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2016 Cut the Cord Thread

C

cmon3

Well-known member
I know there was a thread on this awhile back but I couldn't find it, and this stuff seems to be changing pretty fast.

I live in Chapel Hill.

If I want to get rid of DirectTV and not get cable.

Do I have any options to pick up the Canes games and or other NHL Games? Amazon Fire TV or Smart TV options etc.?

What about local TV for Panthers games?
 
I saw that - didn't see anything that looked like a good option for watching the Canes games... Anybody have any good options on that?
 
you might be able to use an address that is outside the Canes area to watch via the NHL website. That would work unless they have some way to check an IP address or something else to determine where you actually live.

Other than that, your options are illegal websites run out of kids basements in places like Albania.
 
So, I've just quit TWC and replaced them with DirectTV. Just installed today and while I don't know if I've just substituted devils, but already I feel good about my decision. In scrolling through the sports package, I see I am getting all the regional sports broadcasts that I could not get with TWC-- FOX Sports South, West, Comcast Sports channels-- each of which carry NHL hockey. Sweet! I got so tired of TWC customer service and finally went elsewhere. I will say this-- picture quality on my TVs are much improved with DirectTV. Again, I may have gone from the devil I knew to the devil I'm about to meet, but so far so good...
 
SlapShots said:
So, I've just quit TWC and replaced them with DirectTV. Just installed today and while I don't know if I've just substituted devils, but already I feel good about my decision. In scrolling through the sports package, I see I am getting all the regional sports broadcasts that I could not get with TWC-- FOX Sports South, West, Comcast Sports channels-- each of which carry NHL hockey. Sweet! I got so tired of TWC customer service and finally went elsewhere. I will say this-- picture quality on my TVs are much improved with DirectTV. Again, I may have gone from the devil I knew to the devil I'm about to meet, but so far so good...
Click to expand...

You may be blacked out for all of the hockey on the Fox regionals.
 
Direct TV was 1000% better than Time Warner... picture was way better, service, reliability etc. I had no complaints about it, but we 'pretty much watch everything on NetFlix anymore so hard to justify the price tag every month for all of the stuff we don't watch. The only thing is sports and I think I can get all of it except the Canes without it.
 
andyt said:
You may be blacked out for all of the hockey on the Fox regionals.
Click to expand...

The exact reason I dumped DirecTV awhile ago. And for the record, they bait and switched me on that issue. I had access to all the regional coverage for almost a year before they noticed and pulled the plug. Their customer service is probably better than TWC, but they can be awfully random about making changes. Sometimes you get what you're supposed to, sometimes not and nobody on the phone ever seemed to know why.

I recall DirecTV REALLY ticked me off by pulling the plug on my regional Fox affiliates during the 2nd intermission of a Ducks game I was watching. In the end they were right to do so based on the rules at that time, but jeez ...
 
Well, I am paying for the sports package, so I'm hoping they don't pull the plug. I did a lot of checking around and while there were folks like you, JB, with complaints and annoyances, overall, most folks I spoke with love DirectTV. I think most folks I know hate TWC and CenturyLink (80+ percent) whereas most folks I talked to with DirectTV like their service (80+ percent). Like I said, the devil I know for the devil I don't know...
 
Direct TV is now owned by AT&T. AT&T will always be the same phone company with sucky customer service that everyone used to complain about. My neighborhood's Facebook page lights up with UVERSE TV or GigaPower internet outages and people start to complain about AT&T customer service and how long it takes to get things fixed. These AT&T services have WAY more outages than TWC. I've never been out, internet, TV or Phone, with TWC since we moved back here 4 years ago. EVER. UVERSE and The Gigabit service? Down it seems at least once a month in my neighborhood and it takes a heck of a long time to fix. Add in TWCs speed bumps for Wake County this year and I for one am very happy to not be switching my services. We must be old school because we watch a heck of a lot of channels of TV and use OnDemand all the time (we use Netflix as well for one off series that we've missed over the years). My philosophy on TV, Phone, Internet is 'if it works for you, don't change it' especially if its reliable in your area (this is a total crapshoot of course, my never down in 4 years with TWC doesn't mean its not on the fritz a lot in other parts of Wake country). If DirectTV's customer service is good hopefully that rubs off on AT&T and not the other way around.

When has a phone company EVER had good customer service? Cable companies and Phone companies are never good at customer service. Best you can hope for is that you never have to deal with a problem or call customer service. If you get to that point, don't tempt fate and be thankful for your luck.
 
