality as the Apple TV. One thing that's nice about the 360 is you can split screen and watch 2 games at once. Or on a laptop you can do up to 4 at a time. Crazy.
 
huntt26 said:
Read an article last night that says if you get Sling, you can use the Dish Network user name and password for the WatchESPN app as well. That opens up the opportunity to share the login with your friends, charge them a couple bucks and then you call get ESPN and ESPN2 for a few dollars a month. WatchESPN lets more than one user stream at a time on the same login (at least at the moment it does)
Click to expand...

Could you think of anything more illegal to suggest?

Maybe full-on Breaking Bad meth-making? :twitcy:
 
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