Cutting the Cable Guide

[bradl]

So officially my cable is cut once again. Had it disconnected yesterday.

For local channels, is anyone using Air TV, a device with a HD antenna that looks like it fits on a window? Just curious. My wife said she does not care about NFL Football, but I don’t know if I can trust her.

Stream Local TV in HD | AirTV

Watch the local channels you love, like ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC, PBS and more without a monthly bill. Stream your local channels to your mobile device with AirTV.

airtv.net

I'm clearing out my father's apartment and ran into something similar. He only had ATT Internet and Phone (no UVerse), and had his TV connected to his router via Cat 6 cable (why, when his router wasn't getting Gigabit speeds is beyond me), So he was only getting phone, Internet, and free-to-air TV with an antenna he bought at Home Depot or Best Buy and hung himself, similar to the HD antenna that hangs in a window. So he was getting the HD versions of free-to-air TV, and to be honest, I was hard pressed to find any shows I would watch. Most of them were definitely geared towards his generation (shows that were on in the 50s/60s, some 70s), so I'd find a plethora of The Rifleman, Gunsmoke, Bonanza, Little House on the Prairie, the occasional Welcome Back, Kotter, with a few other shows. I was shocked to see that Shout Factory has its own channel, as well as an entire anime channel on free-to-air TV. All of this was in addition to the apps already on his TV, giving him Youtube, Amazon Prime Video, Netflix, Disney+, etc.

I may have to look into such an antenna to add to my TV, if I can, because I dropped my UVerse service down to local channels only to beef up our speeds until Fiber rolls out to our neighbourhood.

Oh.. Don't trust me either; I grew up in football country (read: midwest), and I think the NFL sucks, because of play/stop/plan boredom, and padding. Give me Australian Rules Football or Rugby any day. Those up here in the NFL wouldn't know what to do against that; I could only imagine O'Dell Beckham or Randy Moss getting a mark taken on them by Jeremy Howe or Nic Natainui.

BL.

 

[poorcody]

A work a buddy of mine just went to youtube tv, and he's loving it. It appears I can get my local stations and most (but not all) of my regular channels that I watch for 65 dollars a month. So basically for about 165 (internet + Youtube TV), I'll have nearly the same set up.

I've had YouTubeTV for years and it really is good. I love that you get the local and traditional cable channels combined -- it feels like a high-quality cable service instead of a "simpler" streaming service. The best part is really the cloud DVR, which lets you record just about everything and keeps it for nine months. I basically haven't watched a commercial in years. Everything you might possibly want to watch you just add to your DVR collection -- not just the stuff you will probably watch. For example, I record all the news shows that run all day on multiple news channels. Then I can catch-up on anything at anytime. The whole idea is a big step up from a traditional DVR.

Also nice to be able to watch your same stuff on any device from anywhere. I watch in the living room, bedroom, on my iPad when traveling, on the iPhone when on the elliptical machine, at my Mom's house when I'm visiting. All your DVR programs, channel settings, etc. go with you everywhere.

 

[maflynn]

I've had YouTubeTV for years and it really is good.

That's good to know.

I'm also semi-tempted (sort of kind of maybe not), to see if Verizon's 5G home internet is worth it. I would love to give Comcast the complete heave ho, and Verizon's home internet cost (not FIOS) is about 50 bucks, which is 1/2 that of Comcast

I'm getting better internet speeds running speedtest on comcast then I am on my phone, plus I'm not sure about data caps on Verizon

 

[44267547]

We have an appointment for our fiber optic package to be installed in January, and last year was the actual line install direct in our backyard. We were supposed to have the package actually installed in October, but there were some type of ordinance related issues, where now they’re backlogged and trying to fulfill appointments to customers.

We scored a promo package, where we put $25 down, and then guarantees us $30 a month for 100 Mbps. [It locks is in permanently.] If we didn’t put a $25 down, we be paying somewhere around $49.99 a month.

I Personally will be welcoming the new package, being my Xbox Series X and PS5 require direct Internet connection, and this will definitely make it a smoother transition. (Specifically for the likes of Microsoft flight simulator, which is a heavy data consumer for real time weather affects, live airport traffic, ect..)

The only thing we use our cable company for, is just Wi-Fi. But given that they have ridiculous surcharge fees, there’s a reason they’re losing customers on a rapid basis.

