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Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TUalum0982 on October 07, 2008, 06:53:50 am I know there has been a thread or two about this topic, but I am looking for an unbiased opinion or review per se.
Long story short, I have had Directv ever since Feb 08 when we moved into our house. For some reason, they can't seem to align the dish right. I get "searching for satellite signal" every time it rains. On two occasions, the wind knocked my dish out of alignment and it took them 5 days before they could come fix it. I am looking into U-verse. I can't stand Cox, and I am just seeing if anyone out there other then Tim Huntzinger has had any luck with it. Uverse has some features that are interesting to me and I am thinking about making the switch. Directv just isn't cutting it. Thanks Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: sgrizzle on October 07, 2008, 07:10:43 am I have noticed since our last discussion that you can now record two HD streams and also watch recorded shows from one room in other rooms.
Still haven't tried it, but just wanted to pass that on. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TUalum0982 on October 07, 2008, 07:40:01 am quote: thanks for the info. I went into an AT&T store but as usual, he told me info that was diff then their own website. My neighbor had it installed a few weeks ago, but he must do an awful lot of traveling, because I can never seem to catch him when he is home. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: DolfanBob on October 07, 2008, 07:58:28 am Hey Alum I am sorry that you have had such a bad time with your DirecTV. I have been in the Satellite business over 17 years and I have DirecTV at my home. I also have their slimline hd dish and their hd service with dvr. Your problem is not equipment related it is directly related with your install. The dish was not properly aimed and was not secured down with the furnished stabilizer legs or your dish would have not moved in the wind. My KA/KU dish did not even lose signal during the last big hale storm that we had, But I will say this, I have the smaller 3 LNB dish at the other end of my house for my master bedroom and it lost signal during the same storm. At this time DirecTV does not have local installers for Oklahoma because Premier closed their doors in OKC and Tulsa. So if you had a service call done I am sure that it took several day's to get someone out because we are being serviced out of Texas and Kansas. That is why my boss/owner always say's to go with a local retailer because we have our own installers who only work for us. Again Im sorry for all the trouble you are having.
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: groundhog on October 07, 2008, 08:34:00 am TUAlum:
I've had Uverse for about 3 weeks now and absolutely love it. There is no lag as there is with Dish when changing channels or using any of the interactive (ie. search) functions. The system is unaffected by storms, and I've never lost signal. VERY easy to use remote control and GUI. Two enthusiastic thumbs up. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TUalum0982 on October 07, 2008, 08:36:22 am quote: you are exactly right. I waited and waited and waited, and no one showed up for my first appt. I called, severly pissed off and they said they didnt show me down for a service call. After several more calls over several hours, then informed me that premier was no longer doing business in the OK area. (You are correct, the install was horrible). I have had 3 service calls since Feb and each time they said the dish was loose, had to realign it and they each one said "it ain't going nowhere now". My parents have had directv for years (atleast 10) and I can count on one hand how many times their service has gone out due to rain/storms. Once the storm passed, it was back on. Unfortunately for me, I haven't had the same luck. It just gets really old, if you have a show you want to watch or an "important game" you have been looking forward to all week, and come to find out, you see "searching for satellite signal". And add insult to injury, they can't come out for a week to correct the problem. Directv was high on my list but could never get it because we lived in an apt, but once we built a house, I said the hell with cox. Now Cox actually looks pretty nice. Atleast when it rains, I still have a tv to watch! Thanks for the info Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TUalum0982 on October 07, 2008, 09:05:44 am quote: Thank you for the review. If you could answer a couple of questions for me... 1. Are you able to record two shows at once? 2. Are you able to watch recorded shows on diff tv's? 3. Which package do you have? Do you have their internet bundle as well? I have been told a few diff things by diff people. I don't really want/need their AT&T internet as I am happy with Cox thus far. I am just wanting a diff cable provider. Thanks again Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on October 07, 2008, 10:43:38 am quote: 1. Up to FOUR DVR streams. 2. Each set has a box and the DVR content recorded from that box stays with that set. 3. Think we have the 400 w/the internet. Awesome clarity, faster web, no contract, no activation fees. I am biased sure but this stuff makes Cox Digital look like an eight-track player. I love the Picture-in-Picture preview and the ability to hide channels I do not watch so that my surfing is a lot more enjoyable. The 2x HD streams are available if one is close enough to the 'node.' Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TUalum0982 on October 07, 2008, 11:04:37 am quote: I have been told by a reputable source or two....that in the coming months they will have the ability to have 1 box, and watch a recorded show on either tv. I am not familiar how that would work, but they are saying it should be here in Nov. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on October 07, 2008, 11:29:26 am quote: That may be an option where you are not actually recording on your DVR's hard drive, but rather streaming content from the provider's server. In that instance, insted of "recording" a program you are merely indexing it to summon it later on any machine on your account. I concur with the DirecTV comments earlier. The problem you are describing is bad installation rather than a bad product. When I was traveling with my 18" DirecTV dish I could prop it up with a couple of sandbags and my picture would blow away cable... People in RV's do that routinely. U-Verse was buried in my neighborhood last winter so im looking at that as a possible upgrade from DSL. Cable Modem is just one big open network. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on October 07, 2008, 11:59:22 am quote: We know you're biased. More than half the people I've talked to say it's not available to them. Neither is it available to me. And Cox has the same ability to hide channels you do not watch on all their digital boxes. Guess what? My dl with Cox is about 22 down with no contract. Never have had one with Cox. AT&T didn't have any problems forcing me to carry one when I had DSL though. I'm guessing that Cox will do better since AT&T's mantra is 'get it to the people who can afford it faster according to the area of the city you live in'. AT&T can quit mailing me stuff about getting Uverse now, since I can't. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on October 07, 2008, 12:26:07 pm quote: That is correct. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: sgrizzle on October 07, 2008, 01:55:35 pm I've been trying all morning to price it but either the server timed out or told me it was not in my area (despite the fact I had AT&T employees on my porch telling me it was and I'm almost within eyesight of the box)
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TUalum0982 on October 07, 2008, 02:09:13 pm quote: That is/was my issue too. Our house is served by Jenks (ie water, sewer, schools, fire, police) but our address says sapulpa. So it throws the website for a loop. I go into the store, and they say it is in my neighborhood, and my neighbor has it. I am like well that is good to know. I am just trying to get a clear understanding of what the box is able to do right now. AT&T needs to get their **** together! Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on October 07, 2008, 02:14:50 pm quote: You are in like flynn, Grizz! And Alum if you PM me your street address I have a tool that I can check with. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on October 07, 2008, 03:00:50 pm So when do they roll out more than 2 HD streams per home? And a box that doesn't forget to record things.
(Not that Cox's DVR is any better, but at least with them I can buy a TiVo that actually works right) Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Jonette on October 08, 2008, 12:10:53 am I got the U-VERSE 2 weeks ago and have been happy with it so far.
You can record 4 channels at once versus 2 with COX. I had COX for so many years and loved the DVR, but being able to record 4 channels at once was a way better option. The Total Home DVR option (being able to watch any of the DVR material on any set) will not be available until the end of 2008 or beginning of 2009. The one channel they don't offer is the NEWSNOW53.....24/7 local news for Tulsa. My daughter really misses that channel and it was nice to be able to watch "local" news anytime we wanted. [V] I did not get the internet or home phone, ie bundle. I am on WI-FI already and don't use a home phone. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on October 08, 2008, 06:04:18 am quote: A recent JD Powers Associates survey found that in every market that U-Verse went against cable U-Verse scored higher customer satisfaction. Must be all them teeny tiny screens, huh? Ha ha! Compared tu Uverse, digital cable is like a Commodore Vic 20. If the website is not working, store reps have another tool that can be used to determine if a person is within range of the node to receive this great service. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TUalum0982 on October 08, 2008, 06:26:36 am quote: if you must know. In the our bedroom I have a 46" Sony XBR5. In the living room I have a Sony 60" SXRD XBR. I would assume thats plenty big. Like I have mentioned before, Directv has a great picture, when I actually get the picture. It is frustrating as hell to work 50-60 hours a week, and just wanting to relax and watch some football on the weekends, but instead read a message "searching for satellite signal" at the hint of rain or sprinkling. I still can't figure out how it didnt go out a couple of weeks ago on Sat night when "hurricane Ike" blew through and we had 30+ mph winds!! Thank you Jonette. You have the exact same setup I want. I don't need a home phone, cox internet (although steep in price) is super fast and works great for us. I guess I will wait a little while and make a decision. If anyone is interested, I found a "good" review of uverse here... http://www.satelliteguys.us/iptv-discussion-forum/87544-review-t-u-verse.html http://www.dslreports.com/comments/2911 The second link shows out of 133 individual reviews, only 10 were said to be negative. Not too shabby Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on October 08, 2008, 07:38:10 am quote: Not too shabby! The best!Here is more about at&t U-Verse dominating cable (http://"http://www.multichannel.com/CA6600931.html"). If you are lucky enough to be in range of the node, order U-verse; there is no commitment, no activation fees, free stuff, and great service. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Conan71 on October 08, 2008, 08:00:30 am Still no Uverse in the 15th & Harvard area.
Anyone know what kind of progress they are making on expanding? I'm not 100% certain I'll change from Cox, but no sense wasting a whole lot of time thinking about it when it's not even an option for me yet. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: RedskinRich on October 08, 2008, 08:13:45 am I would just like the chance to have an option. For me it is either Windstream (I remember Valor all to well) or Cox. I am talking more than just TV I meant the whole bundle. I have not had an issue per say with Cox once I made them completely re-wire my house, the signal is clear and consistent. Just would be nice to have a choice.
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on October 08, 2008, 08:15:57 am quote: If Windstream is one of your choices you won't see AT&T Uverse at all, unless you move out of BA/S Tulsa. That's only offered to those in the AT&T DSL/landline footprint. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on October 08, 2008, 08:17:11 am quote: Yet another reason not to have it. 'Range of the node'? Does cable have this restriction? Nope. Sounds to me like TV over DSL. I pass. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TheTed on October 08, 2008, 08:24:46 am I just wish someone could tell me when uverse is coming downtown. They are coming, but they can't tell me whether it's gonna be 10 days or 10 years. If it's 10 years I'm gonna have to explore other options to get a replacement for Cox.
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on October 08, 2008, 09:13:09 am quote: (http://www.satellitedish.com/slimli34.jpg) Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TUalum0982 on October 08, 2008, 09:22:00 am quote: Dish is DEFINITELY not the way to go! that's what I have now, and in 8 months I have had more SFSS issues then my parents have had in over 10 yrs with Directv. I have had 3 diff people come out and "fix" the problem. The last time they came out, they had the nerve to try and charge me a service call of 79.99. After a phone call threatening to cancel throwing their equipment on the curb, they quickly applied a credit for the charge and gave me a few months free Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: BKDotCom on October 08, 2008, 09:41:11 am how does u-verse deal with multiple TVs in the house?
