Why does D* charge extra for HD equipment and programming?

[Tom Imp]

I switched from Cablevision and to me the answer is simple. Because DirecTV has twice as many HD channels and on top of that it's channels that people actually want.

Cablevision can tout their amount of channels all they want, but the plain and simple truth is you can toss out those crappy VOOM channels as part of the total number. They are absolute garbage with no real programming on them.

So CV claims to have 60 now when it's really only 45.
How many do we have again on D* guys?

 

[RACJ2]

Neilkn, once you get DirecTV installed, please let me know if you have any better luck with their DVR's. I have TWC and experience the same 100% full issue you mentioned on one of my DVR's, the other works fine. I have been considering switching to D* to get NHL Center ICE HD and NFL Network HD. My concern is paying $300 upfront for 2 DVR's and then only having a 90 day warranty. Then paying for service calls or $6/month for the protection plan.

I've read numerous complaints about the D* HR21 and HR20 DVR's having gray recordings or immediately saying "Do you want to delete recording?" and you never get to see that program. So I am concerned about spending the upfront money and being locked in for 24 months and having more problems then with TWC. Other issues I have read about is complaints about sound that doesn't sync up with the picture and constantly having to press the reset button because the picture freezes.

I mainly record shows off the local HD channels, Showtime HD, NHL Center Ice and MOJO HD (which I would hate to lose) and rarely watch things live anymore. For the most part my TWC DVR in the living room records those stations flawlessly. And that’s the main thing I want out of a DVR, to know that I will be able to turn on the DVR and watch the program that I had scheduled to record. The last thing I want is to have more HD channels and never get to watch the recordings I had planned to. I would appreciate it if you let me know how things work out for you.

To answer the original question in this thread. With TWC I am paying $14/mo/DVR for the TWC DVR + $5/mo for extra HD channels. Over a 24 mo period TWC totals $792. D* charges $199/HD DVR x2 - $99 = $299 and then $6/mo for DVR service, $10 for HD. So over a 24 mo period D* totals $683, which leaves you $109 (792 - 683) to pay for service calls. So they get you one way or another.

 

[Neilkn]

RAJC, you got it. I get mine this Friday. Of course, you will have to give me some time to get those recordings done. I'm on my 3rd TWC DVR though, the first two having more serious issues right off the block ... like not saving the channel guide, needing constant reboots. In fact, the first wouldn't even connect to the network when we brought it home. TWC's support left a lot to be desired. The second gave us a bad time too, but that time we got a tech who didn't give up and actually got it working. But it again had issues later that forced another exchange. #3 eventually developed the 100% problem, and when called, they had no more available, and a couple of service calls of course found nothing wrong with it, but had nothing available to swap out. For me, it will be a pleasure to say bye-bye TWC.

My wife's friend, who has the same service we are getting, has had no problems with their D* DVR. I believe they have the HR21 as it matches the picture and has the circle of blue lights. WE did not look that close at the time, but were amazed at how much better their HD picture looked than TWC on a Sony 46V3000, we have the 46W3000.

 

[RACJ2]

Thanks, hopefully you will have a good experience. My decision to change won't happen until late September, just before the hockey season starts. So you will have plenty of time to test it. TWC is adding 12 more HD channels in my area in August, but not sure it will be enough to keep my business. I just checked with a couple people I work with that have the HR21 and they said they have no issues. So I am hoping the problems I have read about aren't as wide spread as I original thought it was.

With TWC, I have the Motorola DCH6416 dual tuner HD DVR, not DCT that you mentioned. Could be a bit different? The thing I like about it, is when I do watch live sports events, I can buffer programming on both tuners. So I can have 2 hockey games on at the same time and rewind either of them to see a goal. The HR20 & HR21 with D* will only buffer on the tuner you are watching. So the workaround I have read about is to record the programs on both tuners. I would still miss the dual buffer feature, because you have to remember to start recording before you swap tuners.

I have a Panasonic 50" plasma and TWC HD. I had someone tell me that the football game we were watching in HD, made him feel like he was at the game looking through a window. So I would love to see what the HD looks like with D*. My father-in-law has the D* with an SD receiver and an older projection TV, so the quality isn't up to par. Unfortunately everyone I know that has D* HD, live out of state so I haven't been able to experience it.

Good luck and let me know how it goes.

