[random_pawn00]

The sad part is that if the current Spectrum app is any indication, their streaming video quality is going to be the same compressed to hell garbage that they're sending down the cable wire now. For people used to HD streams from real providers, their stuff looks like poorly upscaled standard def.

People are getting acclimated to high quality images from their streaming suppliers. If they don't up their game, Charter and Spectrum will become the new low rez side channels. Without the monopoly status they've enjoyed for decades, their TV offering will sink without a trace. They have no idea how to compete, and even less than that on how to compete on image quality. They are quickly going to settle on being just another ISP where in many areas they still have their monoply (but not for much longer).

No doubt. The quality of the signal is less. You also pay $21 for OTA signals which are delayed in reception, reduced in quality, and only a subset of the channels available. The savings from the Tivo (lifetime guide) updates has saved some money for us from the receiver/DVR service fees.

Given the current developments in this space (I care less about TV, but my family watches it), we are preparing to improve quality of the service and if we save more money (which preliminary checking shows around $50 / month saving with equivalent programming) great! I can only hope competition in the streaming / live tv space remains and forces competitive offerings. How Tivo responds, no idea. I have had enough of Charter / Spectrum.

 

[cwoody222]

https://www.nexttv.com/news/charter-cuts-off-cablecard-support?utm_source=SmartBrief&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=241BFF69-1938-421F-A5A7-DCA24C4C53CF&utm_content=2884CDF8-2DC5-41EF-913F-5F409CC12035&utm_term=b6f7d907-0585-46db-b760-ebcafea2193a

Charter to Cut Off CableCARD Support

By Daniel Frankel published 1 day ago

Network upgrades will render already obsolete cable-TV security standard utterly useless for the small number of loyal cable customers still using it in their TiVo and SiliconDust DVRs

I know this has been discussed but here is an article from NEXT TV NEWSLETTER
JS

I can’t read that article.

Is there anything new or just a rehash of Zatz?

Charter Will Be Kicking TiVo To The Curb

By way of TechHive and the TiVo Community, we learn that Charter Communications has alerted Spectrum cable customers to replace TiVo ahead of obsolescence: As we continue to upgrade our networks and technology, CableCARDs will not be compatible with future service upgrades for some time. We have...

zatznotfunny.com

 

[SirKnowsALot]

I can’t read that article.

Is there anything new or just a rehash of Zatz?

Charter Will Be Kicking TiVo To The Curb

By way of TechHive and the TiVo Community, we learn that Charter Communications has alerted Spectrum cable customers to replace TiVo ahead of obsolescence: As we continue to upgrade our networks and technology, CableCARDs will not be compatible with future service upgrades for some time. We have...

zatznotfunny.com

Basically the same info. Try this link instead: https://www.nexttv.com/news/charter-cuts-off-cablecard-support

 

[NashGuy]

The sad part is that if the current Spectrum app is any indication, their streaming video quality is going to be the same compressed to hell garbage that they're sending down the cable wire now. For people used to HD streams from real providers, their stuff looks like poorly upscaled standard def.

People are getting acclimated to high quality images from their streaming suppliers. If they don't up their game, Charter and Spectrum will become the new low rez side channels. Without the monopoly status they've enjoyed for decades, their TV offering will sink without a trace. They have no idea how to compete, and even less than that on how to compete on image quality. They are quickly going to settle on being just another ISP where in many areas they still have their monoply (but not for much longer).

Yeah. Similar situation, I think, at Comcast, where they provide all HD channels in overly-compressed 720p (regardless of whether the network offers it in 1080i). I think they use the same encodes for QAM vs. IPTV. YouTube TV is a step up and DirecTV Stream is a BIG step up in terms of HD PQ. But then no cable channel service can match the picture quality offered by direct-to-consumer on-demand services like Apple TV+, Netflix, Prime Video, HBO Max, Disney+, Hulu, Paramount+ and Peacock, where a lot of their new originals stream in 4K Dolby Vision and even the HD stuff looks significantly better than the same show/movie on any live cable channel, regardless of provider.

