Gadgetory

cutting the cord you've heard this term it means saying goodbye to all those expensive pay TV services cable and satellite and instead filling that television with content from a different source over your home broadband connection the one you already have and pay for you still get a lot of the same TV shows and movies still often in high-def but in a whole different manner that I think you might like a lot more it's the future of TV no doubt about that I'm going to show you how you can do it why you would do it and also why you might not want to do it just yet a connected TV connected blu-ray deck game console or connected TV set-top box are among the tools you can choose from and on them you'll find some combination of Netflix Hulu Amazon Instant Video iTunes streaming audio and even the scene that channel now you won't find every service I just mentioned on every device I just mentioned so first research the shows you want to watch go to a site like clicker and research where it's streams and then go buy your gear accordingly and know that just about every TV console set-top box or DVD blu-ray player you buy going forward will almost certainly be connected the smart buyers of year they buy can stream content their existing gear maybe cannot now I should point out if you're a big fan of Network shows and want to see them right away sometimes the easiest way to cut the cord is to install a PC in your living room and stream the shows on the network websites but I find this kind of offensive too big too ugly too noisy if you're gonna do that at least invest in one of these quiet small form factor computers but remember whatever gear you buy the key differences it all connects the same way over your existing home broadband connection either wired or wireless and after a pretty simple one-time setup you're ready to discover the good the bad and the bottom line about cutting the cord the good ostensibly it's real cheap 8 bucks a month for Netflix or Hulu flat rate few or no commercials and broadcast websites they're free with very limited commercial interruptions also its on-demand it's ready when you are no more worrying about when the show airs or if you set the DVR now the bad there's a lot less to watch than on cable satellite and over-the-air TV don't let anyone tell you otherwise secondly you're gonna be missing out on streaming local news if you care or local major sports teams and finally it's kind of complicated you're gonna be hunting through many services versus just one like a cable or satellite provider the bottom line find out if enough of what you like to watch is even available to stream and then do a little fuzzy math to determine if this is right for you or just a high-tech hobby first subtract cable and satellite fees next you got to subtract out some hip miss you're gonna be seeing shows later than some of your friends and the last thing you've got to take out is gonna be access to local news and your local major league sports teams now add the cost of gear if you don't already own some cord cutting equipment you've got to go buy some things you meant to pay for some new services they're fairly cheap like Netflix or Hulu at 8 bucks a month and finally think about this when you break up that bundle of cable TV and Internet you have right now they may charge you more for the internet portion alone okay now you've got to multiply a couple things multiply your frustration you're gonna be spending more effort finding what you want to watch on TV and oddly enough we're gonna multiply the number of commercials you see there aren't a lot of them on streaming when you cut the cord but you can't skip them and finally divide divine pay TVs tyranny now you're only gonna watch what you want when you want and the way you want to okay it's not real math but what do you expect I was an English major but this is what you've got to go through the figure out if connected TV is right for you cutting the cord for another take on this in great real-life detail check out David Katz Myers 30-day experiment he is our TV guru and he tried to live with TV without cable and satellite great insights there on cnet.com i'm brian coulis thanks for watching