05-05-2010, 06:44 PM
silvarios wrote:
[quote=GGD]
I pay them for Cable TV, and I was getting what I was paying for in a much more convenient way, but now I have to pay an additional $2/month for electricity to power their cable boxes, and find space in my TV area to put their box.
This is the first time I've ever had to use a cable box to get watch the cable TV that I pay for (I don't subscribe to any premium channels), and I've had Cable TV for a few decades.
If you have limited basic, you were not paying for the content. I think that's what evilrobot and other's are referring to specifically. If you had another tier, you were warned months ago (year+ perhaps) that analog was going away and that you needed to switch to a digital box. Stupid? Probably. I think Comcast should keep the old standard basic (or a decent subset) as clear QAM and only have the boxes for "premium" content.
I have limited basic and still enjoy many clear QAM channels. Well, enjoy is a strong word. We barely watch regular TV. I pay for limited basic solely to get a break on my Internet costs. Otherwise, I would pay the same amount per month for just the internet.
Nathan
I have what Comcast now calls "Xfinity TV" or "Digital Cable" or "Standard Cable", they changed the name several times in the past year, it used to be called "Extended Basic" for many years.
Over a year ago Comcast said that the boxes would be required (effective a date sometime in March 2009), and I got the boxes at that time, and everything that the boxes could get, I could get with Clear QAM, without converting to analog. I wasn't stealing any programming, I was just watching what I was paying for without using additional equipment.
I've been saving the boxes for the day that they would actually force me to use it, and for a while it looked like that would never happen, but last summer they got an FCC ruling that allowed them to encrypt some additional stuff that allowed them to do what they did to my service recently.