What is it about u-verse that it needs to be "available in your area"? Is that just for DSL part? Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on October 08, 2008, 10:07:35 am quote: Each set has its own DVR box, in my case the tech used the same wiring as cable so no mess no fuss. The customer has to be within range of where the end of the fibre optic line is in your neighborhood. Like being in range of a cell tower. This goes for Uverse phone, TV, and high-speed internet. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Steve on October 08, 2008, 10:40:50 am quote: They strung the cable for new phone & Uverse in my neighborhood on 26th just east of Yale about 8 months ago. Service is on. Another ugly thick black cable strung on the poles across my back yard, and they didn't even remove the old line which is now unused. AT&T has called my home phone at least 3 times a day for the last 2 months trying to sell me this stuff. The calls stopped, for the time being at least, last week. Recording 4 shows simultaneously? If people are as busy as they say they are, when would anyone have the time to sit down and watch? The technology is nice, but I think it is tremendous overkill. There would have to be 48 hours a day to take advantage of this stuff, and for me it would be pouring money down the drain. I'll just stick with my old analog TVs with digital boxes and watch free broadcast, an option many people seem to have forgotten about. I used to work with a gal (in her mid-20s) that didn't even know free broadcast TV existed, until I explained it to her. She thought all TV was via some pay service. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on October 08, 2008, 10:46:53 am quote: It's not as if the box is recording 4 things simultaneously 24x7. During primetime there can be multiple shows that various people in the household want to see airing at the same time. Besides, the point (for me) is to always have something decent to watch, not to watch everything my Tivo records, aside from the few shows I actually care about seeing regularly. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TUalum0982 on October 08, 2008, 10:51:24 am quote: If anything, it actually saves you time. I can record a 30 minute show, start it at 8 minutes after it started, and it is over at the regularly scheduled ending time. I start watching a one hour show about 20 minutes into it and it is over when it is supposed to be over as well. So there is 30 minutes of my life I can devote to other things, like mowing the yard, eating dinner, taking a shower, etc. There are nights that there is absolutely nothing on to watch (especially during football season). So I can tape several shows that are on one night a week that I like to watch, and therefor watch them throughout the week. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Jonette on October 08, 2008, 03:00:53 pm Well, let's see, the DVR works for me mostly because of my work hours. I work M-F 3P-11P and am on call SAT-SUN 7A-11P. This can interfere with a lot of the current sitcoms and series broadcast during primetime.
I am also not a sportsfan at all, during the different sportseasons I get fed up with every channel broadcasting the same sport,leaving nothing else to choose from. Not EVERYONE is a sports fanatic. When there are nothing but Presidential debates on every channel, the DVR can be a persons best friend. It's also nice to watch a 30 minute program in 20 minutes. I just fast forward past the commercials and ZIP I'm done with a program fast and don't have to suffer through the stupid annoying commercials. Those are the things I like about my DVR. Soon with U-VERSE: Being able to watch the DVR programs on different sets will also work well for me because I have 2 kids at home ages 22 and 17 and sometimes we don't all like to watch the same things. Just a little slice of luxury we afford ourselves. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: groundhog on October 08, 2008, 03:36:13 pm quote: Woah! Lot's of people chiming in here. Let me see if I can answer your questions: 1. Are you able to record two shows at once? I believe I can record 2 HD shows and 2 SD shows at once. I also believe that with the "Total Home DVR" firmware upgrade that AT&T is supposed to be beaming to my box in the next month or so (many other markets already have it -- Google THDVR), that I can record more streams than just the 4. Really, the coolest thing about the DVR, besides the really intuitive, easy to use graphic interface is that I can program the DVR with my mobile phone very, very easily. Uverse has a mobile site that displays (and works) perfectly on my Blackberry. 2. Are you able to watch recorded shows on diff tv's? I only have the 40 inch LCD in the living room, but, yes, I believe that you will be able to do that once THDVR is pushed to my unit. 3. Which package do you have? Do you have their internet bundle as well? I have the U200 package with VOIP phone and 6 MB download speed. It costs me $125/month for all three. They brought in a new wireless router which controls the whole shebang. The VOIP phone is pretty cool as I can review the Called ID on the Uverse TV and I can listen to my voicemail messages from the web. No difference in quality. I can also view a slideshow of the photos in my Flickr account on my big screen through Uverse as well as get on demand stocks, weather, and traffic. If you have other questions, feel free to private message me. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Double A on October 08, 2008, 05:13:27 pm I just got the phone/internet/cable U verse. I am taking advantage of the cable trial offer on the bedroom T.V. For all this I will be paying less than I was paying to Cox for cable alone with a comparable channel lineup. One of the few drawbacks(for me, at least) is no TGOV, though.
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Jonette on October 08, 2008, 05:48:05 pm Yeah, I forgot no TGOV.
Also, like I said earlier, no NEWSNOW53 either. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: MDepr2007 on October 08, 2008, 06:56:51 pm I am hoping AT&T is about to hit my neighborhood soon. I keep getting postcards from Cox telling me they are upgrading our area or something so they can now offer us more soon. This after always saying their cable was already the best to carry everything...hmmph
New and improved I suppose. I guess who ever is first gets to keep my business[;)] Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Steve on October 08, 2008, 06:56:52 pm quote: A $125 per month, that is $1,500 a year. I just can't fathom spending that much money on what amounts to unnecessary luxury communications, unless you can write it off as a business expense. To each his own, of course, but from my point of view you are the sucker these companies crave. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Double A on October 08, 2008, 07:26:25 pm quote: It's available in Lewiston Gardens(15th to 21st, Lewis to the B.A.) Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on October 08, 2008, 09:44:24 pm quote: Those are both Cox-only channels. The shortsightedness of some of our local government assumes everyone has cable, but there is *talk* of TGOV someday using a series of tubes to send meetings right to your home on demand! wow [:o)] Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Jonette on October 08, 2008, 11:30:26 pm What they assume is that everyone has COX!
The tubes are a GREAT idea!! Thank Gawd! I gotta have my TGOV!!!!! Like going to the bank drive-thru but better! I get to see the meetings and they get to feed me a load of BS. It's a WIN-WIN situation!!! [B)] Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: groundhog on October 09, 2008, 08:31:30 am quote: It's less than I would pay for basic cable, DSL (I left dial-up years ago and never looked back), and a landline phone. Of course it's a luxury, but I can afford my toys. It sounds as if you can not. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: jmikeh on October 09, 2008, 06:32:03 pm I am ready try U-Verse. At this point, however, It is not available in my neighborhood at the 41st & Peoria area yet. I for one love my Cox DVR but would love to have up to 4 streams to record and some of the other extras.
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Jonette on October 09, 2008, 09:07:10 pm I also live at 41st and Peoria. I have had my U-Verse for 2 weeks, you might want to check into it again.
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on October 10, 2008, 07:44:26 am quote: Well, Steve, you may be interested in at&t DSL or U-verse internet. With more consistent speeds than cable, either are time-saving, low-cost alternatives to cable. There is no 'one-fit' solution and every person does not need every product a company has to offer. However, U-verse has led me into a fuller, more meaningful relationship with TV, and I have re-dedicated my life to quality programming. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: sgrizzle on October 10, 2008, 08:49:09 am I love sales talk.
To the person who is getting "not available" it tells me that on their website so I can't price it or get the big discounts but it IS available in my area. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on October 10, 2008, 08:51:33 am quote: I find that funny as well. I did see a bunch of contract and AT&T trucks working on lines at midnight last night on Admiral at the traffic circle. Wonder if they're getting me that great Uverse? Tim, how long have you worked for AT & T? [xx(] Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on October 10, 2008, 08:54:01 am quote: Apparently it has something to do with how the addresses were entered and are being read by the various programs. Sort of a 'y2k' programming thing, so one may try to enter an address without the 'th' on 'e 45th', entering 'e 45' instead, eg. A co-worker simply called Cox and mentioned the U-verse 200 and Cox upgraded his service for the same cost. So even if you are 'out of area' one should see if Cox has some love for ya. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: jmikeh on October 10, 2008, 11:18:18 am quote: Hey Grizz. I just checked the web thingy and it still says not available. Damn. I guess I will have to call and see if I can get a human on the phone.. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on October 10, 2008, 11:24:01 am quote: Just tried that (leaving out the ordinals) and it worked! I can order just the U-Verse internet by itself, but if I dont include a TV package they want a $99 one-time-charge. Adding a TV package makes the one-time-charge go away. Not enticed enough to give up DirecTV with TiVo just yet, so ill wait and see of the one-time-charge decides to go away on it's own later. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Double A on October 12, 2008, 11:00:44 am U-verse takes top spot in consumer survey (http://"http://www.tulsaworld.com/business/article.aspx?articleID=20081012_46_E3_hJenki164529")
AT&T U-verse, the company's Internet protocol television service, ranks highest in customer satisfaction in three of four regions of the United States in a survey of 18,938 U.S. households by J.D. Power and Associates. J.D. Power's survey measures customer satisfaction with cable, satellite and IP television providers in the North Central, East, West and South regions of the U.S. The survey tracks customer satisfaction with performance and reliability, customer service, cost of service, billing and offerings, and promotions. Customer satisfaction is reported as an index score on a 1,000-point scale, officials said. AT&T U-verse ranks highest in the South region, which includes Oklahoma, with an index score of 706. Verizon's FiOS fiber-optic TV ranks second in the South region with a score of 688; DirecTV is third at 662; DISH Network is fourth with a 650 score. Cox Cable, Oklahoma's largest cable provider, ranks seventh with a score of 638. AT&T U-verse also ranks highest in the North Central and West regions. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on October 12, 2008, 11:50:58 am quote: That is surprising. Ive had to call at&t a couple of times last week to get some bogus charges from some theft identity company taken off my phone bill, and they explain the long waits as being due to all their resources being taken up dealing with "the hurricane." But #7-ranked Cox isnt exactly a local mom-and-pop operation, either. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: inteller on October 12, 2008, 01:31:08 pm quote: OMG....you pay $6 less than I do for less bandwidth and crappy picture quality? well whooptie freakin doo! This is ATTs idea of a deal? Man, **** them. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: groundhog on October 13, 2008, 09:37:00 am quote: I really don't think that I was implying that my monthly rate was a "deal," only trying to put the number out there for information purposes. However, I guess I was given a "deal" of sorts. AT&T gave me a total $275 in cash back Visa cards and checks to activate, and waived all installation charges. As far as picture quality goes, I'm very impressed with the HD. It seems sharper than Cox did to me. I've had no cloud drop-outs or even digital artifacts like Dish is famous for and that I would sometimes get with Cox. The picture-in-picture preview and the responsiveness of the entire system, from on-demand programming to the instant "Search" function, are what really make the system a pleasure to sit in front of. As far as bandwidth goes, I could have chosen the 30 MB download speed for $15 more per month. I don't need that much speed, and unless you're downloading a ton of pirated torrents, I doubt that many people do, so I opted for the lower speed. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Nik on October 13, 2008, 10:42:19 am I'm looking forward to trying UVerse, but I don't expect it in Sand Springs anytime soon. So, I'm trying to get my parents to switch. They don't like the $5/receiver charge but they love that they can record on one DVR and watch it anywhere. I really wonder how they do this. The only thing I can think of is its actually recording on AT&T servers and is fed to the home's DVR on-demand.
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on October 13, 2008, 11:23:10 am quote: Pretty much makes any channel an on-demand channel if you set it up right, wouldnt it? Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: sgrizzle on October 13, 2008, 01:23:41 pm I called Cox and got a 6 month loyal customer discount and 1 competitive year discount. Total saving of almost $400 over the next 12 months.
Wee... Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TUalum0982 on October 13, 2008, 02:37:36 pm quote: did you just call and ask? or did you say you were ready to switch to another company? I found a very useful website for people with questions regarding Uverse and for those people who have it, there are some interesting reads. www.uverseusers.com It has forums for general discussion, and also for each state that uverse is available in. Also, supposedly AT&T is going to announce 18mb download speeds... (http://www.corp.att.com/advanced-tv/) EDIT: I also read that the current box can hold 122hours of regular programming, and 37hours of HD programming. I also read that a new cisco box is in the works, which is supposed to be able to hold even more? I haven't read that anywhere else though. I spoke to someone at AT&T and they stated that THDVR (total home dvr) will be available to the Tulsa Market in Nov. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: inteller on October 13, 2008, 03:34:28 pm quote: BS, considering they are just now announcing 18mb....if you live like 2 feet from the box. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on October 13, 2008, 04:59:53 pm quote: They do it like every other DVR that has this functionality does it. It streams/transfers the show across your home network. In the case of U-Verse, it works over both RG6 and Cat5, depending on which you have your boxes hooked up with. Several other providers (Verizon comes to mind with their FiOS product) also have RF networking enabled on their boxes. I believe both satellite providers also have that functionality enabled Cox's DVRs are capable of networking over coax, they have the hardware, software, and everything. Cox just hasn't enabled it, presumably because they don't want to pay for an update to Passport. TiVo has been doing this for years over Cat5. The TiVo boxes don't support MoCA, though, so no coax networking, although it's not TiVo's fault. It's the regulations they operate under (to get approval from CableLabs, so MSOs are required to give you CableCARDs for the Series3 and HD/HDXL) that make it impossible to include. Interestingly, there's still a court battle over whether or not it is legal for cable companies (and those who provide equivalent service) to use network-based DVRs without the permission of the content owner. Cablevision announced that service a few years ago and promptly got sued. The content owners got a preliminary injunction against them, which was recently overturned by the court of appeals. The case itself still hasn't been resolved, though. Personally, I wouldn't be interested in such a service anyway, except for things I wasn't really interested in watching to begin with or forgot to record. Both Cox and at&t's video on demand products take several seconds to respond to a command. It doesn't seem too terrible compared to the relatively slow response times of their DVRs, but I'm used to my TiVo, which excluding a few buggy software releases is always very snappy at reacting to fast forward, rewind, and instant replay. I much prefer an immediate reaction to my input. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: MDepr2007 on October 13, 2008, 07:08:45 pm Download speeds can be useless if the server it's comong from doesn't match up to the same speed , correct?
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on October 13, 2008, 10:40:09 pm quote: Very true, but most servers can handle better than 10Mbps these days, even if your computer (or router) can't. In fact, a lot of home routers can't, even if they have 100Mbps WAN ports. Personally, I download things mainly from my own server that sits in a data center in San Diego on a 100Mbps connection and other single servers that can handle far more than the 12Mbps I get from Cox. The extra speed is also nice if you are downloading and web browsing at the same time or downloading multiple things. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: sgrizzle on October 14, 2008, 05:47:34 am quote: I called and said that I had looked at AT&T's prices and was wondering if Cox was going to run any specials or discounts to stay competitive. They did ask for what it would cost with AT&T so make sure and check pricing and have it handy. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: buckeye on October 14, 2008, 01:57:44 pm I've used an ancient SMC wired router passed down from my big bro for several years. Great bit of hardware, very reliable and easy to set up. Recently, I changed it out to see if having the Vonage router 'first in line' next to the cable modem would help with QOS/VOIP quality (it didn't). My download speeds went from 3-5meg to 7-12meg. Looks like the SMC couldn't keep up anymore.
Goddang, I wish Cox would pay for a Passport update. As it stands, it's a pretty crappy interface. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: MDepr2007 on October 14, 2008, 08:26:52 pm quote: Didn't you claim that the last time AT&T was talked about a month or 2 ago? How many times in one year can one get a discount? Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on October 14, 2008, 08:32:13 pm quote: If you ***** about your service enough, like I did some years ago with Cox, I didn't pay for 6 months. [:D] Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: sgrizzle on October 14, 2008, 08:50:17 pm quote: I never claimed that, others did so I finally tried it. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on November 13, 2008, 08:21:28 pm Has anyone with the "Max-18" U-Verse (18 Mbps downstream and 1.5 Mbps upstream) internet perfored a speed test to see if these numbers are real?
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TUalum0982 on November 14, 2008, 05:28:04 am quote: have they rolled that out into our area yet? Last time I checked, it wasn't available to me, (U-verse is) but not the 18mb "fast" internet. EDIT: Also, AT&T recently inked a deal to start selling U-verse in Circuit City stores in cities were U-verse was available. Now that they have filed for Bankruptcy, I wonder what that will do. Did AT&T not see this coming? Any company that lays off its top 2000 sales people in order to save money by reducing their bonus' is obviously headed in the wrong direction. They should have gone with best buy. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on November 14, 2008, 08:09:33 am It is a GO GO GO! The 18mps is LIVE! As is the Total-home DVR! The 2-stream HD has been out for about a month, and sooooo much more is on the way!
Installs are still about a week out. I can only say that with a projected growth from 1M to 30M, the FREE install, no-contract, money-back offers may not be around very long. Installs in some markets are SIX weeks out. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Ibanez on November 14, 2008, 09:01:35 am Sigh. If only this were available in Bixby so that I didn't have to deal with Bixby Telephone and their craptastic BTC TV offering.
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: EricP on November 14, 2008, 09:03:20 am Thanks to AT&T, Cox has rolled out free upgrades in Oklahoma recently.... now my downstream ranges from 15 to 25mbit and my sustained upstream peaks out at 1.7mbit! Yay competition!
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on November 14, 2008, 09:11:07 am quote: They have nowhere to go. I would look for a real fire sale on their products and services. Funny, now that I no longer have Cox for TV and have reduced my Cox Radio listenership I am no longer bombarded with their crappy commercials. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: EricP on November 14, 2008, 01:11:19 pm quote: Bwuh? They have nowhere to go with what? As far as bandwidth goes, telcos providing internet service over phone lines have to keep coming up with technology changes to catch up to cable and when they do cable companies can just ratchet up the speed a little bit more. Coax > phone lines. Let's see what current DOCSIS standards Cox uses will support: Version 1.x Downstream: 38 Mbit/s Upstream: 9 Mbit/s Then we have DOCSIS 2.0 and 3.0, which rival FIOS in speed: Version 2.0 38 Mbit/s 27 Mbit/s 3.0 4channel 152 Mbit/s 108 Mbit/s 3.0 8channel 304 Mbit/s 108 Mbit/s Hmmm...... Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on November 14, 2008, 02:34:43 pm quote: All they can do is drop prices or give more of what they already have. My Uverse TV is clearer and with more features than digital cable ever dreamt of. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on November 14, 2008, 05:51:31 pm quote: You mean your Uverse TV can't push more than 2 HD streams at once and has more features than you ever dreamed of. Some of us cable users have far more features than Uverse thanks to third party boxes. I just wish I could figure out exactly why it is that not all multichannel video providers are made by the FCC to comply with the separable security requirement, even though the law requires it. The only advantage Uverse has over cable (it's not cheaper if you subscribe to everything including their highest speed HSI tier like I do) is that there are some niche channels available that aren't on Cox and they have HDNet and HDNet movies on their HD tier..which you have to pay for. I was considering trying Uverse when it becomes available to me until I found that my friend's Uverse box is really no better than the Cox box when it comes to reliably recording all your shows and not recording a gazillion duplicates. Did they ever roll out the online DVR scheduling functionality? Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: groundhog on November 19, 2008, 02:45:58 pm quote: Yes, and AT&T also provides a mobile site so that you can program your DVR from your cell phone. Works perfect. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: izmophonik on November 19, 2008, 02:50:00 pm It's about time someone caught up. DIRECTV has been doing that for a while. You can record shows from your cell phone, PDA or any computer. Also you can stream shows to your PC from the receiver and then there is of course video on demand in 1080p...let's see..what else...
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on November 19, 2008, 03:00:10 pm quote: Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: izmophonik on November 19, 2008, 03:08:18 pm again...U-Verse is behind the 8-ball called DIRECTV. You should give yourself a techno spanking for thinking this is (A) New technology and (B) You are actually happy about it.
[8D] Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on November 19, 2008, 03:14:49 pm quote: TVOIP is real new. 18Gbps is pretty new, too! We are going to be selling DirectTV sometime soon, so good to know you are happy widdit. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: izmophonik on November 19, 2008, 03:21:17 pm Yes, TVoIP is new. I was referring to the actual functionality of your receiver interface not really how you get your content.
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on November 19, 2008, 04:17:35 pm I never had DVR before U-verse. Can you get Picture-in-Picture browsing with DTV? How many streams can it record at once?