Well, unfortunately, our fiber optic install didn’t go as planned. When the company arrived to make the install, The technician needed to access something underground from the opposite side of the house, but because the temperatures are hovering around 10°, he said it wasn’t doable until spring when the weather warms. Not only that, they wanted to run a network cable through our garage and into our downstairs media room, [which is where our router/modem is], and in order for him to do that, he was going to have to drill a hole through our walls and into the garage, which would’ve been completely unsightly. And to top it all off, they didn’t tell us that we had to purchase two adapters at $35 apiece to make the transition. So given the annoyances, we just decided to cancel our installation, and keep Spectrum.

But what really peeves me off, is we paid ahead of time for our promo package, and when they wanted to refund us, they wanted to issue it in the form of a prepaid debit card. And my response to that was? Absolutely not. They can refund us in our original form of payment. Not everybody wants a prepaid debit card.

To be honest, we’ve been really content with Spectrums service, and the range in the house is excellent, we just want to boost our speeds a bit. So the downside, is we know we’re overpaying for our Wi-Fi, but we have no other choice at this point. So what I’m going to do, is talk to their customer service department see if there’s any type of ‘promo’ they can work with us where we can retain our current pricing locked in.

When we build our new house in a few years, will deal with the installation of fiber optic then.

 

[maflynn]

So, its been a few days and I've been living on streaming. I can't say the jury is still out, simply because I'm refusing to spend over 200 dollars with Comcast on a product that my family barely uses. One daughter never watches traditional tv, just streaming anyways, the other likes to watch the local news. Hard to justify that much money.

As for Youtube tv, it seems fine, it has everything I want, though I did make some observations.

• YTTV seems to force the TV into a different image profile, where I needed to adjust the brightness, contrast, sharpness, etc. This doesn't matter if the streaming app is from my LG tv, or Xbox. Same exact phenomenon
• DisneyPlus' settings to turn off HDR does not work. I've googled it and saw my issue is not uncommon. The problem is with many Tvs only giving lip service to HDR, that when HDR content is streamed the image is woefully dark. I've had to make adjustments to said profiles on the TV (HDR specific ones) and that's a quasi work around
• Its taking some getting used to YTTV's guide and how it works, this isn't a negative, but rather its just different
• Streaming (for the most part) is content focused, where as traditional tv is channel focused. That is you go to the cooking channel to see what's on, you don't really have a choice. With streaming apps, its content focused. Want to watch Good Eats, go to DiscoveryPlus and select that show.

Overall, the more I see how this working, and talking with others, I'm having a more difficult time understanding Comcast's position of not discounting my tv package and letting me a long time customer go. I was willing to stay if they cut the price to 175 (internet + tv). So instead of getting 175 from me, they're now only getting 100.

Finally, my internet is still be supplied by comcast, as Verizon 5g is not available, nothing is, other then DSL which of course in this day and age, is not a feasible alternative.

 

[bradl]

Finally, my internet is still be supplied by comcast, as Verizon 5g is not available, nothing is, other then DSL which of course in this day and age, is not a feasible alternative.

This one got me.

I'd love to take you down to my paternal grandmother's house. It is 25 minutes from the closest town, and that town is barely 5000 people. Next closest town is 50 miles away, and it has 25000 people. The house is on roughly 20 acres of land, but it is just land and house, nothing more. Only two overhead wires touch the house: one for power, one for phone. In short, she's still paying for an analog phone. If she wanted to get online, she'd be on a 56k modem. And yes, those still exist, as she's out in Native American country. She'd LOVE your DSL option!

That said, if anything I'd say to get your internet speeds as high as you can, and then see if you can hang a free-to-air HD antenna somewhere and plug it into whatever TV you want (more than likely it will go by coax). That will get you the HD tier of the local channels, and leave you to streaming. That would get you all you'd need for now.

BL.

 

[Huntn]

So, its been a few days and I've been living on streaming. I can't say the jury is still out, simply because I'm refusing to spend over 200 dollars with Comcast on a product that my family barely uses. One daughter never watches traditional tv, just streaming anyways, the other likes to watch the local news. Hard to justify that much money.

As for Youtube tv, it seems fine, it has everything I want, though I did make some observations.

