Spectrum - TV Essentials 60

[KryptoNyte]

I was offered this package the other day for $20/month (they claim this is the base price with no discounts). It has no local channels, so no $21 broadcast surcharge in addition. The total addition to my Spectrum bill was $21, 20 for the service and a dollar of tax. When I dialed this into the Channels DVR software, these are the working channels:

Comedy Central
MTV
VH1
CMTV
BET
TVLand
Paramount
Logo
Nick Jr
A&E TV
History
FYI
Lifetime
Sundance
AMC
BBCA
IFC
We TV
Hallmark
Hallmark Movies & Mysteries
Hallmark Drama
OWN
Discovery
Food
Animal Planet
HGTV
TLC
Travel
ID
DIY (now Magnolia)
Cooking Channel
Science
AHC
Destination America
Discovery Life
Motor Trend
FXW (Fox Weather)
BUZZR
Comet
Charge
ConTV
REVN
TBD
Dove
NASA
NBCNEWS (NBCNN)
Cheddar
ETLive
NEWSMAX
CBSSportsHQ
CBSNEWS
ABCNews
Bloomberg
NHKWorld
Court TV
DW (DWEUR)
CMC USA
CMC
Weather Nation (WTHRNHD)
PBS Kids
FSTV
AMGTV
LX (news)
RETRO TV
Heartland
Positiv
Tastemade
NEWSY
EWTN
EPLUS TV
Global News
AccuWeather
(a bunch of shopping networks that I won't list)
(a bunch of non-local news affiliates, for major cities)

[pjpjpjpj]

Amazing how ALL THE REST OF CABLE of so inexpensive when the ESPN/Disney family is not included.

[KryptoNyte]

And when most high-level sports is omitted.

[sic0048]

Originally Posted by KryptoNyte

I was offered this package the other day for $20/month (they claim this is the base price with no discounts).

When I dialed this into the Channels DVR software, these are the working channels:

Can you give some more "flavor" on the Channels DVR software. What exactly is it providing (DVR service - duh ) and how it works? Is it stand alone or can you tie it into SageTV at all?

[KryptoNyte]

Channels DVR does something very similar to SageTV, as a standalone product. It's fairly well polished in many areas, but is still a work in progress in many other areas. The key advantage to Channels DVR is that it brings TV Everywhere (TVE) into the picture, which is basically a virtual tuner for the move that broadcast television is making to Internet streaming. Channels DVR has a recurring monthly fee of $8 or an $80 yearly fee, for which the user gets guide data and fairly decent technical support from the 3 or 4 developers involved. You can spend time in the Channels DVR forum to better understand their product, abilities and limitations:
https://community.getchannels.com/

Channels DVR also has a very good remote viewing experience, like from your phone while you're away from home, or with a Firestick at a hotel for example. SageTV has been doing this for years with Placeshifter, and now with the SageTV Android Client to some degree.

The other guys here in the forum have since figured out how to use Channels DVR's TVE capability as a generic tuner in SageTV, which brings TVE capability into SageTV, and does it surprisingly well. Here's the thread that works through the integration:
https://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=66804

[sic0048]

Thanks for the reply. That really helps me understand the options out there!

I think we are getting closer and closer to ditching OEM cable and this streaming option seems like a good fit.

[tvmaster2]

Originally Posted by KryptoNyte

Channels DVR does something very similar to SageTV, as a standalone product. It's fairly well polished in many areas, but is still a work in progress in many other areas. The key advantage to Channels DVR is that it brings TV Everywhere (TVE) into the picture, which is basically a virtual tuner for the move that broadcast television is making to Internet streaming. Channels DVR has a recurring monthly fee of $8 or an $80 yearly fee, for which the user gets guide data and fairly decent technical support from the 3 or 4 developers involved. You can spend time in the Channels DVR forum to better understand their product, abilities and limitations:
https://community.getchannels.com/

Channels DVR also has a very good remote viewing experience, like from your phone while you're away from home, or with a Firestick at a hotel for example. SageTV has been doing this for years with Placeshifter, and now with the SageTV Android Client to some degree.

The other guys here in the forum have since figured out how to use Channels DVR's TVE capability as a generic tuner in SageTV, which brings TVE capability into SageTV, and does it surprisingly well. Here's the thread that works through the integration:
https://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=66804

Not quite clear on the tuners used with Channels DVR - similar to Sage, aka Hauppauge and HDHomeRun, or something different?

[wayner]

Originally Posted by tvmaster2

Not quite clear on the tuners used with Channels DVR - similar to Sage, aka Hauppauge and HDHomeRun, or something different?

Channels DVR appears to work with TV Everywhere - this a way of watching your cable TV streamed through a web browser or phone app, kind of like Netflix. So you don't need a tuner like a HDHR or HDPVR or whatever as the software is capturing the stream over the internet.

[KryptoNyte]

One can't discount SageTV's abilities and customizations, virtually unmatched by any other software, and just because I'm not fond of all the Channels DVR features or lack there of doesn't mean those developers aren't doing something special in their own right.

For those of you who haven't been following TV Everywhere (TVE), it's good to know what it is going in to Channels DVR. The cable channels that you subscribe to, or whatever service you subscribe to (list in the link):

https://community.getchannels.com/t/...r-topics/20256

many of your subscribed channels are available by going directly to that network's website and logging in with your subscription login to watch live TV. For example, if you are a Spectrum cable subscriber and Hallmark is part of your subscription package, you should be able to go here:

https://www.watchhallmarktv.com/signin.html

and click on the Spectrum link, login with your Spectrum credentials, and watch Hallmark channels live, streaming. Imagine all the different channels and networks involved, and how you would have to visit each channel's website independently to login and watch live TV - pretty ugly. Now, if a person could assemble an EPG for all your subscribed channels that are available via TVE, and then write a program to automatic the login process and capture the stream for each channel, then you'd have something - Channels DVR. Because the TVE logins and streaming is a moving target, it requires developer intervention monthly, weekly, sometime daily, so the Channels DVR guys chase this constantly when required, so their monthly or yearly fee (mentioned later) seems insignificant, at least for me it's well worth it.

It's important to note that you may not get all channels that you subscribe to via TVE, Bally's for example is not an option for this kind of system because it's encrypted. Additionally, some local affiliates don't offer access via TVE streams (you have to be able to go to their website, login, and stream live linear television, like the local ABC news affiliate for example), so I've found that an antenna works great to capture the local stuff via HDHR and OTA. There are some local affiliates available via TVE, your location's results may vary.

Recently some of the folks here at SageTV, that are also Channels DVR subscribers (at $8/month or $80/year), can leverage the ability to capture those dynamic streams, and even import the EPG data, so that SageTV can now receive streaming channels. Ultimately, you can set up a virtual tuner in SageTV that can use a single stream from any of your subscribed channels. Then you can set up a second, third, etc... virtual tuner that will allow you to potentially use numerous streams simultaneously in Sage. It looks and acts just like any other Sage system, just without the hardware (except maybe the HDHR if you need it for local OTA channels like I did).