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on November 19, 2008, 11:03:23 pm quote: I can only record a paltry two programs at once with the DirecTv TiVo I bought in 2001, but I was still leaps and bounds ahead of cable... Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: joshuasmaximus on November 20, 2008, 10:28:38 am Here is my review of U-verse:
I have had uverse for about a month now and so far I am really impressed. I have the U400 (I have it for the price of U200 for six months) and the 6mb/dl internet. I can't compare Uverse to satellite (would never use a contract service) but I have had Comcast, Timewarner and Cox before. The internet speed so far has been exactly as promised (not typical with cable). You have to use the 2wire wifi/router/gateway provided so that could be good or bad depending on your tech needs but it is reasonable configurable. The DVR tech is miles ahead of any cable company I have used so far. The menus are much snappier the guide data is very good and the 4x sd streams are not available with cable on a singal box. Yes, you are limited to 4x SD or 2HD streams in your house (it does not matter how many boxes you have) so that can be an issue if you have a lot of TVs. The good news is, recorded shows do not count as a stream so if all the live streams are in use you can switch to a recorded show. The box allows 30sec skip (disabled on almost all cable DVRs) on recorded and OnDemand shows! There is a PiP display on the guide (very cool). The HD quality is a better than Cox in my opinion. Cox's PQ was good on the local streams but the fringe channels (HistHD, FoodHD, TNTHD etc. were poorly compressed) Uverse has much better PQ on these channels in addition to having way more HD channels to choose from. The biggest difference for me is how OnDemand works with Uverse. The load times are almost non-existent. There is a very slight delay in accessing the OnDemand menus and guides but it is way way faster than on cable. FFWD, RRWD, replay and skip work much faster with almost no lag(with cable, its a huge pain and very slow to FFWD) the PQ of OnDemand is no better than cable and the SD stuff is not as good as a DVD but the navigation is amazingly good. Finally, you can program the DVR from the web. my.att.com allows you to customize the interactive services provided through the tuner box (weather location, stocks, sports scores, fantasy sports [yahoo] and flickr photos) it also has a guide that allows you to check TV listings, schedule recordings and delete shows from the DVR. This is a great feature which I have used many times. That's about it. I will add anoter TV in the next few weeks so I should be able to review the Total Home DVR stuff then Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: EricP on November 21, 2008, 01:33:03 pm quote: Holy jesus, 18Gbps? Sign me up! :) What is the distance you would have to be to actually get 18mbit on DSL anyway? Distance limitations has killed DSL speeds for a looonnnnnnnngggggggggggg time... u-verse involved adding local pedestals everywhere like Cox uses, right? Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on November 21, 2008, 04:39:40 pm quote: Duhhhh, okaaayyyy. Er. 18Mps. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on November 21, 2008, 10:17:26 pm quote: Welcome to five years ago. ;) Prior to that, being the insane geek I am, I had things set up so I could text message my PC at home and it would connect to my TiVo and schedule a recording. Needless to say, TiVo's online scheduling is far more functional (as I'm sure at&t's is now) Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: HDPokeFan on November 26, 2008, 01:32:13 pm I am an amateur video techie, so I decided to have U-Verse installed in early August. So I could do a fair comparison I had it installed on the same TVs I have Cox - and kept Cox (just used different HDMI inputs).
My review: Except for trouble in the first two weeks of service, I have had little downtime with AT&T. However, I do have issues every now and then with the gateway and I have to constantly readjust my settings in the STB. Picture quality: Almost identical. Mainly comparing HD. On broadcast channels Cox wins - I am guessing AT&T is compressing locals while I think Cox just sends what the broadcasters give them. HD: Cox and AT&T have the same amount of HD channels, but Cox has way more HD content via On Demand. AT&T is way behind here. For HD it is not even close Cox wins by a landslide. (By the way, U-Verse does not even carry PBS HD in Tulsa nor the cool 3 other PBS regular channels Cox carries) High Speed Internet: I read last spring in the Tulsa World that 80% of Cox customers had access to 12 Mbps or more compared to 77% of AT&T customers were 3 Mbps or less. Based on price and speed Cox wins again. Phone: Phone is phone to me. Cox launched caller ID on TV in OKC in the summer according my sister in OKC. Will be interesting when they add that in Tulsa. Recommendation: If you are not a HD fan and you are not happy with Cox, then you may want to consider switching. If you have HD or thinking about buying a HD set - then Cox is your answer. With me being a big local high school sports fan I could not live without The Cox Channel's high school football and basketball. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on November 26, 2008, 01:39:30 pm quote: Maybe if you figure U-verse's 18Mbps instead of the 3Mbps you will be up to speed (if you will excuse the pun). Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on November 26, 2008, 02:07:31 pm quote: That's if you can even get Uverse; I still don't have it available, as do many people I talk to. I'll stick with Cox; I've been pretty happy with them for the last 5 years or so. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: HDPokeFan on November 26, 2008, 02:09:04 pm Considering AT&T just rolled out the 18 Meg only to customers with U-Verse (about .02% of homes in Tulsa) and within that small customer base you have to within a certain distance of the CO - the number of customers with the service is very small. So my guess, I am bet I am not that far off, is about 200 people in Tulsa could get 18 meg. Of those 200 people let's say 5% want the top speed. So about 10 people in Tulsa would have 18 meg.
Since Cox was already offering 20 Meg (at over $20 less than AT&T internet service) to many customers and a large majority of their customers had at least 12 meg - sounds like AT&T 18 meg attempt is pretty feable -- IMHO. It kinda like Comcast did by offering DOCSIS 3.0 speeds in one node in Chicago and claiming they were offer 60 Mbps service - except it was only available to a super small group of people. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: groundhog on November 26, 2008, 05:34:53 pm quote: Good comparision amd recommendation for those thinking of early adopting. You forgot to add one more reason, apparenlty the same reason why you switched -- you want a new toy to fiddle with. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TheTed on November 26, 2008, 11:02:39 pm I don't have Uverse because it's not in my neighborhood. I do plan on getting it ASAP because they offer the regional sports networks, which Cox has no plans to begin offering
I have perused the Uverse channel lineup. I count about 80 HD channels available. Lots of them are movie channels. But it still seems like Uverse compares favorably to Cox in the HD department. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on November 28, 2008, 12:34:02 pm On their website you used to be able to de-select the TV packages from the options you wanted (i.e. just order internet and phone) but recently they have become stingy about installing new customers without a TV package.
If you want U-verse internet (a much better deal than DSL) not bundled with TV then you either have to wait till their marketing people come to their senses or ask to speak to whatever tier has the authority to give the customer what they want. Bundling = Bad. Too many things can go wrong when you put all your eggs in one basket. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: lms68 on December 13, 2008, 12:49:44 pm Does anyone know if there is any discount for bundling an existing AT&T wireless account into a new U-Verse package? I've been all over the U-Verse website and can't get any information beyond telling me I can combine the bills for the cell phone and the U-Verse stuff. Combined billing is not much of an incentive to me -- I'm pretty sure I can handle two bills at once. Anyway, I'd heard from a few people that they thought there were discounts available for bundling all AT&T services together -- just wondering if this is really true.
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on December 28, 2008, 10:14:27 am Hmm..I found this interesting. Some of the comments are also very interesting.
Oh, Uverse is jacking up some of their prices in Feb. http://www.engadgethd.com/2008/12/23/atandt-pushing-up-some-prices-in-february-2009/ [B)] Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on December 28, 2008, 10:45:34 am quote: the rate for the extra receivers is up to seven bux a mo BUT you still have total home dvr which Cox does not, and one still has mo HD sooooo you do get what you pay for. also the cost for stand-alone premium channels went up a few dollars, effecting the lower-tiered packages primarily. at&t does have a 24-month guarantee on its stand-alone DSL packages which is worth mentioning. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on December 28, 2008, 10:48:06 am quote: But is it really more when all I've heard about their HD is crap. They compress more than Cox or the sats. Read the Uverse forum over at DSLreports and you'll see a LOT of complaints, not only about cost/service but install issues. That's why I quit AT&T years ago and will NEVER go back. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on December 28, 2008, 11:35:59 am quote: It is not a perfect process but according to consumer-driven researcher JD Powers in markets where Uverse and cable go head to head Uverse wins. Ha ha ha! Hater! I love the total home dvr and the picture in picture browsing gets funner all the time! Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on December 28, 2008, 12:01:40 pm quote: Yeah, only if you can get UVerse. Most still can't here. And yes, I'll be a hater of all things AT&T until the day I die. But you continue to pay that $5 HD fee for three HD Channels. I'll enjoy my 53 HD channels for free. [}:)] Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on December 28, 2008, 12:53:02 pm Im not going to be an at&t defender, but we have to at least give them credit for one thing:
When at&t installed U-Verse, they buried the lines. They did so neatly and professionally, without crying about it and deliberately making it unsightly and inflating the costs like AEP does. Competition is good. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Jonette on December 28, 2008, 08:56:55 pm Well. I got bad news.