 

[dougdingle]

Yeah. Similar situation, I think, at Comcast, where they provide all HD channels in overly-compressed 720p (regardless of whether the network offers it in 1080i). I think they use the same encodes for QAM vs. IPTV. YouTube TV is a step up and DirecTV Stream is a BIG step up in terms of HD PQ. But then no cable channel service can match the picture quality offered by direct-to-consumer on-demand services like Apple TV+, Netflix, Prime Video, HBO Max, Disney+, Hulu, Paramount+ and Peacock, where a lot of their new originals stream in 4K Dolby Vision and even the HD stuff looks significantly better than the same show/movie on any live cable channel, regardless of provider.

Spectrum on the west coast is pushing out content at the original resolution, but is using terrible first generation MPEG compression from 2001, and no channel goes above about 11 Mb/s at 8 bits, which is horrendous with that codec. They could have gone H.264 (their cable boxes and the TiVos can accommodate that codec) and gotten far superior images at just 4-5 Mb/s but for some reason they don't.

The worst part of their service is where they compress the premium channels you pay extra for even harder, and HBO (for example) never exceeds 9 Mb/s which is just plain pathetic. Freeze any part of the red Marvel movie opening, and you could give a master class on what crappy 8 bit image macroblocking looks like. And they feed the same crappy images to their streaming app.

It's too bad that the best quality streaming images come from DirecTV Stream. I despise AT&T, won't give them a penny, so it's gonna have to be the slightly less hateful Google/YTTV that gets my money going forward. If I had off-air here (I do not) I would use that for the locals and not get that kind of 'cable' package at all. I have plenty of commercial free streaming content already.

 

[NashGuy]

Spectrum on the west coast is pushing out content at the original resolution, but is using terrible first generation MPEG compression from 2001, and no channel goes above about 11 Mb/s at 8 bits, which is horrendous with that codec. They could have gone H.264 (their cable boxes and the TiVos can accommodate that codec) and gotten far superior images at just 4-5 Mb/s but for some reason they don't.

The worst part of their service is where they compress the premium channels you pay extra for even harder, and HBO (for example) never exceeds 9 Mb/s which is just plain pathetic. Freeze any part of the red Marvel movie opening, and you could give a master class on what crappy 8 bit image macroblocking looks like. And they feed the same crappy images to their streaming app.

It's too bad that the best quality streaming images come from DirecTV Stream. I despise AT&T, won't give them a penny, so it's gonna have to be the slightly less hateful Google/YTTV that gets my money going forward. If I had off-air here (I do not) I would use that for the locals and not get that kind of 'cable' package at all. I have plenty of commercial free streaming content already.

Wow. I guess that's why some folks call it "Sharter," ha!

As for DirecTV Stream, well, they're at least spun off now into a separate LLC, although still 70% owned by AT&T, with the other 30% now owned by investment group TPG. (I expect we'll hear AT&T, TPG and DISH announce a merger between the DirecTV and DISH companies sometime after the upcoming mid-term elections with a goal of having the deal consummated by late 2023. We'll see.)

What kind of content from your local channels do you really want that you can't get via one streaming app or another? ABC and Fox shows are on Hulu next-day. NBC shows are on Peacock Premium next-day, while their live sports and SNL stream live. CBS shows are next-day on Paramount+, with sports (including NFL) streaming live. You can even live stream the full local CBS station if you're on their ad-free plan. PBS shows stream same-time in the free PBS app and most local PBS stations live stream in it too. CW shows are next-day (with ads) in the free CW app. Main thing you'd be missing would be the live sports that Fox airs, including Sunday NFL games.

In many areas, the local stations put live and/or recent on-demand replays of their local newscasts in one or more free apps such as NewsOn, Vu It, Stirr or their own branded app. Three of my four local stations here in Nashville do that.

