I am looking to lower monthly expenses and our local cable provider has a monopoly on the market. I do not want to cancel cable and sign up with a pay satellite company. I do not want to do anything illegal either. Is anyone using a satellite dish and receiving (legal) free to air tv? I have googled it and their seems to be a lot of information out there, but I have yet to speak to someone who is actually getting broadcasts. If you are, what types of broadcasting do you receive? Thanks!
Free to air satellite TV
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The website lyngsat has the channels listed. Here is the direct link for available fta channels along with which satellite you need to be pointed at. http://www.lyngsat.com/freetv/United-States.html You need differing size dishes and LNB's based on which satellite you want to tune in. I like watching the fighting sioux sports network to catch some sioux hockey, but I had to buy a bigger dish and KU lnb which is different than say a dish or dtv setup. C band I believe is the huge dishes that people use to have in their yards that spin and you can usually pick up pretty cheap because they aren't used much anymore. Some FTA boxes will control the big dishes and spin them to the satellite you want to watch as you change the channels. The best website to get help with getting going is satellite guys http://www.satelliteguys.us/ Beware of some of the other sites which often promote illegal satellite activities. This is not aloud at sat guys. If you look there's only a few decent channels on each satellite, so you either need many switches with dishes aimed at each satellite or one that spins. There's a lot of reading and learning and you'll need tools like satellite finders to get started.
SolarAndWood
Minister of Fire
Do they have the super basic unadvertised cable in MI? We pay $8/mo for a a couple dozen channels. Would still prefer to grab the television by the cord and heave as far as possible but...
daveswoodhauler
Minister of Fire
SolarAndWood said:
Lammi66, do you have cable now or sat?
Reason I ask is that we are in the same situation...we buy the $12/month cable plan that has only 20 or so channels....more foreign ones than I care to have, but that is another rant. (Funny, they dont even advertise it....you have to ask)
Anyway, we bought a new tv for the kitchen recently as the Mrs's wanted one while the kids occupied the other one....anyway, when I set it up and ran the self test channel finder, it found all the channels that the $50/month program has, so now I get about 60 or so channels...and we have no Cable boxes on any of our tv's. (Also, we have an older filter on our line, but I think it only filters out the non digital channels, as they put it on when we downgraded from $50 cable about 3 years back)
I then checked our big tv that is in the family room, and found the same thing....additional channels.....lastly tried the one upstairs, but no bonus channels there, as I think that tv is about 10 years old, and the ones down stairs are only about 1 year and 3 years.
I think some other folks can chime in here, but I think many people don't realize that this is available in some situations, as the cable co always tried to sell you the box vs just going through the tv.
Good luck
Edit: The channels that show up do not correspond with the tv guide on the tv...but basically, if you go to channel 72 for example, and then go up, you get channel 72.1, 72.2 and so on
SolarAndWood
Minister of Fire
Cable. You definitely have to ask for it and stick to your guns that that is what you want. I imagine it is part of regulation that they do exactly what is required to remain in compliance.
Some of the posts bring up another issue. With cable you can watch a different channel on each TV hooked up. With FTA satellite, you'll need one receiver for each tv or have to watch the same channel on each tv.
Thanks for the all the info. I definitely have some more research to do!! I do have cable now and I think I will be turning in my box and seeing how many stations I receive through my TV.
You can get free stuff via internet through a gaming device like the xbox360. Lots of net works offer free shows via internet
Highbeam
Minister of Fire
Why not put up an antennae? Since the digital transition the days of fuzzy broadcasts are gone. You either get it or you don't and if you get it then it is free HD TV with great color and sound. I set one up and was amazed at the channels we got. I still use cable though since we get our internet and phone through the coax as well.
It is a very real option and you can have multiple TVs on different channels. It is especially atttractive if you live in pretty close to the broadcast towers.
It is a very real option and you can have multiple TVs on different channels. It is especially atttractive if you live in pretty close to the broadcast towers.
ilikewood said:
those are the digital channels. i dropped cable and phone from cable company. they came took boxes and i had direct tv hook up. cheaper and more channels. still use cable for internet but boy they don't even use Vaseline. i hooked up a tv to the cable to see if i could get anything, for the first 2 months got everything you could get without a box, then everything shut off except local tv channels.
flyingcow
Minister of Fire
I was impressed with the new digital channels. I'm on the edge of the reception area, have to be spot on with the direction of the antenna.
flyingcow
Minister of Fire
fbelec said:
Not too many, which suits me fine. 3 total digital( CBS,FOX,MPBN these are out of Presque Isle), plus 2 ananlog out of new brunswick canada (CTV, CBC). Canadian TV is funny stuff. Got some good shows. Also, can watch prime time shows at 7pm over here. They're 1 hour ahead of us. They pick up some of the american shows. ER, CSI, etc.
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