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Over the Holidays, we had contractors boring fiber down our street and they took out our sewage connection at the street. When the City of Raleigh people arrived, first question they asked when they started repairs was if it was Google or AT&T contractors. Luckily for us it was Google sub contractors. The guy from the city says they have to sue AT&T to get reimbursed when their subs cause damage during fiber installs. Google was delivering lunch to the city workers that worked for about 48 hours to get everything put back together and we have had a customer service manager constantly in touch with us as we sort out all the damages. Sucked it happened, but really happy it was not AT&T that did it.
 
SlapShots said:
Well, I am paying for the sports package, so I'm hoping they don't pull the plug. I did a lot of checking around and while there were folks like you, JB, with complaints and annoyances, overall, most folks I spoke with love DirectTV. I think most folks I know hate TWC and CenturyLink (80+ percent) whereas most folks I talked to with DirectTV like their service (80+ percent). Like I said, the devil I know for the devil I don't know...
Click to expand...

In service of accuracy ... my issues with them stem from almost a decade ago and they were under different ownership. And so far as I can tell every single provider has crappy customer service in their own unique way. Like snowflakes ... snowflakes made of suck.
 
CarolinaPen said:
Over the Holidays, we had contractors boring fiber down our street and they took out our sewage connection at the street. When the City of Raleigh people arrived, first question they asked when they started repairs was if it was Google or AT&T contractors. Luckily for us it was Google sub contractors. The guy from the city says they have to sue AT&T to get reimbursed when their subs cause damage during fiber installs. Google was delivering lunch to the city workers that worked for about 48 hours to get everything put back together and we have had a customer service manager constantly in touch with us as we sort out all the damages. Sucked it happened, but really happy it was not AT&T that did it.
Click to expand...

A friend of mine who is a VERY good commercial electrical contractor, and thus who does a fair amount of trenching, had his TWC cable cut slam in two by an AT&T subcontractor on Monday. He sent me a picture ... the location service paint was VERY accurate and very much still visible, but the idiot running the trencher had completely ignored it and thus whacked his cable right in two. This is a guy who runs his business from his house and uses TWC for broadband AND phone. He has had to engage his business insurance to cover the loss of work productivity for the nearly two days it took to restore service correctly.

Trust me ... it was Erie Insurance and they WILL go after AT&T for compensation. It's all they know how to do.

This whole process couldn't have been handled more poorly by AT&T and Google. They subbed out the work to the WORST group of sorry, sloppy, just don't care subcontractors I've ever seen. And that's bloody saying something given what I've done my whole life. Most of them I've seen are cowboy contractors from outside of the region too. "Thanks" for helping the local economy, guys.
 
Well they probably hired the low bidder right?

TWC and phone companies were monopolies for many years. So they did not care about customer service. It was like the scene in Goodfellas - no matter what happens "F**k you, pay me!
 
jeffbear said:
A friend of mine who is a VERY good commercial electrical contractor, and thus who does a fair amount of trenching, had his TWC cable cut slam in two by an AT&T subcontractor on Monday. He sent me a picture ... the location service paint was VERY accurate and very much still visible, but the idiot running the trencher had completely ignored it and thus whacked his cable right in two. This is a guy who runs his business from his house and uses TWC for broadband AND phone. He has had to engage his business insurance to cover the loss of work productivity for the nearly two days it took to restore service correctly.

Trust me ... it was Erie Insurance and they WILL go after AT&T for compensation. It's all they know how to do.

This whole process couldn't have been handled more poorly by AT&T and Google. They subbed out the work to the WORST group of sorry, sloppy, just don't care subcontractors I've ever seen. And that's bloody saying something given what I've done my whole life. Most of them I've seen are cowboy contractors from outside of the region too. "Thanks" for helping the local economy, guys.
Click to expand...

Yeah, they came into our neighborhood a few months back and were going to dig the crap out of the place. Fortunately, it got nipped in the bud. We've got electrical, gas, cable, water and sewer packed in on top of each other - it's a pretty dense development.

We went to DirecTV a year ago and haven't looked back.
 
How do you stop them from digging? From what I know the area near the street is available to utility people based on city rules/laws.

Someone told me that on the power poles, the lowest wires (closest to ground) are for cable. Guess that makes sense since they were probably the last to be installed.
 
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