I discontinued my ATT U-Verse 2 weeks ago. I loved the total home DVR. The channel selection was fine. But the things I hated was: Too much lag time between channels. Too many ATT information channels. No way to block out those information channels, you have to "surf" thru them every time. When you surf thru them it takes FOREVER for each one to load and let you go to the next channel. With Cox you could set your "favorite" channels and use the "favorite" button on the remote to surf thru only those channels. Skipping the INFO channels and those your not interested in. But with ATT you have to go to your "favorite" list on a menu screen and scroll thru them like a channel guide with a small picture.I even tried to block the channels I was not interested in and then when I was crossing those channels I was still forced to look at the channel, but now with a GIANT picture of a LOCK on the screen. And now THAT channel took forever to load and release so I could go on to the other one. Surfing took FOREVER!! I got tired of it and had it all turned off. ATT shipped me a prepaid UPS box to ship all the equipment back to them. You wanna know some thing funny? They don't want the remotes and wires back. They specifically said not to include them when shipping the stuff back. What the hell am I gonna do with that stuff? I got news for you, it's all going back!! For now I don't have cable at all. It's nice and quiet here. But I am getting ready to move and will decide what to do about cable when I get settled in at the new place. [:O] Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: groundhog on December 30, 2008, 05:21:37 pm quote: I don't understand why yours was different from mine. I have no lag whatsoever. I did ask the installer to bring the CAT-5 cable directly into my box; maybe this helps. quote: There are actually three different ways to do what you wanted to do. I think you must have used the parental block. In U-Verse settings you can go through the line up and specifically request that certain channels never display in the on-screen guide, even the info channels. I've blocked all of mine out. Either that, or you could have selected favorites but not added the info channels. Too bad about the lag. Sounds like a bad install. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: HDPokeFan on January 01, 2009, 12:11:05 pm quote: Tim - I don't think you are being fair to this board. This forum certainly is for posting opinions, but for the forum to be successful you should at least be factual. As I mentioned earlier in this thread I had U-Verse installed, but also kept Cox. I can tell you that Cox has way way more HD than U-Verse - it is not even close. I understand you like the whole home DVR, but don't try to claim U-Verse has more HD than Cox (at least Cox in Tulsa) because I can tell you first-hand that is not even close to being true. For people that like watching shows in HD - if you are choosing Cox or U-Verse there really is not much of a choice. Free HD and more HD with Cox versus $15 per month for less HD with U-Verse. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on January 01, 2009, 07:45:52 pm Heres a comparrison of the high definition offerings of U-Verse and DirecTV:
U-Verse 5StarMax HD A&E HD ATMax HD ActionMAX HD - West ActionMax HD Animal Planet HD Big Ten Network HD Bravo HD CNBC HD Cinemax HD Cinemax HD - West Discovery Channel HD ESPN HD ESPN2 HD Encore HD FSN Midwest - Kansas City HD FSN Midwest - St Louis HD FSN Southwest - Dallas HD FSN Southwest - Houston HD FSN Southwest HD FX Network HD Food Network HD Fox Business Network HD Fox News Channel HD Golf HD HBO Comedy HD HBO Comedy HD - West HBO Family HD HBO Family HD - West HBO HD HBO HD - West HBO Latino HD HBO Latino HD - West HBO Signature HD HBO Signature HD - West HBO Zone HD HBO Zone HD - West HBO2 HD HDNet HDNet Movies HGTV HD Hallmark Movie Channel HD History HD KJRH-HD-2 (NBC) KOKI-HD-23 (FOX) KOTV-HD-6 (CBS) KTUL-HD-8 (ABC) Lifetime Movie Network HD Lifetime Television HD MGM HD MoreMAX HD - West MoreMax HD NFL Network HD National Geographic Channel HD Outdoor Channel HD OuterMax HD Palladia Planet Green HD QVC HD General QVC HD General Sci Fi Channel HD Science Channel HD Showtime Extreme HD Showtime HD Showtime HD - West Showtime Showcase HD Showtime Too HD Smithsonian Channel HD Speed HD Starz Comedy HD Starz Edge HD Starz HD Starz HD - West Starz Kids & Family HD TBS HD Movies TMC Xtra HD TNT HD Movies The Learning Channel HD The Movie Channel HD The Weather Channel HD ThrillerMAX HD - West ThrillerMax HD Travel Channel HD Universal HD VERSUS HD WGN America HD WMAX HD Wealth TV HD DirecTV A&E HD ABC HD (East) ABC HD (West) ABC Family HD Altitude HD* Animal Planet HD Big Ten Network HD Biography Channel HD Bravo HD Cartoon Network CBS HD (East) CBS HD (West) Cinemax HD East Cinemax HD West CMT HD CNBC HD+ CNN HD CSN Bay Area HD* CSN Chicago HD CSN Mid-Atlantic HD CSN New England HD CSTV HD Discovery Channel HD Disney Channel HD ESPN HD ESPN2 HD ESPNews HD Food Network HD Fox Business Network HD Fox HD (East) Fox HD (West) Fox News Channel HD FSN Arizona HD FSN Cincinnati HD* FSN Detroit HD FSN Florida HD* FSN Midwest HD FSN North HD FSN Northwest HD FSN Ohio* FSN Pittsburgh HD FSN Prime Ticket HD FSN Rocky Mountain HD FSN South HD FSN Southwest HD FSN West HD Fuel TV HD FX HD Golf Channel HD, The HBO HD East HBO HD West HD Theater HDNet HDNet Movies HGTV-HD History Channel HD MASN HD* MGM HD MLB Network MSG HD MSG PLUS HD MTV HD National Geographic HD NBA.TV HD NBC HD (East) NBC HD (West) NESN HD NFL Network HD NHL Network HD Nick HD Palladia HD Planet Green HD Sci-Fi Channel HD Science Channel HD Showtime HD Showtime Extreme HD Showtime Showcase HD Showtime West HD Showtime 2 HD Smithsonian Channel HD SNY HD Speed Channel HD Spike HD SportSouth HD SportsTime Ohio HD* Starz Comedy HD Starz Edge HD Starz HD East Starz HD West Starz Kids & Family HD Sun Sports HD TBS in HD Tennis Channel HD The 101 Network HD The Movie Channel HD The Weather Channel HD TLC HD TNT HD Toon Disney HD Universal HD USA Network HD VERSUS HD VH1 HD YES HD Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 02, 2009, 01:29:10 am quote: But you still have to pay for HD on both of those. Not so with Cox, except for having the HD tuner. Which is no more expensive than the standard digital tuner. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on January 02, 2009, 11:32:33 am quote: I know DirecTV has some channels included in base plans, I believe Cox and at&t do the same thing. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 02, 2009, 01:51:44 pm quote: The only HD channels Cox charges you for are the premium channels (Cinemax, HBO, Sho, Starz) as part of the premium cost. There's no extra charge for premium HD. Everything else is included with the cost of whatever tier you have. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Nik on January 02, 2009, 04:03:10 pm For Cox, what would it cost for a 2nd HD/DVR receiver?
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: sgrizzle on January 02, 2009, 04:35:18 pm quote: You can have up to 4 at the $15ish per month price. Records 8 shows in HD. Woot. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Nik on January 02, 2009, 08:02:12 pm quote: $15/mo each? UVerse costs $7/mo for an additional box which has HD and the total home DVR. Cox is more than double. I'd like to get HD in the bedroom but I don't think $15/mo is worth it. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: MDepr2007 on January 03, 2009, 12:51:26 am If HD is free on Cox, why do I have to pay for the digital cable and not just basic to get it? That ain't free..
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: HDPokeFan on January 03, 2009, 09:30:31 am quote: Cox offers analog service, unlike AT&T. A fair comparison is Cox Digital Cable vs. AT&T. Cox Digital Cable includes HD at no additional charge. AT&T's U-Verse service does not include HD channels. You pay at least $10 and up to $15. So Cox HD is free when compared to AT&T. A second receiver from Cox is $5.25. A second receiver from AT&T is either $5 or $7. So Cox even has better rates here. AT&T's On Demand service is much more limited than Cox. And they don't have nearly the HD On Demand than Cox does. Cox provides shows from ABC and NBC (Grey's Anatomy, Lost, Desperate Houswives, Heros, for example) free On Demand the day after it was broadcast on the network. AT&T does as well, but Cox provides the shows free to watch an unlimited amount of times -- AT&T charges $1 per episode per view. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 03, 2009, 10:20:10 am With Total-Home DVR I can easily search, record, and replay any content quickly. I can even program recordings from my wireless or remotely on the web. And when I go to replay my content, there is virtually no delay in channel switching, and the picture never 'blocks' or goes all pixel on me. U-verse is a better value and a great product. Consumers agree: U-verse tops cable for satisfaction! (http://"http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=jd+powers+uverse&aq=0&oq=jd+powers+u")
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 03, 2009, 10:29:50 am quote: Still didn't address HDPokefan's issues. Plus the fact that virtually everyone in Tulsa and most surrounding communities has access to Cox Digital. How many have access in Tulsa to Uverse? Only those with AT&T phone service, and even then, still not everyone. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 03, 2009, 10:45:26 am quote: U-verse does NOT charge for DVR would be the larger point. It is so easy to record an entire series with a double click that if someone needs help understanding that i wonder if they are allowed to drive, too! Ha ha! Figgers an OSU fan would not understand D-V-R. Ha ha ha! U-verse has 10,000 movie titles on demand, Sux has what, 700? Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 03, 2009, 10:57:37 am quote: So how much commission is AT&T paying you for each install? Hmm? I smell an AT&T shill.... Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Nik on January 03, 2009, 10:58:48 am To get HD and DVR capabilities on an additional TV, UVerse it cheaper than Cox (and DirecTV?). I'm still not sure whether Cox or UVerse has more HD channels, but from what I'm hearing, Cox has a better HD picture. UVerse has the Total Home DVR and they allow you to set something to record via Internet, while Cox does not. To me, UVerse has superior technology but the negative reviews on the picture quality are disheartening.
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 03, 2009, 11:13:24 am The picture quality has been much much better than with Cox in my first-hand experience. I grew up devouring television, any tv, so I know what I am talking about.
Shill? Hoss, you are right. I guess I should go ahead and keep letting all the positive remarks continue and just get out of the way! Bunch of shills these consumers who participated in the JD Powers survey. Clearly have a profit motive! Hardy har! Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: jiminy on January 03, 2009, 11:21:22 am I actually signed up for Uverse at one point, to a traveling salesman, but cancelled after I did some research. Namely, they don't have a box with Firewire output (salesguy told me they did) and the disappointing HD quality. In order to provide 2 HD streams at once they dropped them to 6 mbps, which is marginal even for h.264. I think Cox's mpeg2 is 18 mbps. Those were the dealbreakers for me.
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 03, 2009, 12:14:31 pm quote: Yeah, seeing a lot of negative remarks as well. Can't shut up the informed consumer, can ya? [B)] Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 03, 2009, 12:32:08 pm Surprise! U-verse is NOT perfect! Hoss, I am going to ride you hard and put you up wet! I do not have HD and would not pay for it anyway so that aspect I do not know what is up. People love the total-home DVR, the picture quality, faster channel changing et al. If HD quality is an issue and everything else does not matter, why not sign up for Dish or DirecTV?
