January, 2018 KIT – Cutting the Cord (Cable / Satellite TV)

KIT Definition & Purpose – The problem we solve this month is paying too much for cable/satellite television for content that you largely didn’t want anyway.  The benefits of implementing this kit are as follows:

• You will have all local over the air / big network channels on your TV in HD quality.
• You will have your most relevant cable channels on your TV in HD quality.
• You will have device and location mobility being able to bring your cable and online derived content with you across all mobile devices.
• You will be able to watch your own content from the comfort of your home network without restriction.
• You will be able to record the usual TV shows on the big / local networks as you do today if you are a cable subscriber.
• You will save substantial amounts of cash within the first year of this KIT being implemented, with secondary years effectively being free for years 2 and 3.

 

KIT Payback / Value Prop / Kit Contents –

Time invested:

Plan on spending two days over the course of a couple weekends in total if you plan to mess around with the antenna – if you hire a handyman like I did to install things – plan on 3 days worth of shopping, configuring, and testing it out.

Cash invested:

The total amount spent to get the setup in place was ~ $1000 with approximately $40 per month recurring.  You will certainly make the money back within year if you are a DirecTV subscriber, maybe a little longer if you are a cable TV subscriber.  Here’s the detail breakdown for the costs profile, I’ve linked out to the prior articles where the details can be found:

Over The Air

• Total Cash Spent – $300
• $200 for the HD antenna
• $100 for handyman mounting and remounting

 

Over The Internet

 

KIT How To’s

The HD antenna is probably the most obtuse piece of this kit, as it will vary depending upon your own personal situation.  I wanted to have the signal distributed throughout my home via the single antenna.  This required me to find the distribution for the cable company in my attic, depending upon where you live – this will vary.  The point is if you have multiple TVs – bring the HD signal from the antenna wherever your cable provider signal is sourced, and jack it in there.  Mohu does offer signal boosters, and I did purchase one – it was totally unnecessary, so I’ve left it out of this recap.

If you have a single TV to rig up, you may just want to put the antenna in the same room by the window, and run a line of coax.

I have Apple’s iTunes software running on my home PC, and the PC is on all of the time…  I have upgraded the amount of storage available via an external USB drive that has been mounted with a fixed hard drive on my Windows 10 image, this is where the media library is held and organized by iTunes.

The Channel Master DVR+ will walk you through how to get it onto the network via a straightforward wizard, and there is a straightforward menu to get the external hard drive mounted within the DVR – this is a must do type of thing for this DVR.  Anything over 1TB will suffice your media needs, I believe.  You can get crazy with 3-5 TB if you want.  Try that with your satellite or cable TV provider supplied DVR…

Apple TV – straightforward setup once it is on your wifi network, and if you are already in possession of an Apple ID – you’ll see your prior purchases readily available as well.  A really nice side perk here is that you can sling the screen from your mobile devices onto any or all Apple TV’s held on your network.

Check out the prior articles for the details: