Football & Sling TV

[hogfansince79]

Thanks for that info about being able to sign into WatchESPN with Sling. I did not know that. I'd gotten rid of cable with Cox, but kept Internet and I figured I could just get apps for my favorites like ESPN and AMC. Well, of course...Cox blocked my access to those because I didn't have cable with them.

I've had Sling for about 5 months and for the price and as little tv as I watch, it's a damn good deal for me. Yes, it can be glitchy. I cast it to my TV with Chromecast and my phone and that's when it seems to buffer/pause/freeze. It's better only watching on my tablet and about perfect on my phone. I was worried about Hog games on ESPN and SEC Net, but not now. ESPN app work perfect while casting.

Yeah, I don't use wifi for firetv (w/sling).  I run a network cable directly to the firetv.  Zero problems.

[HOGGvol]

I have had Sling for a few months now and it works pretty well overall. It can be glitchy at times over Wifi, but for football you can use the ESPN app (on the ROKU) instead of watching the ESPN channels directly on Sling as the ESPN app is more stable.

I buy Sling mostly for live access to ESPN, CNN, and AMC as well as occasional access to several other live channels. The cost for Sling is $25 per month. I also have Netflix $10, Amazon $8, Hulu $8, HBO Now $15, and Showtime $10 (HBO and Showtime are cheaper than what is offered by cable providers). Additionally, I have an indoor digital antennae for local channels (a $35 one-time purchase). The Roku 2 devices cost around $40-$50 each and the Roku 3's are around $75 I think. I have not tried the Roku 4, but I think it costs around $120.

Movie rentals via the online services are a little cheaper than cable too.

I have a 50MB down internet connection and live in Conway. On my antennae I can pick up all of 4 of the central Arkansas TV stations in crystal clear HD as well as several other stations of lesser quality (coming from somewhere).

Basically, I went from spending $175 a month to about $75 a month for TV service and I now have huge catalogs of channels to watch on Netflix, Amazon, and Hulu that are commercial free (or limited commercials on Hulu) as well as live TV on Sling and with the digital antennae. I was a little apprehensive when I took the plunge, but I would never go back to cable and things are only going to get better as time goes on and service continues to improve.

[hogsanity]

I have had Sling for a few months now and it works pretty well overall. It can be glitchy at times over Wifi, but for football you can use the ESPN app (on the ROKU) instead of watching the ESPN channels directly on Sling as the ESPN app is more stable.

I buy Sling mostly for live access to ESPN, CNN, and AMC as well as occasional access to several other live channels. The cost for Sling is $25 per month. I also have Netflix $10, Amazon $8, Hulu $8, HBO Now $15, and Showtime $10 (HBO and Showtime are cheaper than what is offered by cable providers). Additionally, I have an indoor digital antennae for local channels (a $35 one-time purchase). The Roku 2 devices cost around $40-$50 each and the Roku 3's are around $75 I think. I have not tried the Roku 4, but I think it costs around $120.

Movie rentals via the online services are a little cheaper than cable too.

I have a 50MB down internet connection and live in Conway. On my antennae I can pick up all of 4 of the central Arkansas TV stations in crystal clear HD as well as several other stations of lesser quality (coming from somewhere).

Basically, I went from spending $175 a month to about $75 a month for TV service and I now have huge catalogs of channels to watch on Netflix, Amazon, and Hulu that are commercial free (or limited commercials on Hulu) as well as live TV on Sling and with the digital antennae. I was a little apprehensive when I took the plunge, but I would never go back to cable and things are only going to get better as time goes on and service continues to improve.

what if the hogs are on and you need to record it for some reason? How any devices can you view on at one time?

[The Great Hambino]

$1500? What were you paying for? I have Cox, have just about every channel they offer, plus their highest internet speed, and the dvr record 6, 2 extra receivers and a home phone bundled in and I don't pay $1500 a year for the video part of it.  You still have to have internet to get tv even with sling/amazon/netflix etc.

$140 a month bill cut out. I have grandfathered unlimited 4G LTE with hotspot capability on my phone, which pulls 45mbit, so that is good enough.

[hawgrunner]

Thanks for that info about being able to sign into WatchESPN with Sling. I did not know that. I'd gotten rid of cable with Cox, but kept Internet and I figured I could just get apps for my favorites like ESPN and AMC. Well, of course...Cox blocked my access to those because I didn't have cable with them.