IMO, unless you really need cable sports, cable news/opinion channels, or Fox Sunday NFL games, you can probably make a few small adjustments to your viewing habits and be quite happy without paying for any kind of cable TV service.

 

[dougdingle]

What kind of content from your local channels do you really want that you can't get via one streaming app or another? ABC and Fox shows are on Hulu next-day. NBC shows are on Peacock Premium next-day, while their live sports and SNL stream live. CBS shows are next-day on Paramount+, with sports (including NFL) streaming live. You can even live stream the full local CBS station if you're on their ad-free plan. PBS shows stream same-time in the free PBS app and most local PBS stations live stream in it too. CW shows are next-day (with ads) in the free CW app. Main thing you'd be missing would be the live sports that Fox airs, including Sunday NFL games.

This is the part that annoys me. In order to get content that has local news and sports and network programming and is available to many with an antenna, I would have to subscribe to several different streaming services.

I'm going to go one of two ways...I'll either try out YTTV and stick with it if I like it, or else I'll just wean myself from 'network TV' altogether. I was once addicted to NFL games, watched all five games that are broadcast each week no matter how awful the teams playing, but have slowly reduced that to at most two games, and sometimes none. So for me, walking away is doable. I've been with Spectrum and TiVo for decades, but it's mostly been inertia and keeping my wife happy with a system with which she is familiar. With Internet, my current cable bill is about $250/month, and that's an insane amount of money for HD (or worse) content with the pathetic quality I described.

In a way, I'm glad Spectrum is forcing the issue with their sun-setting of cable card support. Makes it somewhat easier for me to transition when there is no choice. And I will be so glad to get rid of the constant nightmare that is the Tuning Adapter.

 

[NashGuy]

This is the part that annoys me. In order to get content that has local news and sports and network programming and is available to many with an antenna, I would have to subscribe to several different streaming services.

I'm going to go one of two ways...I'll either try out YTTV and stick with it if I like it, or else I'll just wean myself from 'network TV' altogether. I was once addicted to NFL games, watched all five games that are broadcast each week no matter how awful the teams playing, but have slowly reduced that to at most two games, and sometimes none. So for me, walking away is doable. I've been with Spectrum and TiVo for decades, but it's mostly been inertia and keeping my wife happy with a system with which she is familiar. With Internet, my current cable bill is about $250/month, and that's an insane amount of money for HD (or worse) content with the pathetic quality I described.

In a way, I'm glad Spectrum is forcing the issue with their sun-setting of cable card support. Makes it somewhat easier for me to transition when there is no choice. And I will be so glad to get rid of the constant nightmare that is the Tuning Adapter.

Well, as I say, you can pay $10/mo for Paramount+ that includes your live local CBS station, their live Sunday NFL games and all the other live sports CBS has, plus a big ad-free on-demand library with some of it (including current CBS series) in 4K Dolby Vision. And they're about to offer the option to get Showtime (live and on-demand, with select 4K content) inside the Paramount+ app for probably an extra $5 or so on top of the $10 base price, i.e. $15/mo, which is only $3-5 more per month than you'd pay for just Showtime as an add-on to cable TV.

Consider the following:

Paramount+ ad-free: $10 (or $15 with Showtime)
Peacock Premium ad-free: $10 (or $5 if you're getting Peacock Premium with ads for free for 12 months with Spectrum TV; you should take that offer now, while you're paying for Spectrum TV because based on my experience you'll probably get the full 12 months even after you cancel Spectrum TV)
HBO Max ad-free: $15 (and will in a few months include the Discovery+ library, perhaps pushing the price up to $16/mo)
Hulu ad-free: $13
PBS app: free
Tubi app: free
Pluto TV app: free
FreeVee app: free
YouTube app: free
total: $43 to $53/mo, depending on options above

That's a ton of quality ad-free content, plus live CBS and NBC sports and live local CBS news, plus a variety of free older "rerun" movies and show with ads, all for significantly less than YouTube TV's $65/mo cost. Pretty much any primetime series airing on any of the 5 biggest broadcast nets you could watch next-day (or same-day for PBS). You can get live and on-demand national news from CBS, NBC and ABC either in their own free apps or other apps like Pluto TV, YouTube, etc. And most MSNBC shows (e.g. Morning Joe, Deadline White House, All In) are now available next-day in Peacock.

