ArmyAg2002 said:
Anyone have Youtube TV?
What do you like/dislike about it? Would you recommend Youtube TV?
Wife and I are considering cutting the cord.
Like many others, I moved from PSVue to YTTV. Previously, I was a DirectTV customer. Some of the benefits I count:
(1) No contract. I can add packages, cancel the service for a period, etc. whenever it suits us. With DirectTV, I felt like I had a good deal for a 12 mos period, then I would have to engage in a negotiation threatening to cancel if I didn't want my promo price to end. It was a frustrating time sink.
(2) No equipment rental. If you don't have a smart TV, you will have to buy a device like a Fire Stick, Chromecast, Apple TV, etc., but it's a one time fee. Similarly, no taxes, surcharges, undercoating I used to see on my satellite bill.
(3) No need for a box. You can throw in the back and basically mount a TV anywhere you want. Fitness room, office, wherever. No need to figure out where to stash a box.
(4) Your laptop, phone, tablets, etc all become TVs when you need them to be. That means if you're stuck at work during one of those mid-week, mid-day baseball games or whatever, you can catch it. If the kids want to watch a Disney movie or something, you can pull up whatever you want to watch on your phone. If you're ducking under the stairs with a tornado warning siren blaring, you can still follow the news. Extremely convenient. Additionally, since your DVR is in the cloud, you take it with you everywhere. I've caught up on things I "recorded" while travelling for work since it syncs up.
(5) Speaking of bad weather, it isn't an issue any more. I know it's been said that weather concerns were a thing of the past with satellite TV, but it was still an issue for us before we cut the cord.
As for downsides, you are tied to your internet. If you have a bad connection in your area, you're going to have a bad time. If you have the need to stream a bunch at once (i.e., netflix in one room, YTTV in the other, video games running, zoom call), you're going to need a lot of bandwidth to prevent buffering. Similarly, if you have an outage, you lose TV. Of course, in a pinch if you need to catch something on the news or a game, you can fire up your phone and watch it over mobile data.
People complain about the bundling bad channels with YTTV, but I think that's the deal across the board, so it doesn't really register for me. I also don't think the services have much of a choice with the way production is consolidated.
They have also raised the price several times, but I think that's probably more a product of low pricing initially to generate a user base. Ultimately, I'm still paying less for far more convenience, and I can cut the service at any time without any issue.
All in all, I wouldn't go back. Ask me again in a couple of months when YTTV and Sinclair can't reach a deal and I don't have access to the Fox Sports Regionals during basketball/baseball season.
