Thinking about Cutting the Cord

[mtdjed]

Currently have Xfinity Internet and TV. Min package but $210 per month. Plan to go T-Mobile internet and some live streaming such as Sling or UTube TV.

Wanted to test the usability of Sling and even though I see The Sling app on my TV, when I speak to my Exfinity Control and ask for Sling TV, I get a message "This app is not supported with your current TV Box".

When I request other apps like Netflix, UTube, Hulu etc, the TV goes to third party and allows access.

Has anyone experienced this condition and how do you get by this hurdle?

My ultimate goal is to switch off of Xfinity, but wanted to keep it while I test the proposed change.

My Xfinity boxes are attached to HDMI port 1. Is it as simple as disconnecting the Xfinity box. I have also installed Firestick controls but they have limited functionality when Xfinity box is installed.

[Bill14564]

Currently have Xfinity Internet and TV. Min package but $210 per month. Plan to go T-Mobile internet and some live streaming such as Sling or UTube TV.

Wanted to test the usability of Sling and even though I see The Sling app on my TV, when I speak to my Exfinity Control and ask for Sling TV, I get a message "This app is not supported with your current TV Box".

When I request other apps like Netflix, UTube, Hulu etc, the TV goes to third party and allows access.

Has anyone experienced this condition and how do you get by this hurdle?

My ultimate goal is to switch off of Xfinity, but wanted to keep it while I test the proposed change.

My Xfinity boxes are attached to HDMI port 1. Is it as simple as disconnecting the Xfinity box. I have also installed Firestick controls but they have limited functionality when Xfinity box is installed.

I remember seeing a similar message for an app when I tried loading it onto the Xfinity Flex box. I did not have Xfinity cable TV and assumed the message was a way of "encouraging" me to buy Xfinity's TV service rather than using a competitor's app.

There are two YouTube apps: YouTube for playing short videos and YouTubeTV for live television. I would be surprised if you did not receive the same message when you tried loading YouTubeTV. For that matter, the Max or Showtime apps might also be unsupported.

I haven't tried Sling but I am currently having very a very good experience with T-Mobile internet and YouTubeTV, Netflix, Hulu, Max, and a couple of others. I use a firestick though others prefer the Roku box which I might try if my firestick ever goes bad.

One important note: As far as I know, Hulu Live will not work with the T-Mobile box. This has to do with the way Hulu Live attempts to determine your location. Whatever protocol it uses, the T-Mobile box does not support it. Since the app cannot determine your location it refuses to provide live channels. Fortunately, YouTubeTV works and has everything I need.

[Bill14564]

...
My Xfinity boxes are attached to HDMI port 1. Is it as simple as disconnecting the Xfinity box. I have also installed Firestick controls but they have limited functionality when Xfinity box is installed.

Sorry, missed this part.

If you only have one HDMI connection on your television then yes, it is as simple as disconnecting the Xfinity box and connecting the firestick or Roku box.

If you have multiple HDMI connections then you could leave the Xfinity box on HDMI 1, connect the firestick or Roku to HDMI 2, and use the TV remote to switch between inputs and compare side-by-side.

[Papa_lecki]

How old is the fire stick? We have some that are 8-10 years old, and the latency is bad.
I prefer smart TVs, with the apps built in.

[Keefelane66]

Try using your TV remote. Xfinity controls it's content not your tv’s content.

[BigDawgInLakeDenham]

A huge advantage to new homes in the new villages is prewired gigabit Fiber Optic internet connections. Sucks to have to be slaves to Comcast and Spectrum type thieves as well as cellular providers. You should at least pony up for the latest firestick when on sale. The firecube is really quite nice with extra inerds and built in Alexa

[biker1]

Pretty much all homes built between 466A and 44 have fiber optic cable to the house. This means houses built probably 13 years ago. Many areas south of 44 do also as well as some areas north of 466A. I know several people with internet via cellular and are happy with it. I also know many people who are happy with Spectrum and Xfinity although the apparent need to periodically call to renegotiate the price seems to be a disadvantage. When asked, I encourage people to switch to Quantum Fiber (aka CenturyLink), if possible, partly because of their fixed pricing.

A huge advantage to new homes in the new villages is prewired gigabit Fiber Optic internet connections. Sucks to have to be slaves to Comcast and Spectrum type thieves as well as cellular providers. You should at least pony up for the latest firestick when on sale. The firecube is really quite nice with extra inerds and built in Alexa

[BrianL99]

A huge advantage to new homes in the new villages is prewired gigabit Fiber Optic internet connections.

That and $2.10 will get you a small cup of coffee, at most any Dunkin' Donuts.

Might as well tear down the rest of the homes in TV.

[baustgen]

Be. careful with TMobile. Over the air internet needs a clear shot to the nearest tower. We had problems with buffering. Keep your old hard wired internet for a week while you try TMobile. Cancelled last May, still waiting for a $45 refund.

