Cord Cutting Advice Please

Meek

Meek

New Fish
so I'm finally going to stop paying Directv the big bucks for a package that I only use for football and movies.

I'd be interested in anyone's experiences with alternate programming that allows for recording ESPN live football games.

I've used Sling and it's fine except you cannot record ESPN (as per their licensing agreement). I don't usually get to watch games live to conclusion so DVRing them is key.

Anyone tried YouTube TV? It seems like the best option, but who has used it and can verify/quash?

Other ideas?
 
How easy do you need it to be?

I don't record games, but if I were to do so, I'd just install any of a number of free screen recorders and go to town. Just watch your settings or a full football game could gobble half your hard drive. A quick google suggests that OBS Studio is a good choice. Download, install, and you can record anything you want. I've done this before with Fraps and CamStudio, and it works (vaguely remember CS being fiddly to set up).

As for actually watching the game, the old Reddit CFB streams sub has been replaced by the site sportsurge.net, and it's fucking sweet. It's just a stream aggregator, but it actually has a pretty nice interface that makes it easy to find streams. If you aren't fortified with adblockers and whatnot, tell your computer to prepare its anus... So far, I have yet to see a Husky football or basketball game that wasn't streaming on sportsurge. Watched the Seahawks game that way last night, too.

As for watching anything else--anything[/i] else--a good VPN is $40 per year* and makes your web traffic anonymous to your ISP. So install and go nuts. Deluge is a great torrent client, and you can find anything you want to watch at the usual haunts (good ol' Pirate Bay or 1337x.to if/when TPB is down).

*I've been a staunch supporter of Private Internet Access (PIA) for years now. Aside from being fast and with encrypted traffic, they're the one VPN provider that has held up in multiple courts that they do not keep logs. That being said, they recently sold out, and the new owner is not trustworthy. It's been suggested that I ditch PIA and switch providers. I'll be switching to Mullvad, as it's the most secure VPN on the market.

I haven't had cable TV in at least 10 years now, and there's not really anything I've missed. I don't record things, but I'd make use of a screen recorder if I wanted to. There have been very few CFB games over the last three or four seasons that haven't found their way to YouTube within a week, so seems kind of redundant. I have Netflix because it's cheap and I have kids, but otherwise it's all free.
 
OBS is free but has paid options for regular updates (subscription model). You can even use VLC to record your screen but no idea how it would hold up over a few hours for a game...
 
so I'm finally going to stop paying Directv the big bucks for a package that I only use for football and movies.

I'd be interested in anyone's experiences with alternate programming that allows for recording ESPN live football games.

I've used Sling and it's fine except you cannot record ESPN (as per their licensing agreement). I don't usually get to watch games live to conclusion so DVRing them is key.

Anyone tried YouTube TV? It seems like the best option, but who has used it and can verify/quash?

Other ideas?
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Ditched DirectTV a month or so ago - pretty happy with Hulu Live so far. Includes all the local channels so I can watch the hottie news bimbos (IKW). Added on HBO and Showtime for proper tittay exposure and life is good. I can't remember why I didn't go with YoutubeTV - it was either lack of local or HGTV which would be a non-starter in the Throbber household.

DVR is included without restriction as far as I know.

No LarryScottFS Network but I didn't have that with DirectTV anyway because of, well, LarryScottFS.

 
I went YouTubeTV around October and liked it. About $53/month which was slightly less than the cable portion of my bundle through spectrum.

No Pac-12 network so I might miss the big games against Sac St, Portlandia St & Idaho St the next few years which means I’ll need to rely on the bored for knowing whether or not we have a big dick gun slinger on the team.

The recording function is nice. I can either start a game from the beginning or live in progress. If I hit pause on a game, I have yet to find how long it’ll stay paused, for example when I had Dish, it would only stay on pause for an hour.

I get the local channels so if you want that, it’s a plus. i think the basic package is around 55-60 channels and when you log in to your subscription, you have the option to hide channels from guide list.

There are some add on bundles but I don’t remember what.

Now that football season is over, I’ll put my subscription on pause or cancel it until late August.
 
You can DVR ESPN on Sling now. 10 hours free DVR included standard. BTN will be I n the lineup prior to next football season
 
i went with Hulu Live TV + the expanded DVR/unlimited screens bundle.

my research concluded that YouTube TV and Hulu Live were pretty similar but that Hulu has the slightly better user interface.

do not get the Pac12 Network but I can always decide to grab it on a month-to-month basis on Sling if something about our schedule compels me to watch those low grade opponents. Reality is that any non-conf game that ends up on the Pac12 Network isn't worth paying for anyway.

With our Hulu package we get Disney+ for $1/month added on too. Since my family already has Prime Video and Netflix I will not plan to add-on the premium channels (HBO, etc) because I think we get enough content now... don't need everything. With Hulu I also get a lot of the series I really enjoy anyway (Baskets, Vikings, Mayans MC, Snowfall) so I'm just going to give up on the ones that are with the premium channels.

@Mad_Son are you sure you can DVR ESPN live games? I was always able to record ESPN programming that was NOT a live game previously. The local channels make a big difference too b/c now I can get all the CBS (and CBS Sports Network), ABC, Fox (including FS1, FS2 which I believe Sling did not carry), and NBC live games.
 
i went with Hulu Live TV + the expanded DVR/unlimited screens bundle.

my research concluded that YouTube TV and Hulu Live were pretty similar but that Hulu has the slightly better user interface.

do not get the Pac12 Network but I can always decide to grab it on a month-to-month basis on Sling if something about our schedule compels me to watch those low grade opponents. Reality is that any non-conf game that ends up on the Pac12 Network isn't worth paying for anyway.

With our Hulu package we get Disney+ for $1/month added on too. Since my family already has Prime Video and Netflix I will not plan to add-on the premium channels (HBO, etc) because I think we get enough content now... don't need everything. With Hulu I also get a lot of the series I really enjoy anyway (Baskets, Vikings, Mayans MC, Snowfall) so I'm just going to give up on the ones that are with the premium channels.

@Mad_Son are you sure you can DVR ESPN live games? I was always able to record ESPN programming that was NOT a live game previously. The local channels make a big difference too b/c now I can get all the CBS (and CBS Sports Network), ABC, Fox (including FS1, FS2 which I believe Sling did not carry), and NBC live games.
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Sling has FS1,2 now
I get local over the air for free
Hulu live has commercials - my Hulu doesn't

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You can pay a couple extra dollars (like $2 per month) for commercial free Hulu Live.

I live in the fucking woods surrounded by huge peaks - ain't no free over the air TV. It all comes through the interweb.

Thanks to @meek for the heads up on the Disney+ Bundle. Just added it for a couple more bucks per month.

There's something about Disney that I like but I can't quite put my finger on it:

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If you have Verizon you get Disney + for free just fyi.

I went with Youtube TV for now and am pretty happy. If nothing else, fights with the wife over football are way down. I've found that I'm now pretty incapable of watching the nfl live and not able to skip through all of their stoppages.
 
If you have Verizon you get Disney + for free just fyi.

I went with Youtube TV for now and am pretty happy. If nothing else, fights with the wife over football are way down. I've found that I'm now pretty incapable of watching the nfl live and not able to skip through all of their stoppages.
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I was going to pick YouTube TV but my wife and son love Disney+ so since Hulu owns Disney+ I just decided to take Hulu Live TV for that reason, but using any of my devicdes as my TV is the key now - especially when I travel.
 
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