After years of hearing my parents complain about their high cable bills, I finally had enough – they were going Cut the rope, whether they feel ready or not. Of course, they would have my help throughout the cable transition, and my colleagues here at Tom’s Guide even gave me all the information on the best cable tv alternativesmy parents would need one.
As you can imagine, the abandonment of more than 20 years of cable service has been accompanied by apprehension. Not only did their primary TV lack a smart tv platform, but the cable service also provided their home Wi-Fi. And Optimum, like some other big providers, makes it difficult to pay for a home internet connection independent of a cable plan.
It took a lot of persuading and a bit of metaphorical hand-holding, but my parents finally decided to quit on Optimum. From there, the first thing to do was to get their house back online. As a fan of Verizon’s Internet service in my own apartment, I researched the Verizon Internet Gateway, which is basically a giant hotspot for your home. With Auto-Pay enabled, Verizon’s home LTE service came out at $25 per month.
My parents were paying $195 a month for cable and internet, so they saw big savings instantly. When the Internet Gateway device arrived in the mail a few days later, I had it set up through the Verizon mobile app within an hour – no in-home service appointments needed.
Cutting the Cord Using a Fire TV Cube
With the Verizon internet gateway set up, it was time to turn their old Sharp TV into a smart TV. I enlisted the Amazon FireTV Cubeone of the best streaming devices. It also serves as Alexa smart speaker.
If you followed my DIY smart home series, you may know that my parents’ house is equipped with more than a dozen smart home devices. I’ll save the story of pairing them all to the new Wi-Fi for another time.
Setting up the Fire TV Cube was almost as simple as plugging in its power and HDMI cords. I entered our WI-Fi feed, signed in with our family’s common Amazon Prime credentials, and started installing streaming apps to use.
Of course, Amazon First video is integrated, but we also subscribe to netflix and Hulu, so I also upload those apps to the Cube. I also installed some of the best streaming services that do not deal with account sharing as a criminal offense, which I won’t name since my parents are very fond of not paying for so many services they can now access, and I don’t want these services to spread. Don’t act like you don’t either.
Skip a cable replacement (for now)
For a week now, my parents have had a dozen streaming apps to watch shows, movies, and other content on demand. I gave them the Verizon cable connection from my apartment to watch the Grammys on CBS, but that was the only cable experience request they wanted. They are happy with anything they can stream without an alternative cable service. If we are somehow forced to drop tethering from this account, well, Paramount More features live CBS Networks in its top tier.
That said, I don’t think they want to be without live TV forever. Fortunately, the best cable tv alternativeslike like TV Sling can be managed from month to month. Sling offers the cheapest basic package price ($40 per month) of any service with network channels, and that would still keep their monthly savings at over $100 compared to before cutting the cord.
Despite their initial hesitation, my parents are delighted with their new installation. They even try to convince our neighbors to do the same. We’ll see how long they’ll be happy without over-the-air TV service, but for now cable is abandoned with no sign of returning to my parents’ house.