This is a followup to a previous post in which I listed my notes relating to how to get rid of my cable service. So how did it work out? Pretty well, actually, so far. We’ve been without cable for 3 or 4 months now and we’re doing alright.

I definitely miss NBA on TNT. I missed Monday night football. I’m certain I’ll miss all the NBA playoff games that only come on TNT. Sports is by far the biggest thing for which there is simply no good alternative location or service that has as much coverage as cable TV. Actually, xbox recently partnered with ESPN3 and you can stream ESPN events directly through you xbox. There are often things worth watching and they look just like regular TV (or better).

We have basically been unable (or unwilling) to keep up with our regular TV shows. We used to watch TV in our “downtime” when we just played it off of our DVR. Live TV just never happened except for sports. Having the DVR was convenient. However, going through hulu and those other options is a really big pain in the butt. Well, actually, it is just an inconvenience, but it is enough of an inconvenience to make it mostly not worth while for me. It is NOT the same as DVR. My wife, however, still manages to watch her shows when she sees fit via hulu, etc.

Netflix (I should be getting paid for this, but I’m not) has a great set of options of children’s programming and children’s movies. My kids even love the idea of getting something from Netflix in the mail. About half the time it is a grown up movie and half the time it is something the kids will like, but they’re always excited when that red envelope shows up. However, it is certainly not limited to dvds. You can stream tons of videos and tv shows. I actually watched some old episodes of “she-ra” (my wife wanted to watch this) and “inspector gadget” streaming through my xbox.

So, between Netflix and hulu (and clones) we seem to have found a winning option. We save about $100 per month and end up with extra time as well. On the downside there are some significant shortcomings when it comes to sports coverage, but as more options become available I think this will also to become less significant.