turtle Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 I am getting Direct tv installed on tuesday. I have until tommorow to cancel. I am getting the Standard and HD recievers and 3 movie channels for free for 3 months. My bill should be around $65-70 a month. Is the HD quality good? Is it a good service overall? Thanks for any input. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kosher Ham Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 Make sure you watch your installer when he is doing the signal check and question anything you think is wrong, or does not make sense. With a strong signal DirecTv is vastly superior to cable. More HD channels, and the HD quality is equal. Enjoy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ingtar Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 I agree with Kosher. Just keep an eye on the signal strength meters as the installer sets things up. My HD quality is excellent and I have a lot more HD channels than my friends who have cable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sarge Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 Don't. I have it and ****ing HATE it. Ordered a DVR box that I've had nothing but trouble with and have had replaced 6 times. Six times of having to be at home and six times of losing all my recorded ****, including Skins games Customer service BLOWS. I had to find the number of the VP in order to get **** done If you are out of the area and getting it for the Ticket, then I guess it's trade off. Otherwise, I liked Dish far better Direct, although I've heard their service sucks as well Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chascougs Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 Don't. I have it and ****ing HATE it. Ordered a DVR box that I've had nothing but trouble with and have had replaced 6 times. Six times of having to be at home and six times of losing all my recorded ****, including Skins gamesCustomer service BLOWS. I had to find the number of the VP in order to get **** done If you are out of the area and getting it for the Ticket, then I guess it's trade off. Otherwise, I liked Dish far better Direct, although I've heard their service sucks as well I'm with you on that one, I get a freaking headache just thinking about having to deal with the morons in customer service. I've litterally gotten into to shouting matches with "cust service reps" and had to spend countless hours over the past 7 years getting bills corrected. If it weren't for the ticket, I'd have kicked their @@@ to the curb years ago. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sticksboi05 Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 HD is only as good as the broadcaster decides to put out. No TV station puts out a full bandwidth HD signal because it would take up to much space so it is compressed. As long as you have a good signal from your provider to your house, there really is no difference between cable/satellite/optical cable (FiOS) except that satellite and optical cable (fiber) can hold alot more stations than regular cable lines so at this point if FiOS/DirecTV is available at your house no point in staying with Comcast. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GoSkins561 Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 Direct TV sucks, don't do it. They have HORRIBLE customer service. It took them 2 weeks to come out and repair a connection I had in our bedroom. If you can deal with a local company I would reccomend avoiding Direct TV at all costs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GoSkins561 Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 I am getting Direct tv installed on tuesday. I have until tommorow to cancel. I am getting the Standard and HD recievers and 3 movie channels for free for 3 months. My bill should be around $65-70 a month. Is the HD quality good? Is it a good service overall? Thanks for any input. Oh yeah and dont buy into the BULL S*** about getting more discounts if you use Verizon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ECU-ALUM Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 As far as Direct TV goes...I don't miss it....just as happy with cable. (Not to mention they gave us a better deal and Direct TV has been begging us to come back). When they installed mine they put the box in wrong outside so that when it rained...the box shorted out and they couldn't come out here for a week. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest sith lord Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 Directv is well worth the money especially if you're a diehard sports fan. I have no idea what the other posters are talking about, because I've never had any problems getting what I want. NOTE: Get the protection plan. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Riggins77 Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 I am getting Direct tv installed on tuesday. I have until tommorow to cancel. I am getting the Standard and HD recievers and 3 movie channels for free for 3 months. My bill should be around $65-70 a month. Is the HD quality good? Is it a good service overall? Thanks for any input. Listen to me Turtle, and listen good. Make sure when the guy is installing your HD dish that they install it with stabilizer bars or whatever they use to make sure the wind doesn't make it sway. They didnt do that for me and right after they added a ****load of new HD channels, I couldn't get any of them. We called them back out there and the repair guy told me the installer was slack and didn't install the stabilzing equipment. Once he put those on, all the channels came in perfect. Signal strength is important, so pay attention to that and do not let them leave until you check out every HD channel to make sure it comes in. Trust me on this one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Riggins77 Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 Direct TV sucks, don't do it. They have HORRIBLE customer service. It took them 2 weeks to come out and repair a connection I had in our bedroom. If you can deal with a local company I would reccomend avoiding Direct TV at all costs. The product is far superior to cable, plus you can get NFL Direct Ticket along with the SuperFan package and get almost all of the games in HD. Their customer service is a little shady, I will agree, however, if you give them grief and ask for a break on packages, etc., they usually do it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turtle Posted February 17, 2008 Author Share Posted February 17, 2008 Thanks all so far for all the advice. I will make sure about the stabalizers. What do I need to look for signal strength? what range or whatever should it be in? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sarge Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 Sounds like you're going to do it. Good luck If you have time, do a google search on Direct TV customer service You can start here http://www.complaintsboard.com/complaints/direct-tv-c46926.