• YTTV seems to force the TV into a different image profile, where I needed to adjust the brightness, contrast, sharpness, etc. This doesn't matter if the streaming app is from my LG tv, or Xbox. Same exact phenomenon
• DisneyPlus' settings to turn off HDR does not work. I've googled it and saw my issue is not uncommon. The problem is with many Tvs only giving lip service to HDR, that when HDR content is streamed the image is woefully dark. I've had to make adjustments to said profiles on the TV (HDR specific ones) and that's a quasi work around
• Its taking some getting used to YTTV's guide and how it works, this isn't a negative, but rather its just different
• Streaming (for the most part) is content focused, where as traditional tv is channel focused. That is you go to the cooking channel to see what's on, you don't really have a choice. With streaming apps, its content focused. Want to watch Good Eats, go to DiscoveryPlus and select that show.

Overall, the more I see how this working, and talking with others, I'm having a more difficult time understanding Comcast's position of not discounting my tv package and letting me a long time customer go. I was willing to stay if they cut the price to 175 (internet + tv). So instead of getting 175 from me, they're now only getting 100.

Finally, my internet is still be supplied by comcast, as Verizon 5g is not available, nothing is, other then DSL which of course in this day and age, is not a feasible alternative.

I have friends who live in rural Minnesota and DSL is all there is.

I think the Cable Companies are somewhat in trouble, even when they try to jack up the price on internet to make up for the shortfall in bloated cable package revenue. That all boils down to competition which frankly there is not that much, most of us are hostages. At one point in time my Cable, internet, and security monitoring was $230. My Dad in Florida is paying $200 for cable, internet, and VOIP phone.

I’m now paying $60 for internet, and $35 for Sling TV and even there we don’t watch most of the channels. Helping is that a third party company not associated with our cable company (Suddenlink) just ran fiber optic though the neighborhood. Suddenlink has frequent outages. We’ve had this new service for a month and so far, it just works. And I took the opportunity to dump my basic cable package too.

The good thing about Sling, Hulu, or YTTV, is that you are actually getting channels like AMC, TCM, Home and Garden, etc, that you could not normally get without a cable provider account who the channel has negotiated a contract with. Sling has a grid layout of the channels that looks just like my cable TV guide looked like.

 

[Huntn]

Well, unfortunately, our fiber optic install didn’t go as planned. When the company arrived to make the install, The technician needed to access something underground from the opposite side of the house, but because the temperatures are hovering around 10°, he said it wasn’t doable until spring when the weather warms. Not only that, they wanted to run a network cable through our garage and into our downstairs media room, [which is where our router/modem is], and in order for him to do that, he was going to have to drill a hole through our walls and into the garage, which would’ve been completely unsightly. And to top it all off, they didn’t tell us that we had to purchase two adapters at $35 apiece to make the transition. So given the annoyances, we just decided to cancel our installation, and keep Spectrum.

But what really peeves me off, is we paid ahead of time for our promo package, and when they wanted to refund us, they wanted to issue it in the form of a prepaid debit card. And my response to that was? Absolutely not. They can refund us in our original form of payment. Not everybody wants a prepaid debit card.

To be honest, we’ve been really content with Spectrums service, and the range in the house is excellent, we just want to boost our speeds a bit. So the downside, is we know we’re overpaying for our Wi-Fi, but we have no other choice at this point. So what I’m going to do, is talk to their customer service department see if there’s any type of ‘promo’ they can work with us where we can retain our current pricing locked in.

When we build our new house in a few years, will deal with the installation of fiber optic then.

Fiber Optics Internet Install talk Dec2021- We just got Fiber Optics for internet (North Houston Suburbs).To install it in the neighborhood, the entire neighborhood, they had a fancy drill machine that could tunnel the wire across the yard while remaining on the edge of the yard, across the utilities, the sprinkler system, and the driveway, even across and under the street. For every house there are two access boxes in the ground on each side of the yard that sits on the property line.

To run it to the house it was my option, my preference was the side with less obstacles, so they went up the driveway side with just special 6” shovels. The line is 6” under the surface. Good to make note of where it is. The outside internet line has a bright green conduit covering that maybe could withstand a couple of hits with a shovel, not sure if you stood on the shovel.

Back adjacent to the garage, they came out of the ground to a junction box. The portion under the box has 1/2” pvc pipe for protection. Above the box, it’s just a little black fiber optic cable (1/4 the size of coaxial cable) that runs up the side of the brick to the overhang and then into the attic. We have a single story house. The cable is not very noticeable.

