Calling on you! Need advice for alternative to Big 3

[teachermama]

I am a middle school teacher. I NEED access at home to good educational TV (NatGeo, Discovery, Science Channel, TLC, etc). I now have Dish with the $93/month plan. I CAN'T keep paying this big bill.
With a smokin fast laptop, a medium fast DSL service, and house WiFY, is there no other option to get educational TV and a local channel or two? I don't care if the programming is real time except when a tornado is barrelling down on us and we need weather radar images and local news.
I don't know where to start in kicking my Dish habit. You are my peeps! You speak the language of signals/waves/receivers/and mysterious boxes that make the TV come to life. HELP!

 

[Jhon69]

I am a middle school teacher. I NEED access at home to good educational TV (NatGeo, Discovery, Science Channel, TLC, etc). I now have Dish with the $93/month plan. I CAN'T keep paying this big bill.
With a smokin fast laptop, a medium fast DSL service, and house WiFY, is there no other option to get educational TV and a local channel or two? I don't care if the programming is real time except when a tornado is barrelling down on us and we need weather radar images and local news.
I don't know where to start in kicking my Dish habit. You are my peeps! You speak the language of signals/waves/receivers/and mysterious boxes that make the TV come to life. HELP!

3 Letters.....PBS.

You can also check out what's available at your address at AntennaWeb for information on OTA(Over The Air) High Definition Television and Over The Air antennas.Good Luck!

 

[teachermama]

Thank you Jhon. I appreciate your reply. I checked-out the AntennaWeb site and printed a profile for my area. I'm a little intimidated by the prospect of constructing a secure base tall outdoor antenna and directing the reception to specific compass readings, vhf and uhf but willing to try. I love PBS and watch it often. I have heard that it is too weak to get in our area using only an antenna. I hope this is not the case.

 

[sergei]

I am a middle school teacher. I NEED access at home to good educational TV (NatGeo, Discovery, Science Channel, TLC, etc). I now have Dish with the $93/month plan. I CAN'T keep paying this big bill.
With a smokin fast laptop, a medium fast DSL service, and house WiFY, is there no other option to get educational TV and a local channel or two? I don't care if the programming is real time except when a tornado is barrelling down on us and we need weather radar images and local news.
I don't know where to start in kicking my Dish habit. You are my peeps! You speak the language of signals/waves/receivers/and mysterious boxes that make the TV come to life. HELP!

Another possible option ( if we still have it after this month...check first here) would be going with a 6' satellite dish and picking up a Motorola 410 receiver to get the Discovery Package which has at least a couple channels you listed and it only cost $12.49 a month with no contract. Then get the right type FTA receiver if the OTA PBS stations are difficult to get.and you can get a lot of PBS on the AMC-21 satellite.I would check with other people here about which receiver would best work for you.
Then you can kick Dish to the road and in the end save yourself some money.

http://skyvision.com/programming/index.html#discovery


125.0 West AMC-21

MEGA COSMOS Greece
LPB-2 PBS Louisiana
LPB-3 PBS Louisiana
LPB-HD PBS Louisiana
LPB feeds PBS Louisiana

PBS HDTV CH 4 (FEEDS)
PBS SCHEDULE SD-05
PBS SCHEDULE SD-06
PBS SCHEDULE SD-07
PBS FEEDS

MONTANA PBS
OETA-HD Oklahoma
OKLAHOMA NETWORK
PBS HDTV CH 1 HD EAST
PBS HDTV CH 2 HD WEST

PBS HDTV CH 3 (FEEDS)
PBS SCHEDULE SD-01
PBS CREATE
PBS V-ME
PBS WORLD

 

[Mr Tony]

you could drop the Dish package down to the Welcome pack.
$14.99 with locals and includes

AMC
Bloomberg
Boomerang
CMT
Comedy Central
Food Network
Hallmark
Home & Garden Television (ADDED)
History
HSN
ICTV (ADDED) (just a shopping type channel)
MSNBC
MTV2
Oxygen
QVC
ShopNBC
TBS
TLC
The Hub (formerly Disc Kids)
WE: Women's Entertainment
The Weather Channel

and you can add the FREE Public Interest channel list. Basically the channels up in the 9400 area + a couple more like C-Span and NASA

 

[dfergie]

Download TVVersity and set it to down load video from NASA & other educational sites then access with a PS3.