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: EricP on January 03, 2009, 12:52:43 pm quote: It's ironic you are talking about its fantastic picture quality.... then you mention you don't even watch HD. Better SD picture quality? lol. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 03, 2009, 01:03:17 pm quote: Absolutely. Funny thing is 'officially' HD is not available in two streams. But the SD has - on my 42" Sanyo and 27" RCA tuber - no pixelation or blocking. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 03, 2009, 01:23:15 pm quote: Which is why I suggest you're a shill for AT&T. I don't shill for Cox, I do shill against AT&T and their.. a) deceptive ad practices b) HORRENDOUS accounting practices. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 03, 2009, 01:36:05 pm quote: I been working for 'now' 'at&t' for ten years. My company has the hottest products going. I been posting here for years and this is the first time I have endorsed a product offered by my company. And even then I have not specifically asked for anyone's business here even though I could make quite a bit of commission. Shill? Whatever! Here y'go! (http://"http://www.flickr.com/photos/43648691@N00/3163335819/") Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on January 03, 2009, 02:22:12 pm quote: Not that it matters much, but DirecTV has had that capability for what, two years now? FYI, DirecTV's HD is MPEG4. Id go with them or Dish Network over cable anyday. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 03, 2009, 02:38:52 pm quote: That was all I ever asked is that you come clean about it. At least now we know your motives. Or at the very least, I do. And if by 'hottest products' you mean that 10 year long debacle called 'Project Lightspeed' (yes, I did have SWB back then) then you have everyone fooled. When Uverse can deliver to everyone and not just pockets here and there, will I not shoot it down every chance I get, especially when you are shilling for it. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: inteller on January 03, 2009, 02:54:19 pm quote: BFD. I can schedule recordings to my MCE box from my mobile as well as stream the content I have reocrded back to it as well. makes any of internet crap dish, cox, or att offer look like the stone ages. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 03, 2009, 03:50:00 pm quote: And I am sorry that some almagamation of the company sort of known as at&t done you wrong sometime wayyyy back when. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 03, 2009, 04:11:51 pm quote: Trust me, they're still doing it. They're trying to collect on $100 dollars they say I owe them after their idiot technicians failed to turn off the DSL when I asked them to TEN YEARS AGO, after they had already come and taken the modem. JD Powers my donkey... Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: HDPokeFan on January 03, 2009, 08:15:04 pm quote: Tim - Okay we get you work for AT&T and like their video product -- but you are losing a lot of credibility by posting things completely untrue about the product. As I mentioned I have both U-Verse and Cox (although I will be officially ending my personal trial of U-Verse at the end of January). I can tell you that Cox has way way way way more On Demand content than AT&T -- it is not even remotely close. And now that you mentioned you don't have HD at home we can see why your HD information is incorrect. The amount of HD content available On Demand for AT&T is about 14 shows at last check. Cox has hundreds of titles. I do like U-Verse's guide, but at least admit U-Verse has some serious problems. Mainly the technology. AT&T decided to add video without truly building their network. The spent about 1/7th of what Verizon spent building their video network. That is why if you are downloading something on your AT&T DSL you can be effecting the quality of your video signal -- because AT&T decided to send video over the same copper wires as the telephone and DSL. THIS IS A FACT: AT&T has less bandwidth coming into the home for phone service, U-Verse video service, and internet service combined than Cox has for just one channel of video service. (Tim - If you don't believe me ask your engineers. AT&T has about 25 Mbps available going into the home for all 3 services, -- Cox has about 36 Mbps available for just one channel of video service. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Cats Cats Cats on January 04, 2009, 10:06:29 am Just cancel cox and u-verse and then join back up when the prices drop. I only want 15 channels. Take the other 200 channels throw them in the trash and I will give you $20 a month. These a**hole companies can't use the its too hard to offer individual channels crap for so long. If people don't want to buy them they will either 1) lower their price or 2) go out of business.
ESPN Ocho Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 04, 2009, 10:23:00 am HD poke you are losing a lot of credibility posting things completely misleading about the U-verse product! Cox needs all the extra bandwidth because of the kind of receivers they are using, no? Why does the Cox channels take soooooo looooooong to change? Is it because of the receiver or because of all their extra bandwidth? Ha ha! 14 HD titles? Are you kidding? Tulsans get 45 channels!! What zip code are you using when you visit the easy-to-navigate uverse.att.com site? Unless you are seeing something different, you must think the readers here are stoopid or something!
Again, the slower speed of the delivery of the 'on-demand' product - really a hodge-podge patchwork of forced programming (previews, clips, snippets of shows) - and the richer digital quality of the SD make U-verse a better value IMO. By saying 'completely untrue' you are saying I am a liar; I am calling you are a Damned Liar! Protocol suggests that you "double-damn" me before I "double-damn-you-to-hell." And then, it would be On like Ron. In civil debate when such a broad accusation has been leveled by an opponent, the offended mistakes greatly if he/she does not immediately ask for an apology or resignation of the argument from the opponent. # HDPOKEMINTHEARASEFAN - Okay we get the fact your crappy Cowgirls lost - but your bitter tirades are boring and useless. Feed the birds rather than trolls, Tulsan! Ha ha! QUACK QUACK QUACK!!! As I mentioned I have had both U-Verse and Cox (and I really do not miss the crappy insulting commercials every ten seconds demanding that I surrender all my communication products to some blue-shirted she-male). I can tell you that Cox's has way way way way more "On Demand" content is a JOKE! Your information is misleading and incorrect, and I really do not have time to try and correct your poor attempt at debate. THIS IS A FACT: "Reputation" is very important, and I know when I am being "struggled against" by thugs and I will not stand for it!! I apologize for even getting involved in this discussion. Things may have gotten heated a time or two but what is going on is not even cool. If I posted anything that was taunting or playfully worded at the Cox company I never intended to mislead or misdirect or misconstrue any claim they made about their service or the capabilities. I have made every effort to have Tulsans visit the att website, pay attention to their mail, visit a store, or even engage any of the hordes of clipboard carrying neophytes descending on your neighborhood/subdivision for information about the U-verse service. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: EricP on January 04, 2009, 10:43:04 am I think I threw up in my mouth a little bit. You are not making anybody switch to u-verse with your broken record "faster channel switching" and "better looking SD" arguments. What most people would do is not involve their own companies in discussions like this beyond a little peep because the information they provide is going to be biased garbage. Hopefully you realize that by now..
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 04, 2009, 11:18:57 am quote: When it happens for all of Tulsa, then you might not look like such an arse. But instead AT&T picks and chooses where Uverse is deployed instead of getting the infrastructure set up for everyone. Kinda like what Cox did with the digital rebuild. But at least they (Cox) were very upfront about that. And I'm guessing the reason you 'don't have time to debate' him is because you can't. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on January 04, 2009, 11:34:30 am quote: Those companies have been the content providers, who set the prices all the carriers must pay. When you buy ESPN, you also have to subsidize the parent company's Disney and ABC losses. Likewise when you subscribe to Comedy Central your paying to keep MTV, BET and Spike afloat. I cant say the carriers have "nothing" to do with provider's pricing schemes, but publicly they have testified before the FCC that they support ala-carte programming. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Cats Cats Cats on January 04, 2009, 02:57:09 pm quote: That is why I said if people don't buy them (the channels) they will go out of business. Now you pay double to keep Hallmark, Hallmark Western, Hallmark Halloween, Hallmark Touch By An Angel, Hallmark Touched by An Uncle channels on the air for the .5% that watch them. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: MDepr2007 on January 04, 2009, 06:55:27 pm With Cox going up on DVR service , it looks like I might as well pick up a 2nd Tivo now and get their reduced price for having 2.
http://www.cox.com/oklahoma/emailoffers/TUL_Feb_2009_RateNotice.htm (http://"http://www.cox.com/oklahoma/emailoffers/TUL_Feb_2009_RateNotice.htm") Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: inteller on January 04, 2009, 08:14:01 pm what's that up from? I thought it was already $11.
If Cox were to include Tivo IPG for $11.99 that would be killer, and a death blow to any crap ATT could offer. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 04, 2009, 09:23:35 pm quote: From what I understand Cox is working on the TIVO IPG, but they're dragging their feet due to the economy, is my understanding. And I think what he's referencing is the yearly summary of fees that all cable companies are required to provide to their consumers. Doesn't mean any rates have gone up, it's just policy. Although I'll admit I haven't completely looked through it yet. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on January 04, 2009, 10:55:36 pm quote: Cox has an annual rate increase every spring for as long as they have had the franchise with the city. TCI was the same way. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 05, 2009, 09:42:55 am quote: I guess what I mean is that I am not going to go through each line and show in exhaustive detail why everything he said is incorrect, misleading, and designed to confuse. The reason deployment is spotty is because the equipment is expensive. I do not know but suspect the neighborhoods are carefully chosen based on ability to pay. That way, if some deadbeat tries to skirt off with equipment or just magically stop paying the bill they are worried about losing more than the trailer. Oh. Sorry. Ha ha ha! Just kidding! Laugh! And EricP next time you throw up in your mouth - spit it out, do not swallow. Ewwwwww. There are scads of forums, blogs, and websites devoted to all this and a lot of them are geeky netpicking BS that want to argue the number of angels on the head of a pin. The concept is really simple: no contract, sign-up incentives, exciting new options. http://www.att.com/uverse (http://"https://uverse1.att.com/un/launchAMSS.do") Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 05, 2009, 10:31:03 am quote: Then why 'pimp' something if not everyone can have it? That just does not make a whole lot of marketing sense. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on January 05, 2009, 04:37:32 pm Apparently at&t has folks going door-to-door now. I decided that in the interest of fairness and just seeing what the competition has to offer, I'll give U-Verse a shot, since they have the 30 day money back guarantee, which I'll probably be using.
The install is on Thursday. I'm just wondering whether the installer will be more than a little annoyed that there is zero chance in hell I'm letting him touch my existing cable lines, given that I plan on keeping Cox and doing a side-by-side comparison. If I could use TiVo with U-Verse, they'd have a much greater chance of keeping my business when the 30 days come around. They'd have a 100% chance of getting $10 a month for me if I could get only the HD channels for their HD service upcharge. (HDNet and HDNet Movies are worth that much to me) They'd also have a better chance of keeping my business if they'd make use of the extra speed my line will almost surely support. (The U-Verse cabinet is next door, so my gateway will probably sync at 100Mbps) Speaking of Cox, they gave me a free month and charged me no money to install a couple of outlets when I moved this past weekend, although it looks like come February 1st, my bill will be going up big time. A dollar here and a dollar there and soon it adds up to real money. Edited to add: Surely when Hoss said 'project lightspeed,' he really meant 'Project Pronto,' which was canceled half complete, leaving any additional remote terminal installs to be done as the normal budget allowed. And this when profits were already high. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 05, 2009, 05:34:48 pm quote: You're exactly right. I had DSL for exactly one year from SBC when the rep told me I was 9500 feet from the CO, the tech came out and said 'you were given bad information, you're about 16.5 from the CO, which renders you down to 384 kbps'. At the time, that was faster than dial up, and I was waiting for Cox to finish the 'rebuild' as it was called in the day. My first two weeks with SBC were utter hell. The modem would not sync for more than 30 minutes at a time, and instead of getting someone local when I called about it, I got someone from their outsource in Wichita (pre India outsourcing I guess). They were horrible. I called a total of 20 times in a month and got zero resolution. Finally, after some time they finally got the line working. I carried it until the rebuild was finished, which just so happened to be as my 1 year contract (yep, SBC made you sign a contract back then) expired with them. This is back in 2002 mind you. I called to cancel, and they had the nerve to ask why. Couldn't they see the notes all over my record?. They said 'is there anyway we can retain you?'. I said 'yeah, get me 3mbps service to start'. Of course that didn't happen. I went from 384kpbs to 3mbps with Cox@Home. I got caught in th @Home demise too and still the rollout of Cox only was pretty smooth. And to top it all off, I found out they had been charging me for DSL from April until August without my knowledge (I had not been receiving bills because I had ALL my SBC services turned off since I had a cell phone at this point). I called them and it was taken care of...or so I thought. Until last year, when I started receiving collection notices, none of which showed up on my credit report until after I started receiving the notices. I had paperwork in hand, faxed it to them, and they STILL would not clear and have not cleared the entry from my credit record. I have to keep an addendum on file explaining this to anyone peeking at my credit info. So to say I'm a little pissed at AT&T is like saying the Pope is 'a little Catholic'. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on January 05, 2009, 06:18:59 pm quote: Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on January 05, 2009, 07:21:32 pm quote: Sometimes getting what you really want depends on how determined you are to talk to the person who has the authority to complete your order. My brother had to talk to a few at&t reps before he was escalated to one that could hook him up to just internet without a TV package. Something to consider if you prefer your TV from one provider but your internet from another. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 06, 2009, 09:11:45 am quote: Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: HDPokeFan on January 06, 2009, 07:58:57 pm First and clarification because the information I provided earlier was not updated. HD On Demand movies is 68 movies for Cox and 42 for AT&T. Cox has another 190 free HD On Demand titles that are regular shows ... AT&T has zero.
