DishNetwork or DirectTV?

Any other comments out there? I've had DirecTV for 10+ years now, but I'm paying $80 a month for the Choice package, 1 DVR, 1 HD receiver. I'm thinking about switching to DishNetwork Turbo HD with 1 HD DVR and 1 HD receiver, and it would be about $20 less per month. It is less channels with Dishnetwork, but who watches Galavision and Lifetime?!?

 

DirecTV did to me exactly what they are being class-action sued for in more than one state.

I moved exactly 1.2 miles from my old house to this one. I used the "movers package" from them two days before I disconnected the receivers and hooked them up at the new house.

Guy shows up and tells me I have old receivers and they won't work anymore. Keep in mind this is 4 days after they were working fine 1.2 miles away. So he gives me new boxes. Apparently that meant I was locked into a NEW 2 year contract.

I went to temporarily suspend service since I got laid off. They declared I had terminated the two years early, got into my bank account and took 461 bucks. Early termination fee, "deposit" for two receivers (they never asked for them back, ever), balance due while the service was suspended, and the NEXT month's bill. I had been a DirecTV customer since 1990, this is the way they treat their (formerly) loyal customers.

DirecTV are bastards. My bank took the money back from them and changed my account number so they can't take it back. Now, they can rot in hell.

 

I called DirecTV and was able to negotiate the following:

1. $199.99 HD DVR - $60 instant credit
2. Free HD access for 1 yr - $119.88
3. Free DVR service for 6 mo - $35.94
4. Free Showtime for 3 months

So I pay upfront for the HD DVR to be dropped shipped to my house (I'm not paying some tech $99 to hook it up!). Then I get my money back in the form of credits for the next 12 months. I will actually end up about $17 ahead at the end of the 12 months.

Should I ask for more? I've been a DirecTV customer for over 10 years, and I didn't have to ask very hard for this deal.

 

So after doing alot of research and price comparisons, I've decided to switch to Dishnetwork. Here's what I'm getting:

1) Classic Bronze 100 Plus with local channels
2) Bronze HD
3) 1 HD DVR receiver
4) 1 HD standard receiver
5) Cinemax - 1 yr for $0.01

All this for $32.97/mo for 6 months, then $67.97/mo for the next 18 months (24 month commitment). I'm paying almost $82/mo right now with DirecTV.

All told I'll be saving almost $500 over the next 2 years vs. my DirecTV service, plus I get 2 HD receivers (only 1 with DirecTV) with one of those being an HD DVR (no HD DVR with DirecTV).

Install is scheduled for Saturday so I can be present. I'm not going to cancel DirecTV until the install is completed and I'm satisfied.

 

I've made some observations on both:
I have Dish BTW
My folks have Direct TV- Their equipment cost imo is overpriced. I know the serivce is regional and there are different service centers.. but my folks had to do without for a week at one point to get the main cabling repaired. Now keep in mind they (folks) have not one but 8, yes eight! receivers. They still blew 'em off.

My Dish guy went the extra mile setting up my system. Made sure and double checked aiming, signal strength, connections. Heck I hadn't even moved in yet, no tv's in the house. He said no prob.. I plugged my HD in and smiled. I have a decent treeline behind the house and still no signal degradation during foul weather.

Dish is faster on channel switching esp on HD feeds and the guides are much better laid out for programming, recording.

 

I'm happy with my DirecTV service. The new DVR is nice... plenty of capacity, can stream media over my home network to it, and they have tons of awesome free video-on-demand content. If you call them and tell them that you think dish has a better package, you can easily get them to throw in a bunch of freebies. I got the HD-DVR for $99, showtime free for a year, a coupon book for discounts on ppv stuff and other programming, as well as a 3 free months of programming. My signal is awesome too. I've had it for about a year now, and it's never dropped on me to my knowledge.

 

Do you have the newer style DVR box? (If you look on the back, I think it'll have cooling fins back there).

We were running the older designed box for a couple years and the thing kept locking up and causing us all sorts of problems. They finally sent us a newly designed box and we've haven't had any problems since. It's about damn time! Love the service otherwise....

 

Yeah, I've got the newer box. It's 100x better than the crap DVR from Comcast.

 

Dish sucks, Directv all the way!

 

i keep not getting dish, and always wish i had..

You can watch AlJazeera with Dish, AND all the football games

 

Got Dishnetwork installed today, very happy with the service and picture quality. Another nice feature is I can now use my picture-in-picture on my big screen TV, I couldn't do that with DirecTV. Plus I'll be saving over $600 in programming fees for the next 24 months.

 

DishNetwork blows DirectTV away, within two months they will have more HD channels for less price...
The only thing that Direct has is the NFL ticket. Word is that will go away in two years though... NFL network is taking all the games once the contracts are up.
DishNetwork has a new DVR coming out in three weeks... 922. It is the fastest, biggest hrd drv and a built in slingbox. With the sling technology you will be able to watch your home TV/recorded shows anywhere in the world on a laptop, computer, PDA with a wireless connection.

 

We recently switched to DishNetwork from Charter Communications, who will systematicaly suck the life out of you if you let them.

We don't watch all that many channels, so we got the TurboHD Bronze package. In fact, the only channel we gave up that we really cared about was Fox News. To our surprise, though, even Fox News has been coming in the last few days. We couldn't be happier.

We have two HDTVs (one w/ a DVR) and two standard definition TVs (one w/ a DVR). Almost every channel we get is HD, including all locals. We pay just under $50/month including taxes, fees. Except for a $6/month fee that has been waived for the first 9 months, it's not a promotial fee.

 

Cable.

 

And only get 20 channels in HD? No thanks.

 

Delmarva... I would think that you would be all over DishNetwork, with your type of job.
Just think, you could watch every episode of the "Office" while deployed to some Sheethole place. Just bring out your laptop with wireless and click on your DVR's homepage and start watching your TV from a thousand miles away. Plus if you recorded shows you could watch them over and over.

 

I personnally have to go with Directv just for the NFL packages!!!

 

How's that work? I have DIsh.... Thought I needed slingbox to do that...

 

DishNetwork has a new DVR coming out in three weeks... 922. It is the fastest, biggest hrd drv/ 1 terrabite and a built in slingbox. With the sling technology you will be able to watch your home TV/recorded shows anywhere in the world on a laptop, computer, PDA with a wireless connection. stated above...

 

Sweet. It might be time to trade in my trusty series one I've hacked a dozen times to end up with 600GB. If only I wouldn't lose that lifetime subscription.