The neighbors ran it to the same place but went straight into the wall horizontally to a room and placed the modem there, using an extender, wireless nodes that expand the network around to all portions of the house. They have a 2 story house. Ours is single story.

In our house the wire went though the attic, down through the top of the wall in our family room, where our current modem and router sat. This is a good central location. The installer had to use a 4’ drill bit to drill a hole through the fire stop in the wall (while in the attic).

The company is Tachus. They provide a modum but not a router, so previously I was using a combo, Surfbord modem/router so I did not have to pay rent to Suddenlink for that. Fir this service I bought a new Linksys Wifi 6 Dualband router (about $150). One month later so far so good!

I learned that fiber optic cables are not spliceable. They come manufactured in set lengths like 30’ or 100’. They used a 100’ length to get from the outside ix to our family room.

We’ve had it for a month and so far service has been dependable. I’m paying $65/month for 100Mbps service. For 2 people, it’s fine for streaming. The thing I notice is that for large downloads that I do not do every day, it takes longer, but my upload speed is twice as fast (old service 400Mbps down, 50MBPS up).

 

[satcomer]

Then for the antenna look at this guy:

 

[maflynn]

Then for the antenna look at this guy:

I tried a couple of different HD antennas over the years, and it never really worked as well as I had hoped

 

[MBAir2010]

We have a RCA $38 TV antenna that gets good reception, the key is the hight were i added a 20ft pole
to get more stations last month. the range is almost 60 miles, and there is no amplifier involved.
seems to me the local stations are cable tv owned and won't increase the signal.
which is a shame. hopefully more homeowners will cut the chord and these satin will need to increase their viewing radius.

 

[satcomer]

I tried a couple of different HD antennas over the years, and it never really worked as well as I had hoped

The Higher of your antenna (usually on pole) would be good if you know the direction of the station antenna location by looking at the web site Attennas Direction.com to see where the transmitters are located by your location!


Plus try this antenna on pole connected to home!

 

[maflynn]

Revving this thread, as I'm wondering about other folks and if others have cut the cord, or even gone back to cable after a time? With almost a year under my belt, I wanted to revisit my decision to go to YTTV and see if its the best deal. Currently I'm paying a little more then a 100 dollars for internet (to comcast) and 65 to YTTV.

I just looked at xfinity, and their internet + tv bundle and at first glance it looks tempting but this is comcast we're talking about. So for 1 year you can pay 109 dollars and then the price goes up to 140.00 dollars. Still cheaper then what I have now. But lets dig a little deeper:
Broadcast tv fee 25 dollar
Regional sports fee 19 bucks,
Cable Boxes 15 dollars (from my bill in January)
Taxes 10 dollars (from my bill in January)

Adding all that together you get
Year 1: 109 + 25 + 19 + 15 + 10 = 178
Year 2+ 140 + 25 + 19 + 15 + 10 = 209

Btw, I'd have to slow down my internet, as I have the 1,000 Mbps level of internet. To summarize, I'll get slower internet, hidden fees and pay more per month. I'm still a little bit surprised because people are turning towards streaming and they're not making this more affordable

 

[yaxomoxay]

Revving this thread, as I'm wondering about other folks and if others have cut the cord, or even gone back to cable after a time? With almost a year under my belt, I wanted to revisit my decision to go to YTTV and see if its the best deal. Currently I'm paying a little more then a 100 dollars for internet (to comcast) and 65 to YTTV.

I just looked at xfinity, and their internet + tv bundle and at first glance it looks tempting but this is comcast we're talking about. So for 1 year you can pay 109 dollars and then the price goes up to 140.00 dollars. Still cheaper then what I have now. But lets dig a little deeper:
Broadcast tv fee 25 dollar
Regional sports fee 19 bucks,
Cable Boxes 15 dollars (from my bill in January)
Taxes 10 dollars (from my bill in January)

Adding all that together you get
Year 1: 109 + 25 + 19 + 15 + 10 = 178
Year 2+ 140 + 25 + 19 + 15 + 10 = 209

Btw, I'd have to slow down my internet, as I have the 1,000 Mbps level of internet. To summarize, I'll get slower internet, hidden fees and pay more per month. I'm still a little bit surprised because people are turning towards streaming and they're not making this more affordable
View attachment 2096966

Still no cable for me and I don’t regret it.
I currently pay for Netflix and HBO, about $35/month. Pretty soon I’ll cancel HBO and go to Paramount+ to watch Yellowstone.