If standalone internet costs you, say, $75/mo, then you could see your total monthly cost of internet plus TV cut in half from $250 to around $125.

 

[dougdingle]

Well, as I say, you can pay $10/mo for Paramount+ that includes your live local CBS station, their live Sunday NFL games and all the other live sports CBS has, plus a big ad-free on-demand library with some of it (including current CBS series) in 4K Dolby Vision. And they're about to offer the option to get Showtime (live and on-demand, with select 4K content) inside the Paramount+ app for probably an extra $5 or so on top of the $10 base price, i.e. $15/mo, which is only $3-5 more per month than you'd pay for just Showtime as an add-on to cable TV.

Consider the following:

Paramount+ ad-free: $10 (or $15 with Showtime)
Peacock Premium ad-free: $10 (or $5 if you're getting Peacock Premium with ads for free for 12 months with Spectrum TV; you should take that offer now, while you're paying for Spectrum TV because based on my experience you'll probably get the full 12 months even after you cancel Spectrum TV)
HBO Max ad-free: $15 (and will in a few months include the Discovery+ library, perhaps pushing the price up to $16/mo)
Hulu ad-free: $13
PBS app: free
Tubi app: free
Pluto TV app: free
FreeVee app: free
YouTube app: free
total: $43 to $53/mo, depending on options above

That's a ton of quality ad-free content, plus live CBS and NBC sports and live local CBS news, plus a variety of free older "rerun" movies and show with ads, all for significantly less than YouTube TV's $65/mo cost. Pretty much any primetime series airing on any of the 5 biggest broadcast nets you could watch next-day (or same-day for PBS). You can get live and on-demand national news from CBS, NBC and ABC either in their own free apps or other apps like Pluto TV, YouTube, etc. And most MSNBC shows (e.g. Morning Joe, Deadline White House, All In) are now available next-day in Peacock.

If standalone internet costs you, say, $75/mo, then you could see your total monthly cost of internet plus TV cut in half from $250 to around $125.

Your research is compelling.

 

[NashGuy]

Your research is compelling.

And don't you already use an Apple TV 4K? Their brilliant Up Next universal queue in the Apple TV app keeps track of all the shows (and even live sports) you watch across all your underlying apps (except for Netflix, who won't participate because they think they don't need to but they seem to be rethinking a lot of things these days, so who knows...)

So Apple's Up Next watchlist essentially replaces your old TiVo recordings list. And the curated cross-app content picks elsewhere in the Apple TV app replace your old channel grid guide and TiVo recommendations. And Apple is making their Friday night MLB doubleheader free in the Apple TV app at least through August, regardless of whether you subscribe to Apple TV+ for $5/mo (which you should, because Severance is one of the best series I've seen anywhere in the past few years).

 

[random_pawn00]

We got screwed when the FCC didn't have the balls to require an IPTV access standard. You'd think this is what gov't is supposed to do (i.e. standards) but you'd be wrong, although somehow it was perfectly ok to do ATSC 3.0.

All about corporatism. The people who are supposed to protect you from monopolies do the exact opposite.

 

[dougdingle]

And don't you already use an Apple TV 4K? Their brilliant Up Next universal queue in the Apple TV app keeps track of all the shows (and even live sports) you watch across all your underlying apps (except for Netflix, who won't participate because they think they don't need to but they seem to be rethinking a lot of things these days, so who knows...)