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sly Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 As far as customer service goes, it seems EVERY large television service provider have pretty poorly trained CS reps. I've had trouble with Verizon, as well as major problems with DISH Network. It's just something you have to deal with now. Look at the service itself. Direct TV offers more HD than anyone else now. They also have exclusive rights to NFL and MLB packages. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Raub Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 I've had DTV for 6 years and absolutely love it. I'd never go back to cable. I don't know what experiences others have had, but mine have been nothing but good. I've moved 3 times in those 6 years and have had new dishes and service installed within a couple of days each time. Customer service has always been very good, and if you whine hard enough they'll cut you a deal on just about anything. HD quality is good, and there are a ton of channels. You can pretty much watch anything you want in HD. The ability to change programming online is nice also. You can order a new channel online and watch it within a few seconds of ordering it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SUSkinsFan Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 My only BIG complaint with DirecTv was that I couldn't get ABC in HD (and Lost is my favorite show) so I switched to cable. The thing that really pissed me off was I went to Wal-Mart and bought an OTA antenna so I could try to get ABC without having to go to Comcast. Couldn't get ABC in HD so I called CS and asked them what I could do about that and they wanted to charge me $100 to come out and do a signal strength test to confirm what I already knew, that I was out of range for the ABC signal in my area. And while I'm venting I really have a few bones to pick with Comcast. We got the triple play and they came out and set everything up. Worked great for a couple of days then my wireless stopped working. Called them, told them what the problem was and they sent someone out to put in a new wireless router, had the same problem a few days later. I called them back to request another router and asked for them to send me a Netgear, not a linksys (I had used Netgear equipment once before and never had a problem) and they said they would mark it on the work order and send it out with a tech. Tech showed up, no Netgear and another Linksys that did not work. After doing this little song and dance for a few weeks I finally got a Linksys router that actually worked (it was a different model then all the previous ones). And their DVR equipment SUCKS. When I had DTV the DVR had TiVo technology which was amazing, while Comcast has its own ****ty DVR that is nowhere near as productive as DTV's. AND the damn ONdemand doesn't work half the time. I also had a problem with the HD once, I was watching a 'Skins game and all of a sudden the picture switched from HD to SD. So I called CS and told them what the problem was and the guy actually asked me how I could tell the picture wasn't in HD. okay, done venting... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jbooma Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 I like FIOS more similar cost and better hd now Direct Tv does have more hd channels as of now, but FIOS will have about 100 by the end of the year Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest sith lord Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 Thanks all so far for all the advice. I will make sure about the stabalizers. What do I need to look for signal strength? what range or whatever should it be in? Your transponder strength should be atleast be in the high 80's. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sticksboi05 Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 I like FIOS more similar cost and better hd now Direct Tv does have more hd channels as of now, but FIOS will have about 100 by the end of the year 60 new HD stations rolling out market by market this spring and 150 by the end of the year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
da#1skinsfan Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 DTV is hands down better than cable in every possible way (ESPECIALLY picture quality), except for not having ondemand service, which is great. But if you have DVR, its not as big of a deal. Also with DTV you can call every other month, threaten to cancel, and get free things tossed your way. why pay for premium channels, one phone call, you'll get em free Ahhh the joys I used to indulge in when I had more time on my hands! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoCalSkins Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 HD is only as good as the broadcaster decides to put out. No TV station puts out a full bandwidth HD signal because it would take up to much space so it is compressed. As long as you have a good signal from your provider to your house, there really is no difference between cable/satellite/optical cable (FiOS) except that satellite and optical cable (fiber) can hold alot more stations than regular cable lines so at this point if FiOS/DirecTV is available at your house no point in staying with Comcast. That is not correct. Most companies compress what they receive from the broadcasters. Dish Network for example, reduces the resolution on all HD stations and allocates far less bandwidth than the original signal. DirecTV did the same thing prior to their MPEG4 launch last year. They still do it on their MPEG 2 hd stations. As far as HD, Directv is hands down the best right now and will likely be for the foreseeable future. They have another sattelite launching ths year that will add more capacity. The HD DVR also has video on demand now if you have broadband and you can schedule recordings from the internet or PDA. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SUSkinsFan Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 Ahhh the joys I used to indulge in when I had more time on my hands!They give ya the Playboy channel for free??? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoCalSkins Posted February 17, 2008 Share Posted February 17, 2008 My only BIG complaint with DirecTv was that I couldn't get ABC in HD (and Lost is my favorite show) so I switched to cable. That was probably prior to the MPEG 4 launch. They have HD locals for most major markets now DTV is hands down better than cable in every possible way (ESPECIALLY picture quality), except for not having ondemand service, which is great. But if you have DVR, its not as big of a deal. Their HD DVR has on demand service if you have broadband. You can also stream media from a PC to it. Best DirecTV forum is: www.dbstalk.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turtle Posted February 18, 2008 Author Share Posted February 18, 2008 Thanks for the awesome advice everyone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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