 

[Neilkn]

Well RACJ2, keep in mind that you will mostly see complaints on line on these boards. How many of those things are out there that you don't hear about because they do work? I'm sure that number is quite a bit larger than the complaints you do see ... the squeeky wheel is the one you hear most of. Our friend about 30 miles away in Long Beach, CA has the most beautiful reception from D*, and no issues with her DVR. After seeing her picture on the similar model TV, our TWC picture just hasn't been the same ... we know there's better to be had. I mentioned the difference to TWC in a stupid sales call they made to me recently trying to sell me on their expensive cable Internet, the number of channels, and they told me how they were increasing the HD channels to 60 in August. So I called someone else there to verify, and they denied it, told me that someone was mistaken. So conflicting stories as usual from TWC. My AT&T DSL connection is fast enough to allow me to perform server and database maintenance on clients from home, and half the price of TWC ... that's good enough for me. And seeing the picture difference on a Sony V and W series, when I have the better of the two and the worser picture ... Can't wait for tomorrow afternoon to come.

 

[RACJ2]

Neilkn, I agree that most people will take the time to write and complain vs. praise. So I hope that is the case. I really want the HD sports packages D* offers really bad. I am just a bit concerned that I will be the unlucky one to end up with the bad DVR's. Although based on talking with people that have D*, its sounding less likely that it would happen.

I am in the Dallas suburbs and TWC now has 31 HD channels in our area, not counting all the "On Demand HD channels" (see TWC DFW attachment at bottom). They have a new technology that only sends the channels you typically watch, so it frees up bandwidth for more HD channels. If you select a channel you haven't watched, it will add it quickly and it’s not noticeable.

I did read that TWC in some NYC boroughs now have 50+ HD stations available and will be expanding to 100 (see article in TWC attachment below). Verizon FiOS is moving in that market, so they are beefing up the HD lineup, so they don't lose too much market share to FiOS. So if I decide to stick with cable, maybe I will get that many channels one day. The question is when?

Your local TWC rep may have stretched the truth a bit based on hearing about other markets. TWC customer support is not the greatest and they do tell you things that aren’t true. Although when I call D* support (to help out my disabled father-in-law when he has an occassional problem like picture freezing), their support associates can be just as useless. They are usually friendly, but can’t help, so you have to wait 3 days for a tech to come. Also, D* advertises that their customer support has beat cable in the ratings the last seven years, but they never give you any statistics. If 20% of people rate cable as satisfactory and 21% rate D* support as satisfactory, then they can say their customer support beats cable. It doesn’t necessarily mean that their support is good. So my decision to change won’t be based on that claim. Its all about the HD channels they currently have available.

Hope your install went well today and you are enjoying your new HD channels!

View attachment TWC.doc

 

[Neilkn]

Well, we have it. It was touch and go for a bit, the installer wasn't sure he could get a good signal as our mounting locations were a bit limited. We not only live in a condo, 4 units per side of building, 2 up and 2 down on either side of a center entryway ... but I am on the Board of Directors ... so I HAVE to behave. You mount on the roof and blow our roofing warranty, I will access you the $350 charge to have the roofing company remove your dish and patch the roof to their satisfaction to maintain our warranty. So no way I could break that rule myself The installer said that D* no longer allows mounting big dishes on the fascia, where we are allowed to mount, as they tend to pull off. We had a good spot picked out though, hard to describe the location, but it put the dish above roof level, and also above our upstairs neighbor's eye level. Of course, we then ran into tree branches in the way. I'm on the verge of giving up, about to say this was not meant to be. I've been wanting to go satellite since we bought in here some 5 years ago. The installer reached up from the roof and did a bit of tree trimming ... with my approval of course. Next week, our tree people will be there trimming some more to make sure the damn trees stay outta my way.

So, we have the HR-21 in the living room, and two D-12's in the bedrooms. They all came in brown boxes, the "professional installer" will have the cables you require in his truck to supply you with ... according to what I read. He gave us an S-Video cable for one small digital, non-HD set, an HDMI cable so we'd have one to return with the cable box as he used theirs, and a coax for our old tv that only has coax in the bedroom, along with the necessary stereo RCA's. So far it looks great. And my wife just called me in while I was typing this and said the TV went black when she was playing with changing channels. Not a good sign. I hit the reset button, waiting to see what is what. She's not sure what she did. This could be trouble as we've only had it about 4 hours now. I've recorded 3 programs with no issues, watched and deleted one, just deleted another. Was going to say everything is great so far ... then the wife called me in. Will keep you informed.

 

[RACJ2]

Hopefully just a minor glitch and your already back up. I'll be interested to hear if things go well over the next couple months. Really want to switch and be able to watch more hockey games in HD this fall.

 

[zimm7778]

I would agree with this, for example our local comcast office will charge you I think 9.95 for each DVR that you would like, that can add up...and not to bring up and old bit but in our area comcast is lacking in HD channels!!

Wow. You are getting a deal. Here it is $13.95 for the DVR and if you have a second one it's the $13.95 DVR fee PLUS the $6.99 or whatever it is "digital box" rental fee.

 

[RACJ2]

My DVR's with time warner are 13.95 a piece as well.

 

[RACJ2]

Forgot to mention, I don't pay for any other charge like the 6.99 you mention.