 

[maflynn]

Still no cable for me and I don’t regret it.
I currently pay for Netflix and HBO, about $35/month.

Its funny, perhaps because I'm a boomer, but I really don't watch netflix. My kids do, but what I want is the typical tv stations. YTTV gives that to me, from what I know, I can get so called traditional tv from Sling, Hulu (one of their higher end tiers) and DirectTV streaming - there's probably others as well. When I think of cutting the cord, its with that mind, basically a like for like replacement. I am not dissatisfied with YTTV, it gives me 80 or 90% of what I used to watching for less.

I tried cutting the cord a few years ago, and back then the only way for us to get streaming was through my PS4. That turned off my wife, i.e., use the remote to turn the tv on, get the controller navigate the PS4 interface, select the streaming service and navigate that service. Back then the UI/UX of stuff was not as easy to use and that just hampered our adoption.

When push comes to shove we want as a process as seamless as possible to use our TV the way we've been doing for a hundred years (because we're boomers )

 

[yaxomoxay]

Its funny, perhaps because I'm a boomer, but I really don't watch netflix. My kids do, but what I want is the typical tv stations. YTTV gives that to me, from what I know, I can get so called traditional tv from Sling, Hulu (one of their higher end tiers) and DirectTV streaming - there's probably others as well. When I think of cutting the cord, its with that mind, basically a like for like replacement. I am not dissatisfied with YTTV, it gives me 80 or 90% of what I used to watching for less.

I tried cutting the cord a few years ago, and back then the only way for us to get streaming was through my PS4. That turned off my wife, i.e., use the remote to turn the tv on, get the controller navigate the PS4 interface, select the streaming service and navigate that service. Back then the UI/UX of stuff was not as easy to use and that just hampered our adoption.

When push comes to shove we want as a process as seamless as possible to use our TV the way we've been doing for a hundred years (because we're boomers )

Ultimately it’s just a matter of preferences. I don’t like reality shows, regular programming, talk shows and so on. I despise CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News (when I watch them while I do cardio at the gym I understand why I despise them), so even for that it’s pretty useless to me.

As for sports, I get the free MLB TV app with TMobile and I watch some MLS and UFC (on ESPN+ when I have it) but I am not a person that watches all games and matches. MLS will be on AppleTV+ next year without blackouts so even that is another reason to not go back to cable.

I do love TV series and movies, especially long slow shows, so streaming works like a charm, in addition to the Criterion Blu-ray’s I buy. Most importantly: no ads, at least for now. I am one of those people that is willing to pay extra to skip ads.

I think that compared to just 5 years ago, streaming TV is much easier thanks to the improvement in smart tv’s.

But again, I feel it’s a thing where there’s no right or wrong.

PS: I forgot I also pay for YouTube premium for the whole family.

 

[Huntn]

Revving this thread, as I'm wondering about other folks and if others have cut the cord, or even gone back to cable after a time? With almost a year under my belt, I wanted to revisit my decision to go to YTTV and see if its the best deal. Currently I'm paying a little more then a 100 dollars for internet (to comcast) and 65 to YTTV.

I just looked at xfinity, and their internet + tv bundle and at first glance it looks tempting but this is comcast we're talking about. So for 1 year you can pay 109 dollars and then the price goes up to 140.00 dollars. Still cheaper then what I have now. But lets dig a little deeper:
Broadcast tv fee 25 dollar
Regional sports fee 19 bucks,
Cable Boxes 15 dollars (from my bill in January)
Taxes 10 dollars (from my bill in January)

Adding all that together you get
Year 1: 109 + 25 + 19 + 15 + 10 = 178
Year 2+ 140 + 25 + 19 + 15 + 10 = 209

Btw, I'd have to slow down my internet, as I have the 1,000 Mbps level of internet. To summarize, I'll get slower internet, hidden fees and pay more per month. I'm still a little bit surprised because people are turning towards streaming and they're not making this more affordable
View attachment 2096966

I talked a lot about cutting the cable, but did not actually cut it completely (kept basic) , because my wife insisted on convienent access to US Football. That is until, fiber optics came to the neighborhood, and she is less interested in football these days, then cable was really gone.