I've had Sling for about 5 months and for the price and as little tv as I watch, it's a damn good deal for me. Yes, it can be glitchy. I cast it to my TV with Chromecast and my phone and that's when it seems to buffer/pause/freeze. It's better only watching on my tablet and about perfect on my phone. I was worried about Hog games on ESPN and SEC Net, but not now. ESPN app work perfect while casting.

I use mine with FireTV and works just fine.

[Hogz87]

I don't really like bumping an old thread (although it's not that old), but I didn't want to start a new thread for this since it's not directly Hog related.  So I just Googled "Playstation Vue Hogville" and it led me to this thread.

Anyway, we "cut the cord" right around the time this thread was made and I guess I just never saw it or overlooked it.  With Cox we were paying around $140/month for cable and internet which was ridiculous since the only thing we ever used cable for was live sports during football and basketball season.  That, and we'd use it for AMC and The Walking Dead. 

My wife and I were newlyweds and had a baby on the way (born July 29) so if we could find a cheaper, still viable alternative to cable, it'd be worth a try.  When I heard about Vue and did more research on it, I got really, really excited.  And then they added a one-time purchase option for NFL Redzone and I lost my mind; Vue was now almost perfect.  The only downfall was not being able to get the local channels live.  I know an HD antennae is a simple fix for that, but it's an additional cost.

Anyway, the main reason I dug up this old thread is because I found a very pleasant surprise this morning when I fired up the PS4 for the Saturday slate of football games: I'm now getting CBS live out of Kansas City.  Is anyone else getting this?  Is it like a week long or weekend promo?  Is it a glitch/  Or is it a permanent thing that I didn't hear about?

[carolinahogger]

I'm thinking about cutting the cord & switching from Directv to Sling TV.

Some folks call it Sling TV.  I call it Kaiser TV.

[007 License To Squeal]

I miss several  Hog games because my cable provider doesn't carry much American football and the SEC network won't work in the Dominican Republic, stating they (SEC network) don't have an agreement with my provider..

Any ideas about a service that might work for streaming when traveling?

Have you tried using a VPN ?

[Pecos Hog]

Missed one of your questions..... You can only watch SlingTV on one device at a time in the US, unless you are transmitting the signal from that device to your HDTV, using AppleTV or something similar.

Not true.   If you get the top tier (blue) programming you can watch sling on up to 3 devices. 

We cut the cord early this year.   Went with over the air antenna, Roku2, and SlingTV.    I have the Orange package with the Sports add-on.     Saves me $50/month over cable.    Picture is just fine and I can usually watch just about any game.   Only one minor annoyance I have is that the feed can be delayed (or buffered) by 30 seconds to a minute.   I'll get a text msg from a friend saying "great play" and the ball hasn't been snapped on my tv yet.   

I like that I can watch Sling on any device and T-Mobile will let you stream all that data for free.    I'll be watching the Hogs tonight on my phone while I'm in the stands at my son's high school football game.   

[FANONTHEHILL]

We had Sling and had no complaints.  We decided to try PlayStation Vue. Vue was cheaper than Sling Blue/Orange.  Vue also has a DVR function and can be streamed to multiple devices at once.  We have a Roku that we used with Sling, an old PS3, and a PS 4.  We can all watch different channels at the same time.  A total of 5 streams.  Strongly recommend Vue.  We use a leaf antenna for local networks.

[casken]

It may have been answered but a sling account with the sports pkg...25 bucks a mo...will give you access to watch espn with sling as the provider. IT works better than sling with less snags even with a mid tier connection. Glitchy sling Problem solved!

[Hogz87]

I'm definitely getting live CBS on Playstation Vue, now; or at least for today.  I don't know when it happened but I know last week I still had to stream the CBS SEC game through my computer hooked up to the TV and the stream was terrible quality. 

I'm not sure why I'm all of a sudden getting CBS live, but I'm not going to complain.

[Hardcore Hoggy]

How many people under 60 still have a home phone? I cut ours out about 5 years ago and haven't missed it one bit. I probably should have sooner, but decided I might need the home phone for something other than robo calls.......

We have Cox internet (50 Mbps ) and the 250 channel package, actually saved $10 a month by signing up for phone as well, so technically we DO have a home landline, but don't even know the number let alone have a phone connected.

Also have a friends and family discount card that discounts our entire bill by 50% for a year. So we're paying $70 a month for fast internet and cable TV.

Hopefully my friend can give me another discount card when the first year is over, but even if not $140 a month isn't unreasonable for internet and TV that is available 24/7 and you don't have to fool around with figuring out who gets to watch what and when

[Hardcore Hoggy]

It may have been answered but a sling account with the sports pkg...25 bucks a mo...will give you access to watch espn with sling as the provider. IT works better than sling with less snags even with a mid tier connection. Glitchy sling Problem solved!