Tim -- A couple of questions for you. 1) Did you ask you engineer about the fact I provided that Cox has more bandwidth available in one channel than AT&T has available for the whole house? (Nathann - that is why you won't get 100 Mpbs because AT&T only has 25 Mbps available to the home and if you are watching a HD channel and recording another you use all but 7 to 8 meg. You start using the internet and you are toast.) That is why Cox's network is better because they can channel bond and provide way faster internet speeds and still offer no bandwidth issues on the television since they are completely separate channels. 2) Why doesn't AT&T offer PBS in HD? 3) Why did AT&T decide to build their U-Verse network (Project Lightspeed) on the cheap instead of following Verizon's plan for FIOS? (i.e. AT&T only used existing copper wires which have inherently limited bandwidth versus FIOS building a more state-of-the-art network like cable companies and have vastly more bandwidth (Seem to make better sense to me -- and results definitely show FIOS is a tough customer to cable companies) Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 06, 2009, 09:02:01 pm quote: 1. Does not matter. I prefer the quicker channel changing, picture in picture, 4 DVR streams and still have a better quality picture than I did with Cox. I surf the web and TV all the time and have not experienced the speaker coil wire plasma switcher geek-talk-bs that you keep laying down. I have heard where mathematics perfessors can prove that 2+2=5 and this is what you are doing. All I know is that the picture quality is great, my surfing is faster and funner, and my internet works consistently. I had Cox digital for a decade and the quality of picture is better. I dunno why. The speaker coils I guess. 2. PBS in HD? No idea. Are you sure about that? You were wildly incorrect earlier about your disinformation so maybe you are wrong here too! Of course I am 'only' using SD and it looks great! Every HD channel can be conveniently DVR'd so all the slow-poke 'on demand' cox has to offer is beside the point. S-t-r-a-w-m-a-n. 3. Inasmuch as AT&T beats cable in customer satisfaction sounds like they made a good decision to go 'cheap!' Ha ha! Someone can have an arm that will allow them to throw from the back of centerfield all the way to home plate but will still be slower than a relay. Your agenda is to misinform and confuse. Folk here are smarter than that. No contract. No activation fees. NO MORE DOPEY COX COMMERCIALS EVERY TEN MINUTES. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: EricP on January 06, 2009, 09:51:05 pm Please, PLEASE DO SHUT UP ABOUT PICTURE QUALITY. You DON'T HAVE HD.
"Ha Ha!!!" Do you just sit there flipping SD channels all day to see how fast the low resolution picture changes on your oak console TV with vaseline on the screen? Have you heard of a guide before? I am done with this thread. Gawd. Nothing useful or informational anymore at all. Lock it and throw away the key. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 06, 2009, 10:19:06 pm quote: You have obviously not seen Cox's new ONdemand, which is much snappier. Oh, and still has more titles than AT&T [:D] Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on January 08, 2009, 02:47:53 pm They did my install this morning.
Thus far, I've noticed that there are some annoying PQ issues on a few of the HD channels and the Total Home DVR feature is nearly useless. You can't request a recording from the secondary DVR. Additionally, there are no trick play features available. Why they couldn't have spent the extra few bucks a box and put a decent amount of RAM in it so it could buffer live tv, I'll never figure out. It's just stupid. The secondary boxes not being able to request a recording on the DVR is beyond stupid; it's inexcusable. On the plus side, the install went smoothly, only 3 hours, there are quite a few more HD channels, although I don't care about most of them, and the DVR itself hasn't yet done anything to annoy me. It's not even slow. Channel changes are much faster than I would have thought possible without bloating the stream's bandwidth with a whole bunch of I frames. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TheTed on January 08, 2009, 03:30:39 pm I guess it depends what your interests are but for me AT&T offers so many more channels that Cox will not offer any time in the near future. I'd be willing to put up with a reduction in quality for the increased quantity.
Now if Uverse would just hurry up and come downtown, or at least give me the slightest idea of some sort of timeframe for downtown. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: MDepr2007 on January 08, 2009, 07:03:31 pm Gosh after all this I am thinking : DirecTV + Tivo + Amazon movie downloads thru Tivo[^]
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: EricP on January 08, 2009, 09:19:04 pm Wait.... no buffering/pausing live TV?? Ew.
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: lms68 on January 08, 2009, 09:52:42 pm quote: Nathan, I just ordered U-Verse but it can't be installed until the end of the month for a variety of reasons, some mine and some AT&T's. Anyway, I hope you don't mind if I ask you a couple of questions -- I'm still a little nervous about making the switch from Cox since I don't know anyone else who has U-Verse yet. 1. What do you mean by "PQ issues"? 2. What are "trick play features"? 3. Do I understand you correctly that you cannot pause live TV? I thought was a basic feature of all DVRs. 4. Did you get the phone? If so, are you using it with a security alarm? Thanks for your help! Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on January 08, 2009, 10:17:13 pm quote: I'm happy to answer questions. Answering my own questions about the service was my primary reason for ordering, anyway. [:D] 1. By PQ issues I mean obvious compression artifacts on some, but not all, HD channels. Their encoders seem to have this bad habit on news shows and other programming without a lot of motion. When the screen is fairly static, it'll alternate between being sharp and soft every few seconds. If it were just soft the whole time, it wouldn't be nearly as noticeable. 2. Trick play features are pausing live TV, instant replay, 30 second skip, that sort of thing. If you only have one TV, it's nothing to worry about, as the DVR box itself can do those things. On any secondary TVs, you don't get a DVR box, you get a regular box (they won't rent you a second DVR, even!) that can't do those things. The shows on the DVR are available for viewing (and trick play use) on secondary boxes, however. The major oversight here is that you can't hit record on a non-DVR box and have the DVR start recording it on behalf of the non-DVR box. You can't even schedule future recordings from the non-DVR box. You either have to use the website or go to the DVR box itself. That basically makes the service unusable in my home. (My SO will not be pleased when she figures that one out!) 3. As I mentioned before, the DVR box can pause live TV, but any other boxes cannot..and you can't get multiple DVRs at this point. 4. No..my security system has a cell modem. Oh, and just for what it's worth, if you do get the phone, they can't run wires for you without charging, apparently. At least that's what my installer seemed to think. Also, there's a glitch on the music channels that can cause audio dropouts if you use the trick play features on them. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 09, 2009, 07:24:49 am quote: SPIT, ERIC! SPIT! Full DVR functionality is available on the Master Box (setting, erasing recordings, pausing live TV) and on the extra boxes one may view recorded programs. If there is a show I want to watch in the other room like last night's game, I will set the channel to record on the Master Box and then go to my recordings and play the recording from the other box. I quickly and easily pause rewind and ff from that box no problem. Folk still get picture-in-picture viewing and super-fast surfing on the other boxes. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: EricP on January 09, 2009, 08:42:09 am quote: What exactly are you on, anyway? Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 09, 2009, 08:47:47 am quote: I think the term is a 'shill pill'. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 09, 2009, 10:10:56 am quote: . . . a quest, a never-ending journey of truth, justice, and the American Way! Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: patric on January 09, 2009, 11:29:27 am quote: If that's the essence of 'Total Home DVR' then Im disappointed, as I would prefer fully-functional DVR's instead of master/slave boxes. I can say that DirecTV TiVo's are pretty robust, and you can have as may DVR's as you want (however many outputs your multiswitch has) and Dish network is pretty much the same. Their price for internet is less than the equivalent speed on DSL, so I would upgrade to U-verse for my internet at least, and keep the satellite TV. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on January 09, 2009, 02:06:38 pm quote: It wouldn't be so bad if it was possible to rent multiple DVRs, or if you could at least set up recordings from the slave boxes, but you can't, so it's pretty much useless if your TVs are far apart. I'm not going to hoof it downstairs every time I feel like setting up a recording. The PQ isn't there on my 47" LCD, either. It's not terrible by any stretch, so if you're saving money, it might be worth it. I'm not. It costs me the same either way. The only advantage is the extra channels, but there's no way I'm going to put up with the limitations of this DVR box for HDNet and HDNet Movies, especially when you consider that I can't even watch/record more than 2 HD streams at once despite the fact that my RG could easily sync at 60Mbps or more. (The VRAD is maybe 10 or 20 yards from my front door) While I can't say I've made up my mind for sure yet, it's not looking good for U-Verse. I may consider keeping the Internet part, though, since Cox is only at 15Mbps (before Powerboost), while I can get 18 from at&t that should be completely reliable without the TV hogging the bandwidth. And as I said before, there are certain aspects of the service that blow away Cox's standard offering. The channel change speed is crazy fast, the online scheduling is a nice feature, and as I said before, the extra channels are also nice. It's not all bad by any means, I just think it fails overall on the TV front compared to my TiVos. I'm going to give it a week or two and if my mind still isn't changed, the stuff is going back. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: HDPokeFan on January 09, 2009, 08:16:56 pm quote: You are not going to get 60 Mbps. Unless you are new build area with fiber to the house, U-Verse limits to around 25 Mbps for all services - with as you mentioned internet capped at 18 Mbps (of course, probably far less if you are watching HD channels). Oddly enough even though I have decided Cox service is vastly superior to U-Verse it is not picture quality for me as a main reason. I think picture quality on U-Verse is only slightly less than Cox. The big issue is HD service and On Demand. And I like having a lot of speed for internet. AT&T wants $55 for 18 Mbps -- I can get 20 Mbps with Cox for $34 in my Cox bundle. Plus I don't need a digital box in my daughter's room so nice to have free 68 channel service in her room and the garage -- with U-Verse I need a $7 receiver in each room. And frankly I wasn't so anti-AT&T until I kept reading Tim H try to fake everyone on this board and make up stories about what his company's service can do. And you get all the OKC Thunder games on Cox - while AT&T only carries some of the games. Of course, since the Thunder is horrible maybe that is not a good reason :). Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on January 10, 2009, 11:08:03 am quote: Even in FTTH areas, the profiles are exactly the same, it's just delivered over fiber instead of VDSL. And I know they won't use the extra capacity my line has, but I could sync at 60Mbps if they'd let me. (the RG actually says 70, but the tech's tester said 60) As far as Internet goes, Cox won't give me a discount without taking their phone service also, which I'm not at all interested in, so the prices are the same. And Cox's 20Mbps tier isn't actually 20Mbps, it's 15Mbps with the first 10 seconds or so uncapped. I've gotten 30Mbps on speed tests with it before, but any time you actually download something, after the first 10 seconds it'll drop back to 15Mbps. I don't have a problem with that except on the marketing end of things. With at&t, if you don't have TV service (or don't have HD service, or only watch one HD channel at a time on the 25Mbps profile) you'll get the full 18Mbps (minus the slightly higher overhead that at&t incurs because they use PPPoE, so really about 17Mbps) That's one thing I really liked about my DSL service. The speed was slower than snot (3Mbps..they couldn't get me 6), but it was always there. Cox is pretty good in that department, too, but there are a few more slowdowns with them to certain sites than I used to see on DSL. Right now I'm thinking I will probably cancel the TV but keep the Internet since it's the same price and is actually faster on large downloads. Not that I think Powerboost is bad, mind you, but 18 is better than 15 and I do download a lot of stuff, so the jump to 20Mbps or higher at the start of a download just isn't that interesting to me. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 10, 2009, 12:53:39 pm quote: Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 10, 2009, 01:18:07 pm quote: Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 10, 2009, 01:35:29 pm quote: Keep trying there pal. Zero misleading information. If I had the time I would go back through seven pages and cut and paste and blah blah blah, right? Wrong. If you want to go back through it all and show me where I have mislead or even misspoke I will be more than happy to correct myself. In the meantime we have determined that U-verse offers a variety of exciting new features that greatly enhance customer experience. The number of HD channels U-verse offers will expand to over 100 by end of month February. By end of year 09 30% of residences in the at&t footprint will be close enough to the fibreoptic nodes to enjoy the service. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: EricP on January 10, 2009, 02:16:35 pm quote: Ooooooooooh.. competitive service in 30% of areas by year end.. I wouldn't be bragging about that. can this be over yet? PLEASE? Will you guys go back to convincing yourself that you're awesome in the mirror? I am tired of this stupid useless thread coming up in my recently active threads. Gawd. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 10, 2009, 02:17:12 pm quote: Guess what? 30 percent is less than 100 percent. You're making my point so much easier. http://www.dslreports.com/forum/uverse Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 10, 2009, 02:51:34 pm Hoss, now you are just being completely stupid - as stupid as Eric must be requesting alerts on on threads from TulsaNow!