Of course they are trying to get me back, I am paying more for fiber than the current offerings from Optimum (Suddenlink) 300mb for $30 a month for 2 years before it goes back up and TV packages, I’m not sure what, for $30 a month of course on promotion, the hook to lure you back.

My biggest single beef with Suddenlink/Optimum is their huge channel packages of which I watch just a couple, and their unreliable service. In Minnesota, I went from thinking internet was just there, to here in North Houston, cursing the cable company for weekly outages. They might be short primarily internet outages, but they happened seemingly all of the time. Now on fiber for 8 months, and I can’t remember an outage, and much/most of the stuff we watch though streaming would not be available included in the cost of regular cable. They just want to charge us for over a hundred channels we don’t watch.

And though I am paying $35 a month for SlingTV, we hardly watch anything there, except MSNBC and Turner Classic Movies. I am considering dumping Sling, which does not bode well at all for our return to regular cable programming. 🤔

The type of stuff we are watching:

• Netflix (regularly)
• Amazon Prime (regularly)
• HBO (got a 1 year deal for $9 a month, will return to hit and run subscribing when this goes away.)
• AppleTV (got a complimentary 1 year though T-Mobile, will return to hit and run subscribing when this goes away.)
• Disney+ (wife, will get rid of this when wife gets tired of it.)
• Britbox (wife, same.)
• SlingTV (mimics normal cable selection, semi-regularly)

 

[maflynn]

The type of stuff we are watching:

Here's what I'm subscribing too

• Youtube TV
• Netflix (as I mentioned, I don't even use this, but the kiddos do)
• Disney+ I'm not paying for this, I get it free from VZW. If they end that promotion, I'll not pay for it
• AppleTV, I get this through Apple one subscription. I wanted the other features of that sub, and other then Friday night baseball I've not used it

So basically, I have 4 streaming services, but I only use one, my kids use one, and no one uses Disney or AppleTV. I'm not paying for Disney and I may see what I can do about my Apple One sub, since I'm not fully using that service.

 

[yaxomoxay]

Yeah I have to revise my list from above.
So I have:
- Netflix
- HBO
- AppleTV+ (because I have AppleOne)
- Prime (because I have Amazon prime)
- YouTube premium (family subscription)
- MLB TV (free with T-Mobile)

The only 3 I actually pay for because I want the specific services are Netflix, HBO, and YouTube. I often cycle HBO with other services such as Paramount or Disney+.

 

[Huntn]

Oh, I forgot, doing a 1 month Paramount+ to catch up on Evil Season 3, well worth it.

I’ve noted that it’s well past due to loosen up on public broadcasting standards regarding language and nudity, or no one will remain watching it. 🤔

 

[yaxomoxay]

Oh, I forgot, doing a 1 month Paramount+ to catch up on Evil Season 3, well worth it.

Yep, that’s what I am going to watch when I get Paramount+ back for Yellowstone. Last episode I watched was in the silent monastery, very funny!

 

[maflynn]

Oh, I forgot, doing a 1 month Paramount+ to catch up

I was tempted to get Paramount+ but due to inflation increasing and my salary not keeping up, I've been looking at ways to cut back. They're not asking for a lot of money, but small expenditures add up to large and I definitely think you can fall into the trap of death by a thousand cuts with these services.

 

[Huntn]

I was tempted to get Paramount+ but due to inflation increasing and my salary not keeping up, I've been looking at ways to cut back. They're not asking for a lot of money, but small expenditures add up to large and I definitely think you can fall into the trap of death by a thousand cuts with these services.

That is definitely a threat in the future as every entity in what is known as television seeks to scoop streaming revenue. 🤔

 

[maflynn]

So both my wife and I are underwhelmed by YTTV, and now that I bought the new 4k Apple TV, I think I'll sign up for their free trial. I've been doing more research and what not and I'm ready to give it a shot. The tier that that gives us the biggest bang for our buck is a bit more expensive then YTTV, so I'm disappointed in that, to be sure but we'll see how things flesh out and go with it.

 

[HDFan]

I just looked at xfinity, and their internet + tv bundle and at first glance it looks tempting

Need to call every couple of years to get the discounts reapplied. Quad play helps reduce costs as well: Gigabit internet with unlimited data, TV, phone and home security.