[Bill14564]

Be. careful with TMobile. Over the air internet needs a clear shot to the nearest tower. We had problems with buffering. Keep your old hard wired internet for a week while you try TMobile. Cancelled last May, still waiting for a $45 refund.

Good advice about the T-Mobile. Location matters.

We switched recently and have had a very good experience with it here in Hillsborough. My father in central NY has had a good experience for over a year and my brother has moved his between central NY and Wildwood with success in both places.

T-Mobile internet can work, but it doesn't work for every location.

[MrFlorida]

Verizon also offers over the air internet. Some of my neighbors have them and like it.

[BigDawgInLakeDenham]

Pretty much all homes built between 466A and 44 have fiber optic cable to the house. This means houses built probably 13 years ago. Many areas south of 44 do also as well as some areas north of 466A. I know several people with internet via cellular and are happy with it. I also know many people who are happy with Spectrum and Xfinity although the apparent need to periodically call to renegotiate the price seems to be a disadvantage. When asked, I encourage people to switch to Quantum Fiber (aka CenturyLink), if possible, partly because of their fixed pricing.

If your whole house is pre wired with Cat 6 (circ 2010) or better to allow gigabit networks, good for you...but if you're using cable tv cables with moca adapters, not so much. New homes have an advantage in today's environment with all the tech available for smart home toys, entertainment systems, and for some, working from home

[Villageshooter]

Get a fire stick, and subscribe to IPTV for approximately $10-$25 a month and absolutely everything is included, if you do a search for IPTV on Facebook there are many places that will come up. Read the reviews find a highly rated service pay them with a Visa gift card that you can buy at Walgreens or Walmart and you are set. You can get a free 24 hour test sample from most any of these to check them out. It is unbelievable what you can get for a small amount if you are looking for a real bargain for Internet access, do not call on the phone go up to the Xfinity store and cancel your current Xfinity account and then put the account in your wife’s name to receive the latest promotional deals. At this point I have Xfinity Internet high-speed for $25 a month for the next 36 months. Calling them on the phone is like talking to your two-year-old grand kid. Good luck you cannot believe what is out there for free. By the way, some of them have some nice adult channels if you’re into that

[biker1]

The only ethernet cable that is used in my house is from the fiber ONT in the low-voltage panel to the RJ-45 jack in the room where my router is located. All the devices in the house use Wi-Fi. The rest of the ethernet cable and coax cable in the walls is not used. Those using coax-based services such as Spectrum or Xfinity are probably using Wi-Fi for most everything also. There is probably a small minority that use ethernet cables from their routers to their devices. Those using cellular internet access aren't using any cable in the walls unless they chose to hardwire some devices. You only need an internet "pipe" into your home. I worked from home for several years running software projects after moving here in 2014. By the way, cat5e supports a gigabit per second.

If your whole house is pre wired with Cat 6 (circ 2010) or better to allow gigabit networks, good for you...but if you're using cable tv cables with moca adapters, not so much. New homes have an advantage in today's environment with all the tech available for smart home toys, entertainment systems, and for some, working from home

[Coop63]

Currently have Xfinity Internet and TV. Min package but $210 per month. Plan to go T-Mobile internet and some live streaming such as Sling or UTube TV.

Wanted to test the usability of Sling and even though I see The Sling app on my TV, when I speak to my Exfinity Control and ask for Sling TV, I get a message "This app is not supported with your current TV Box".

When I request other apps like Netflix, UTube, Hulu etc, the TV goes to third party and allows access.

Has anyone experienced this condition and how do you get by this hurdle?

My ultimate goal is to switch off of Xfinity, but wanted to keep it while I test the proposed change.

My Xfinity boxes are attached to HDMI port 1. Is it as simple as disconnecting the Xfinity box. I have also installed Firestick controls but they have limited functionality when Xfinity box is installed.

Verizon will throttle you once you hit a data cap. This is easy to do if you are using it as a hotspot to stream TV and Movies. Not sure about T-Mobile. Something to look into.

I recently got rid of Xfinity internet and TV. Went to fiber optic and YouTube TV. Paying about $150/month. I work remotely so need high-speed Internet 24/7/365.

[kingofbeer]

Verizon will throttle you once you hit a data cap. This is easy to do if you are using it as a hotspot to stream TV and Movies. Not sure about T-Mobile. Something to look into.

I recently got rid of Xfinity internet and TV. Went to fiber optic and YouTube TV. Paying about $150/month. I work remotely so need high-speed Internet 24/7/365.
Switched from Spectrum internet at 49.99 per month to Comcast at $30.00 per month (less automatic payment discounts). The speed for Comcast is 75Mpbs. This speed is perfect for streaming. Also have youtube tv which is the best streaming service IMHO. Comes with unlimited cloud dvr. Paying $25 for comcast. Youtube tv is $62.99/mo for your first 3 months (Save $30), $72.99/mo thereafter for YouTube TV Base Plan.

