Last year I ended my 15+ year subscription to DirecTV. Since then we have been watching Over The Air (OTA) with antennas at both the condo and the motorhome on our 3 HD televisions.
The only frustration has been that we have had to watch TV on schedule. The national news really is on at the same time every day! We were very addicted to the DVR process and skipping through commercials. And, sometimes, we have had to stay awake at 10 PM!
A few weeks ago I bought a new product called the Channel Master DVR+. It is so new, you can only buy direct from Channel Master. Demand is high and I had to wait through a back order. I had it delivered to us in Tucson and have used it across the country to Hilton Head. If you are an electronics junkie and follow the January CES show, the DVR+ got headlines for being the first box that got it right for cable cutters.
http://www.channelmaster.com/Default.aspThe DVR+ presents a “guide” just like cable and satellite boxes and you have a “record” button on the remote. It is very small and thin like a iPad or Kindle. The connections are few and all on the back. Coax antenna in, power in, an optional network connection and an HDMI to the TV. There are two USB ports to plug in an optional generic hard disk and an optional wifi button.
The optional hard disk is for recording lots of TV and the network, or WiFi, is for getting an enhanced and extended guide from the internet. I have a WiFi connection and a recycled 500GB Western Digital HDD plugged in. The DVR+ functions with a three day guide and will record a few hours of TV without the options. My WiFi connection is to a 3G Verison MiFi “hotspot”. With the options you get a 2 week guide. You can use a typical external HDD like you would buy at Costco for backups that is as big as you want.
Set up is not quite as nice as a fully automatic KVH antenna finding DirecTV signals but, operation is relatively simple. On travel days I turn my entire entertainment system off with a powerstrip. There is not an “in motion” option here anyway. At arrival I turn it on and with the remote put in a new zip code, check the time zone, point the antenna and direct it scan for channels. Pointing the antenna can be based on where others in the park have pointed theirs, a guess or a website. On the Seeking Southern Comfort trip there was a town with no broadcast TV so I skipped the news and read a book. Here at Hilton Head it is full of trees and I'm getting the networks when most of the other Beavers with satellite are tree blocked.
There are two tuners in the DVR+ so you can watch one show while recording another or record two shows. If you use a Radio Shack type coax splitter for the antenna connection you could use the TV tuner to watch a show while recording two others.
Picture quality is outstanding. DirecTV’s version of HD for most channels is compressed to fit available bandwidth. By law, when the TV stations were directed by the Federal Government to switch to HD, they had to broadcast at “full 1080p”. Brian Williams really does look a little more “bright eyed” on an OTA signal.
At the top I said I was a long time DirecTV customer. At about $750 a year average for service, we've given them about $11,000! The DVR+ is priced to equal about 3 months of DirecTV service. I am having fun watching recorded network TV again, but now for free. With a fraction of what we are not sending to DirecTV, we have bought a couple boxed sets of acclaimed drama series like The Sopranos and Mash. RedBox is everywhere and a good source for a few recent releases.