 

[Neilkn]

My wife returned our Time Warner DVR today. In the TWC store, they had ads about getting two more channels in HD very soon ... let's see, that will bring them here to 15 channels instead of 13 ... as compared to D*'s 45 ... hey!!! That brings D* down to only 3 times as many

 

[Jimbo]

My DVR's with time warner are 13.95 a piece as well.

Forgot to mention, I don't pay for any other charge like the 6.99 you mention.

You don't suppose that the $ 6.99 quoted would be part of that $ 13.95 you mentioned , do you ?

 

[RACJ2]

To answer the original question in this thread. With TWC I am paying $14/mo/DVR for the TWC DVR + $5/mo for extra HD channels. Over a 24 mo period TWC totals $792. D* charges $199/HD DVR x2 - $99 = $299 and then $6/mo for DVR service, $10 for HD. So over a 24 mo period D* totals $683, which leaves you $109 (792 - 683) to pay for service calls. So they get you one way or another.

The 6.99 might already be in the 13.95, but as I mentioned above, whether its D* or TWC they get you one way or another for HD programming and DVR's. Actually, I beleive I should have added $5 x 24mo = $120 for the lease fee that D* charges for a second receiver. So TWC = $792 and D* would be $803 over a a 24 month term, so its about equal.

 

[Neilkn]

The 6.99 might already be in the 13.95, but as I mentioned above, whether its D* or TWC they get you one way or another for HD programming and DVR's. Actually, I beleive I should have added $5 x 24mo = $120 for the lease fee that D* charges for a second receiver. So TWC = $792 and D* would be $803 over a a 24 month term, so its about equal.

Fair enough, except, TWC also charged us $5 extra for the two extra TV's. So that extra $5/month is across the board.

 

[RACJ2]

Fair enough, except, TWC also charged us $5 extra for the two extra TV's. So that extra $5/month is across the board.

Well if you paid an extra $10 per month for the 2 TV's, now you have enough left over to cover the cost of the service contract at $7 per month! That way you won't have to pay for service calls.

Based on the feedback from another thread I started, I feel better about D* DVR's now. So I plan to change to D* in early October, just prior to hockey season. Maybe the HR23 will be out by then. I waited forever to finally get 31 national and local HD channels with TWC and will at least enjoy them for a few months.

 

[randyk47]

I couldn't even get TWC out to my house for an estimate of what needed to be done to hook me up. The first/previous owner of my house was an SBC/AT&T manager and never had the cable run through the yard to the house so I knew at least that would have to be done. There's a cable box in the corner of my front yard, clearly labeled as TWC, and the community is 7 years old. Neighbor has TWC off the same box. TWC's assessment over the phone, and this was like after 5 plus phone conversations, was that they don't and couldn't service my neighborhood/house. Supposedly they were going to send a tech out to report on the situation. Never heard from them again. Right, whatever and I'm sticking with DirecTV. Other than I'd prefer to have RoadRunner over DSL I'm in no hurry or mood to deal with TWC.

 

[Jimbo]

Well if you paid an extra $10 per month for the 2 TV's, now you have enough left over to cover the cost of the service contract at $7 per month! That way you won't have to pay for service calls.

Based on the feedback from another thread I started, I feel better about D* DVR's now. So I plan to change to D* in early October, just prior to hockey season. Maybe the HR23 will be out by then. I waited forever to finally get 31 national and local HD channels with TWC and will at least enjoy them for a few months.

Oh Cool, We have another Hockey fan on board !!!!

Jimbo

 

[Jimbo]

I couldn't even get TWC out to my house for an estimate of what needed to be done to hook me up. The first/previous owner of my house was an SBC/AT&T manager and never had the cable run through the yard to the house so I knew at least that would have to be done. There's a cable box in the corner of my front yard, clearly labeled as TWC, and the community is 7 years old. Neighbor has TWC off the same box. TWC's assessment over the phone, and this was like after 5 plus phone conversations, was that they don't and couldn't service my neighborhood/house. Supposedly they were going to send a tech out to report on the situation. Never heard from them again. Right, whatever and I'm sticking with DirecTV. Other than I'd prefer to have RoadRunner over DSL I'm in no hurry or mood to deal with TWC.

I understand your design to stick with D*, but as far as your situation with running a drop to your house,it sounds like your in a buried plant... No one charges for that, so the drop would be free of charge to you, the company would have to fill out a report and the buried sub contractor would come out and run a line for you, in some cases they will run a line ahead of time , so you have service and bury it when the crew gets there.

Jimbo

 

[RACJ2]

Oh Cool, We have another Hockey fan on board !!!!

Jimbo

Yes, hockey is one of my favorite sports. Did you have the NHL Center Ice package and watch the games in HD? Or do you live in your teams home market and watch it on a sports channel?