[skippy05]

Tmobile internet slows down considerably the more users are using. I tried it and returned their box in less than 2 weeks. Highly unreliable was my experience.

[RoadToad]

Comcast basic internet service is available starting from $25 . All the upgraded speed and whatnot is
unnecessary. As suggested in post # 13, goto their store and get rid of all equipment and services other than "Basic Internet". Then use a streaming stick of your choice to get apps to provide whatever entertainment you choose. Quite a few content provers offer "live Tv" as an addon if you feel you need it.(e.g. Hulu+live; YouTubeTv+live; DirectTv+live; etc). We found that all the "+live" content is actually available via other apps that cost substantially less than the +live options. We like ROKU and Chromcast sticks better than Fire sticks since Fire started cramming all conceivable marketing hype into their sticks. It has become a huge Amazon advertising billboard. Also we tried Tmobile internet and found it to be wholey unable to keep up with a contebt stream way too often. YMMV.

[Janie123]

A huge advantage to new homes in the new villages is prewired gigabit Fiber Optic internet connections. Sucks to have to be slaves to Comcast and Spectrum type thieves as well as cellular providers. You should at least pony up for the latest firestick when on sale. The firecube is really quite nice with extra inerds and built in Alexa
I live in Santiago near the Savanna Center and we have fiber. It was added to the neighborhood many years after the homes were built.

I have CenturyLink for Internet and use YouTube TV for all the regular stuff. 100+ channels and unlimited DVR all using Roku sticks on 3 TVs in the house and then we add and subtract other streaming channels like BritBox, Amazon, and Netflix as needed.

[Ellwoodrick]

We went with T-Mobile in February. At first it was spotty. The streaming shows we would watch would freeze. In October (we are snow birds) Modem/Router went out completely. After a lot of time with their Tec Support multiple calls they finally sent a new router. Then they changed the plan we were on and raised the rates. Once again a call back to get them to give us the promotion we were promised. We still had problems streaming. Finally I moved the router to our Kitchen on top of the Kitchen Cabinets (Front of the home). There I finally got a better signal on the router. That stopped 95% of the problems. The router absolutely must have a strong signal to stream anything. Also I have a computer, two Roku TV's and two Roku adapters for two other TVs.

Still have occasional issues and will need to restart the Router to clear problems. Not the best but for 4 months out of the year I can live with it.

[jedalton]

Your Internet speed is too sliw

[jedalton]

Slow

[Baringek]

we have Xfinity for Internet, and then we stream to our smart TV. I don’t think we’re more than $70 a month and the service has been awesome! We get speeds higher than we pay for.

[RRGuyNJ]

I remember seeing a similar message for an app when I tried loading it onto the Xfinity Flex box. I did not have Xfinity cable TV and assumed the message was a way of "encouraging" me to buy Xfinity's TV service rather than using a competitor's app.

There are two YouTube apps: YouTube for playing short videos and YouTubeTV for live television. I would be surprised if you did not receive the same message when you tried loading YouTubeTV. For that matter, the Max or Showtime apps might also be unsupported.

I haven't tried Sling but I am currently having very a very good experience with T-Mobile internet and YouTubeTV, Netflix, Hulu, Max, and a couple of others. I use a firestick though others prefer the Roku box which I might try if my firestick ever goes bad.

One important note: As far as I know, Hulu Live will not work with the T-Mobile box. This has to do with the way Hulu Live attempts to determine your location. Whatever protocol it uses, the T-Mobile box does not support it. Since the app cannot determine your location it refuses to provide live channels. Fortunately, YouTubeTV works and has everything I need.

As far as I know, Hulu Live will not work with the T-Mobile box.

Just curious, do you happen to have Amazon Prime? We use Google Chromcast in NC with T-Mobile Internet and it seldom works.
When we were there, we used our Chromcast but the house we rented had Infinity internet and the Prime Video worked fine. I'm guessing it has something to do with the T-Mobile internet vs a cable internet provider. Thanks.

[Bill14564]

As far as I know, Hulu Live will not work with the T-Mobile box.

Just curious, do you happen to have Amazon Prime? We use Google Chromcast in NC with T-Mobile Internet and it seldom works.
When we were there, we used our Chromcast but the house we rented had Infinity internet and the Prime Video worked fine. I'm guessing it has something to do with the T-Mobile internet vs a cable internet provider. Thanks.

Amazon Prime through the firestick works just fine for us. (that would make sense since Amazon makes the firestick) We haven't noticed any issue with any of our services with the exception of Hulu Live.

If you would like, send me a DM with the specific issues you have seen and I will try to recreate them on my T-Mobile/firestick combination.