So Apple's Up Next watchlist essentially replaces your old TiVo recordings list. And the curated cross-app content picks elsewhere in the Apple TV app replace your old channel grid guide and TiVo recommendations. And Apple is making their Friday night MLB doubleheader free in the Apple TV app at least through August, regardless of whether you subscribe to Apple TV+ for $5/mo (which you should, because Severance is one of the best series I've seen anywhere in the past few years).

I now have four of them - two first gen and two second gen. I also subscribe to AppleTV+.

Actually, maybe you can help me here. I have a very difficult time with AppleTV+ when I'm watching a series and trying to get it to show me the next episode. So for example, I'll watch Ted Lasso season 2 episode 5, and next time I launch it, it launches into Season 1 Episode 1. It's maddening and I have not delved into it to try to figure out why. Almost every other service I use maintains a "Continue Watching..." list but I can't seem to make it work on AppleTV+. It has become sufficiently annoying that I've taken to just watching movies on AppleTV+. I'm sure I'm missing something here, but can't figure out what.

Are you aware of the "What did he say?" function on the ATV4K and its remote? It's magical.

 

[NashGuy]

I now have four of them - two first gen and two second gen. I also subscribe to AppleTV+.

Actually, maybe you can help me here. I have a very difficult time with AppleTV+ when I'm watching a series and trying to get it to show me the next episode. So for example, I'll watch Ted Lasso season 2 episode 5, and next time I launch it, it launches into Season 1 Episode 1. It's maddening and I have not delved into it to try to figure out why. Almost every other service I use maintains a "Continue Watching..." list but I can't seem to make it work on AppleTV+. It has become sufficiently annoying that I've taken to just watching movies on AppleTV+. I'm sure I'm missing something here, but can't figure out what.

I honestly don't even know how this is possible. If you scroll all the way down to the main tab in the Apple TV app and look at your watch history, do any Apple TV+ series or movies show up there? Somehow, that app doesn't seem to be tracking your Apple TV+ viewing. And while that feature is optional for third-party services (whose apps you must opt to associate with the Apple TV app and its tracking functionality) it is not at all optional for the native Apple TV+ service or the Apple TV Channels services, as far as I can tell.

Long story short: something be wrong. My guess is that if you wiped the box and reinstalled everything, that would fix the issue. And while the box will remember your apps and auto-redownload them, you'll still have to sign back into them all, which is a bit of a PITA. You could also try contacting Apple support but my guess is that they'll just have you do the ol' wipe and re-set-up trick.

Are you aware of the "What did he say?" function on the ATV4K and its remote? It's magical.

OMG, I use it ALL. THE. TIME. Because apparently I either have a mild hearing impairment or Hollywood sound engineers are crap at their job. (Or a little of both.) Only other device that comes close in this regard is Roku, which has a jump back button which you can set to temporarily turn on CC during the repeat playback.

 

[dougdingle]

I honestly don't even know how this is possible. If you scroll all the way down to the main tab in the Apple TV app and look at your watch history, do any Apple TV+ series or movies show up there? Somehow, that app doesn't seem to be tracking your Apple TV+ viewing. And while that feature is optional for third-party services (whose apps you must opt to associate with the Apple TV app and its tracking functionality) it is not at all optional for the native Apple TV+ service or the Apple TV Channels services, as far as I can tell.

Long story short: something be wrong. My guess is that if you wiped the box and reinstalled everything, that would fix the issue. And while the box will remember your apps and auto-redownload them, you'll still have to sign back into them all, which is a bit of a PITA. You could also try contacting Apple support but my guess is that they'll just have you do the ol' wipe and re-set-up trick.

OK, well, you've given me an incentive to delve into it deeper. I despise the idea of doing a factory reset but sometimes, ya just gotta do it. I'm going to look at the other devices (something I should have done long ago when first finding the issue) to see if they all do it, or if it's isolated to the main one I use 90% of the time. Thanks.