Yeah I was a litle upset a few weeks ago because Cox where I live didn't switch to the Arkansas game on the SECN Alternate channel but figured out that I can sign into the Watch ESPN app through my XBoxOne and any game that is showing on ANY ESPN Network anywhwere is available there by using my Cox account as a sign in. Honestly with 50 Mbps internet you could barely tell the difference between streaming and TV except that there was an obvious delay.

[Hogz87]

We have Cox internet (50 Mbps ) and the 250 channel package, actually saved $10 a month by signing up for phone as well, so technically we DO have a home landline, but don't even know the number let alone have a phone connected.

Also have a friends and family discount card that discounts our entire bill by 50% for a year. So we're paying $70 a month for fast internet and cable TV.

Hopefully my friend can give me another discount card when the first year is over, but even if not $140 a month isn't unreasonable for internet and TV that is available 24/7 and you don't have to fool around with figuring out who gets to watch what and when

Eh, $140/month for cable and internet is way too much for a lot of people.  There's a decent sized group of people out there who are/were using cable to watch live sports almost exclusively.  I'm one of those people and my wife has never been a big TV watcher.  She'll binge watch the crap out TV shows on Netflix with the best of 'em, but she's not someone who has to have cable to keep updated on the latest shows.  Not to mention there's always viable online streaming options that you can "suffer" through for one episode (at a time) of something.  For instance, with the Walking Dead, you could just stream it through AMC's website after the episode aired.

Playstation Vue really is pretty awesome.  I just have to fire up the PS4, open the Vue app, and it's like I'm watching cable; but instead of paying $150ish/month for cable+internet, we're now paying about $90/month for internet+cable/Vue.  I get ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, SEC Network, NFL Redzone, NFL Network, FS1, FS2, Big Ten Network, and now I get one live local station (CBS).   

[Hardcore Hoggy]

Eh, $140/month for cable and internet is way too much for a lot of people.  There's a decent sized group of people out there who are/were using cable to watch live sports almost exclusively.  I'm one of those people and my wife has never been a big TV watcher.  She'll binge watch the crap out TV shows on Netflix with the best of 'em, but she's not someone who has to have cable to keep updated on the latest shows.  Not to mention there's always viable online streaming options that you can "suffer" through for one episode (at a time) of something.  For instance, with the Walking Dead, you could just stream it through AMC's website after the episode aired.

Playstation Vue really is pretty awesome.  I just have to fire up the PS4, open the Vue app, and it's like I'm watching cable; but instead of paying $150ish/month for cable+internet, we're now paying about $90/month for internet+cable/Vue.  I get ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, SEC Network, NFL Redzone, NFL Network, FS1, FS2, Big Ten Network, and now I get one live local station (CBS).   

Yep, reason I don't get the taking sides some do when these type things come up. LOL The best solution isn't the same for everyone.

I have SIX kids,  who almost always want to to watch different things. Cable works best for me, that certainly doesn't mean it works best for everyone.

And in actuality, I'm paying about $40 a month for the TV (well half of that really with the discount) the rest is for the super fast internet I elected to get, I could downgrade to 10 Mpbs internet and save about $30 a month (before discount) and I also don't have the cheapest TV package because there are some channels that we want.

In short, I could make my bill about $40 a month cheaper if I wanted to.

[Hogz87]

Yep, reason I don't get the taking sides some do when these type things come up. LOL The best solution isn't the same for everyone.

I have SIX kids,  who almost always want to to watch different things. Cable works best for me, that certainly doesn't mean it works best for everyone.

And in actuality, I'm paying about $40 a month for the TV (well half of that really with the discount) the rest is for the super fast internet I elected to get, I could downgrade to 10 Mpbs internet and save about $30 a month (before discount) and I also don't have the cheapest TV package because there are some channels that we want.

In short, I could make my bill about $40 a month cheaper if I wanted to.

Yeah, we may be singing a different tune in a few years when our daughter is wanting to watch something on a Saturday during football season, but for the "only use cable to watch live sports" types, cutting the cord is probably the best option.  But I fully understand why keeping cable is the best option for some.

[Hardcore Hoggy]

Yeah, we may be singing a different tune in a few years when our daughter is wanting to watch something on a Saturday during football season, but for the "only use cable to watch live sports" types, cutting the cord is probably the best option.  But I fully understand why keeping cable is the best option for some.

There is NO telling what may be available in a few years. I'd love to see Google Fiber available nationwide