[Justputt]

We have a new house with pre-installed Centric Fiber modem/router/wireless at $65/mo for 1 gigabit speed, no contract, no installation (live the day you buy the house). The only thing plugged in is power cables to TV, DVD, etc. Everything else is wireless. We have existing Netflix streaming, Amazon streaming, and considering YouTube TV. Centric has packages for other channels.

[JRcorvette]

There are many option but you need to first find the least expensive internet service that fits your speed requirements. With cable companies when you don’t bundle they jack up the internet only cost quite a bit. You can test the T-Mobile or Verizon WiFi boxes out and see if they will fit your needs first. I have done the math and cutting the cord only saves a little bit so it’s not really worth it to me.

[Nell57]

I dropped xfinity and went to tmobile, just as you are considering doing.
When I returned my equipment to xfinity I told them I was leaving because they were charging me $82. for 75 Mbps. I asked how long I had to be gone to come back as a new customer. He replied, “three days.”
I got everything hooked up to tmobile. The signal was rated VERY GOOD. As others have reported, lots of buffering and dropped service . I liked their fixed price of $50, amd definitely would have stayed with them if they could have provided steady service. After a month I bought an Arris modem/router and signed back up with Xfinity. As a new customer , $30.
I returned the TMOBILE equipment. It was a lot of horsing around, but I'm glad I did it. I’m saving $50 a month.
So go into it knowing you might end up back with xfinity.
I checked with neighbors. Tom is paying $35, Mary $65 and xfinity just raised Larry to $111….internet only. Larry is now on ATT.
Xfinity is ridiculous….they really treat existing customers badly.

[Bill14564]

...
I got everything hooked up to tmobile. The signal was rated VERY GOOD. As others have reported, lots of buffering and dropped service . I liked their fixed price of $50, amd definitely would have stayed with them if they could have provided steady service.
...

May I ask: How long ago was this and what were you trying to do (stream television, move files, read emails, etc) when you experienced the buffering and dropouts?

As I have mentioned above, I have had T-Mobile service for over 45 days now with none of those issues. I typically stream HD to one television while using the internet on two other devices. I have had no issues so I'm wondering if their service has improved lately or if I've just gotten lucky so far.

[jrref]

If your whole house is pre wired with Cat 6 (circ 2010) or better to allow gigabit networks, good for you...but if you're using cable tv cables with moca adapters, not so much. New homes have an advantage in today's environment with all the tech available for smart home toys, entertainment systems, and for some, working from home

Exactly right, but its also important to note, If you have a home from 2014 ish and newer in an existing village, you probably can get Quantum fiber. They will install the fiber termination and router and provide a pretty nice wifi 6 mesh network, for free as of now, in your home. I've been helping many of my neighbors and friends switch from cable to Quantum Fiber and every installation is excellent. Just like with Centric, you get a pretty sophiticated network set-up included in the cost of the service.

[biker1]

It was an interesting, and smart, marketing move by QuantumFiber. They went from offering 200 megabits per second for $30 per month (add an additional $15 per month if you want their router) to 500 megabits per second for $50 including their mesh router. So, the router is not exactly for free. Essentially, $5 for an increase in nominal bandwidth from 200 to 500 megabits per second and their $15 per month router is now included in the price of $50 per month, whether you need it or not. The increase in bandwidth is of limited value unless you are routinely moving gigabytes of data around. However, don't get me wrong, I still think it is a good deal, especially since the price appears to be fixed unless you make a change in the service. I have the $30 service using my own router and that provides about 10x more bandwidth than I can use.

Exactly right, but its also important to note, If you have a home from 2014 ish and newer in an existing village, you probably can get Quantum fiber. They will install the fiber termination and router and provide a pretty nice wifi 6 mesh network, for free as of now, in your home. I've been helping many of my neighbors and friends switch from cable to Quantum Fiber and every installation is excellent. Just like with Centric, you get a pretty sophiticated network set-up included in the cost of the service.

[Nana2Teddy]

Exactly right, but its also important to note, If you have a home from 2014 ish and newer in an existing village, you probably can get Quantum fiber. They will install the fiber termination and router and provide a pretty nice wifi 6 mesh network, for free as of now, in your home. I've been helping many of my neighbors and friends switch from cable to Quantum Fiber and every installation is excellent. Just like with Centric, you get a pretty sophiticated network set-up included in the cost of the service.
This is what we want, but Quantum says not available in our village yet. Deluna, south of 44. Home less than 2 y/o.

[Dusty_Star]

This is what we want, but Quantum says not available in our village yet. Deluna south of 44. Home less than 2 y/o.

Check back on their availability page from time to time, as they are rolling it out, it may come to your Village.

[Nana2Teddy]

Check back on their availability page from time to time, as they are rolling it out, it may come to your Village.
Thank you! We’ll do that. 👍🏻