On the other thing, if you're going deaf, it's both of us. The dialog mix seems to just get worse and worse much more quickly than my hearing would degrade. I know a retired studio sound mixer who complains about this as well, so I think it's 80% the mix, 20% our hearing.😁

 

[slowbiscuit]

What kind of content from your local channels do you really want that you can't get via one streaming app or another? ABC and Fox shows are on Hulu next-day. NBC shows are on Peacock Premium next-day, while their live sports and SNL stream live. CBS shows are next-day on Paramount+, with sports (including NFL) streaming live. You can even live stream the full local CBS station if you're on their ad-free plan. PBS shows stream same-time in the free PBS app and most local PBS stations live stream in it too. CW shows are next-day (with ads) in the free CW app. Main thing you'd be missing would be the live sports that Fox airs, including Sunday NFL games.

The big problem with sports streaming, if you go with individual streamers, is that they don't keep the streams for later viewing if you can't/won't watch live (because of commercials etc.). This is the main reason why some sports fans will stick with Tivo or something like YTTV that has a DVR feature, because we don't watch most sports live.

It's a big issue with a lot of streamers, unfortunately. I won't be watching the Amazon Thursday night NFL games this fall because of this, even though we have Prime.

 

[humbb]

My recollection is that I can start from the beginning the Peacock (premium ... free w/ Comcast) Sunday morning baseball during the game and skip commercial breaks. Useful, since the games usually start at 8:30 or 9am here in CA. No idea if that will work for the Thursday NFL games on Prime Video.

 

[NashGuy]

My recollection is that I can start from the beginning the Peacock (premium ... free w/ Comcast) Sunday morning baseball during the game and skip commercial breaks. Useful, since the games usually start at 8:30 or 9am here in CA. No idea if that will work for the Thursday NFL games on Prime Video.

Yeah, I know you can pause, rewind and FF live sports in Peacock. And I think they make at least some events available for on-demand viewing later? I also know that if you have the latest tvOS update on Apple TV, you can do the same with Apple's live MLB games. And I think they're also making those games available for later on-demand viewing. IDK, maybe the NFL has some sort of specific policy against later on-demand streams, though?

 

[NashGuy]

The big problem with sports streaming, if you go with individual streamers, is that they don't keep the streams for later viewing if you can't/won't watch live (because of commercials etc.). This is the main reason why some sports fans will stick with Tivo or something like YTTV that has a DVR feature, because we don't watch most sports live.

It's a big issue with a lot of streamers, unfortunately. I won't be watching the Amazon Thursday night NFL games this fall because of this, even though we have Prime.

Good point. But are you saying that if watching Thursday Night Football live is your only choice, then you won't even bother to turn it on at all?

 

[dougdingle]

maybe the NFL has some sort of specific policy against later on-demand streams, though?

Would not be surprised. The NFL Network reruns the games over and over and over and over. There's advertising revenue in them there hills.

And the rerun games more often than not feature the wrong teams in the TiVo guide. Or you get some vapid sports talk show instead of the listed game. The world class incompetence of the NFL Network should not be taken for granted. It's the classic example of a very rich corporation hiring low wage amateurs and doing the most stupid things imaginable.

 

[slowbiscuit]

Good point. But are you saying that if watching Thursday Night Football live is your only choice, then you won't even bother to turn it on at all?

If I'm forced to watch the AMZ games live I won't watch, because I'm not going to sit through the commercials. If they let me chase watch and skip then I might watch some of them. I'm hoping they will be available to watch after they finish, but I doubt it.

I wanted to watch the end of the first couple of British Open rounds that aired on Peacock this week, because I was chase-watching the USA network broadcast that ended at 3pm or so and then continued on Peacock. Nope, not an option - if you didn't catch it live it wasn't available. This is a real problem for sports streaming, you never know what you can and can't watch after the event. Not a real issue if you sub to YTTV or DTVS and you can DVR it, but if it's streaming-only you're hosed.

Another example is the IndyCar race in Toronto today, only available on Peacock (a first for them), but NBC is only going to show 5 minutes of commercials so I can deal with that. I doubt it will be available after it airs though.