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 10, 2009, 07:43:13 pm quote: You're still not addressing the question. I guess when you don't have a valid answer to it you call other people stupid. I have a 5 year old nephew that does this. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 10, 2009, 08:16:30 pm What questions precisely? Again, understand that I am congenitally unable to allow the last word on the subject a dig at myself or a decent product that I sell. That package may not be perfect - but it is in the zip code of perfect! Ha ha hoss! Hi Eric!
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on January 10, 2009, 09:02:36 pm quote: Dude, you suffer from ADHD. Seek help. Really. Hell, I almost expect you to start wearing a cheerleading uniform with AT&T's logo and a big U on a sweater. You also suffer from elitism, as the zip code comment plainly suggests. I wonder how your handlers at AT&T would look on this? And mods, please feel free to lock this topic. I believe it's run its course because all you're going to get are answers from a shill. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: tim huntzinger on January 10, 2009, 09:10:56 pm quote: . . . and inaccurate, misleading, incorrect and biased lies from anonymous detractors. U-verse leads customer satisfaction versus its cable competitors. I am sorry that upsets you. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on January 11, 2009, 09:47:41 am quote: And all this time I thought most households had more than one TV set. Maybe most people don't care if their kids/wife/whoever get all the same features as they do in the living room. On the feature set alone, TiVo on cable is a much better proposition. Really, the only thing Uverse has going for it is the expanded channel lineup. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TUalum0982 on February 17, 2009, 08:54:01 am Well AT&T finally came out yesterday and installed U-verse. I must say the Tech was very knowledgable in some areas, and other areas not as much.
Tech called about 1000AM and said he would be there in about 30 minutes. 1030 rolls around and he is right on time. I show him where the tv's are and he explains what he is going to set up, etc. Install went pretty smooth with only minor problems. I originally ordered U200 with HD. He showed I ordered U200 with no HD plus internet. A quick phonecall to whomever quickly solved the mixup. Overall install time was about 3 hours. I did have him turn on the internet with their "max" speed of 18 and he assured me it would be dedicated, with the TV feed being different. I tested the speeds both on my laptop and on my desktop and they still were not as fast as Cox. I am calling them tonight to disconnect the internet. As for the picture quality, it is pretty good. I have both TV's hooked up with HDMI. The picture color is what concerns me. The black levels are off as are peoples faces and skin tones. People's skin tones almost look orange. As for the blacks, it is kind of hard to describe. For instance, last night I was flipping through the HD channels and landed on fox news with Greta. It was an interview with Sarah Palins daughter. She was wearing a black shirt and has dark hair. When the camera was on her, you could not distinguish between the shirt and her hair, it all looked as one. I noticed this while watching the Texas A&M basketball game on ESPN HD as well. The blacks just seem to run togheter for lack of a better word. I have read on uverseusers.com that this might be a problem with the HDMI, as these boxes are succeptible to problems. I will switch to component cables tonight and see what it looks like. I have it all hooked up via ethernet and the router is sitting behind my tv in the living room. I still have my directv hoooked up via cox with HDMI to the tv's and have been comparing. I would say after 1 day I will probably stick with Directv as they are coming out with an app for the iphone where I can set my recordings and such thruogh the phone. You can do it online like Directv but only if you subscribe to AT&T's internet. Pros for the uverse are its LIGHTNING QUICK response when changing channels as well as the guide in comparison to Directv. Also, the Total Home DVR is great. One other thing I like about directv is it tells you the original run date in the info button, where as AT&T does not. Overall, U-verse has some great features, but the overall picture quality IMO is inferior to that of Directv. If Uverse could improve upon their picture quality it would be vastly superior, but the picture quality kills it for me. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: sgrizzle on February 17, 2009, 09:05:31 am Have you used HDMI on a different input? contrast settings could be an issue as well. Also make sure that the box is inputting the highest format capable. The Cox boxes default to 480p on HDMI.
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TUalum0982 on February 17, 2009, 09:25:04 am quote: Yeah I have. I made sure both boxes were at 1080i and that the picture setting was Pro. I have a 60" Sony SXRD XBR in the living room with a 46" Sony XBR3 in the bedroom. The vivid and standard picture settings are too bright. I will mess around with the color contrast tonight. Also, another positive of Uverse is the fact that they have WGN HD. Which Directv does not yet carry. I love watching my beloved Chicago Cubs in HD! Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Conan71 on February 17, 2009, 09:35:46 am I see on my current Cox bill my cable and internet combo have arbitrarily gone up about $7.00. Might be time to start thinking about alternatives....
Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TUalum0982 on February 17, 2009, 10:42:46 am quote: correct me if I am wrong sgrizzle, but haven't you called into Cox in the past about raising their rates, and threaten to cancel and they have lowered your monthly rate? I don't understand when companies raise their rates yet provide nothing more then the service they were already providing. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: sgrizzle on February 17, 2009, 11:14:15 am quote: Yeah, they lowered mine $20 for 12 months and an additional $20 for 6 months. Cox has been running new fiber and expanding their bandwidth which I believe is constrained (no matter what cox says). They have been adding more HD channels, albeit 3-4 at a time. Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on February 17, 2009, 02:05:10 pm quote: If you get your TV calibrated properly, you'll have much better dark detail, but you'll also notice the compression artifacts much more. I'm surprised you find the total home DVR worth a damn. Can't you share shows between DVRs with the newer DirecTV boxes anyway? Title: AT&T U-Verse Post by: TUalum0982 on February 17, 2009, 02:28:33 pm quote: not to my knowledge. I have the HR22 in the bedroom (HD DVR) because the directv installer said he could not run the additional wire down the 12FT living room cieling. I have the regular HD receiver in the living room. I like the features of THDVR and the SUPER FAST channel speed and the guide IMO is overall a better product, but I can't seem to get the picture quality to even equal that of directv. I have had both of my TV's calibrated to ISF standards and are set as a custom video setting. Also, to manage your recordings from online, you have to have AT&T internet. With directv, I can go to ANY computer and manage recordings, etc. And like I mentioned earlier, they are coming out with an APP for the iPhone that is supposed to be even easier. My only gripe with Directv is they still do not have WGN HD which generally carries about 60 cubs games a year. It looks AWFUL on DTV SD channel 307. Like I said, I have read from several forums where if you hook up Uverse with components, it will take away some of the saturation. I will try that this week, but based on my experience overall, I don't think I will keep Uverse. Title: Re: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on March 06, 2009, 03:56:28 pm Talk about ridiculous. As some of you may know, I canceled my U-Verse service within the 30 days. I received yet another bill today. They wanted $140 from me.
I called them up and they said "oh, yes, you canceled in the first 30 days, let me credit that back to you." Why exactly is it that their computer system failed to do that on its own? Are they just trying to steal money from inattentive people? Idiots. Title: Re: AT&T U-Verse Post by: Hoss on March 06, 2009, 04:49:43 pm Talk about ridiculous. As some of you may know, I canceled my U-Verse service within the 30 days. I received yet another bill today. They wanted $140 from me. I called them up and they said "oh, yes, you canceled in the first 30 days, let me credit that back to you." Why exactly is it that their computer system failed to do that on its own? Are they just trying to steal money from inattentive people? Idiots. Sounds like their billing practices haven't changed much. They still claim I owe them $180 from 2001 (yes, 2001, which is now outside the statute of limitations) that they keep selling the debt off to, even after I provided them proof that I paid them the final bill. Title: Re: AT&T U-Verse Post by: nathanm on March 06, 2009, 07:18:03 pm Nat just guessin you may have cx the service after the bill cycle began. You may still get one last statement, I am really not sure. It was the second bill I'd received since I canceled, and was marked "final bill." I ignored the previous one, since it came only a few days after I canceled, I presumed it was generated beforehand and would be corrected. Apparently not. At least the hold time was minimal.CAUTION: PAID EMPLOYEE OF AT&T That Uverse continues to amaze everyone I talk to that have it. Promos (no contract, no act, $ back) are still in play so if anyone wants to take the Nat challenge, now is definitely the time. |