My TV is Better and Cheaper then Your TV

I discussed in a previous post, that TV is Becoming Asynchronous, well if you’re an early adopter you can get rid of the word “becoming”. Over the last couple months I’d been planning a complete switch away from cable and last week, I achieved it. The picture above is how I pulled it off. Here’s every component and its price:

32″ Television – I’m not big on TV even when I do have it, so I didn’t stress out about the size and performance. Price: $350 at Walmart
eMachines Computer – I know, they’re crap computers, but they’re disposably priced. Windows 7, 64 bit processor, 750 GB hard drive, DVD player, speakers. Price: $350 at Walmart
Boxee – It’s a free download from Boxee.tv. It aggregates all of the TV shows released on the internet in to one, easy to navigate location. I can use an old remote I had lying around from a windows media center to easily navigate to all the latest episodes of all my favorite shows. Price: Free
MLB.tv Boxee Plugin – Major League Baseball has partnered with Boxee to build the plugin pictured above. I can select any game off the scoreboard pictured above with my remote and it will ask me if I want to view the home or away feed. This actually gives me access to MORE Pirate games then I would have had with FSN Pittsburgh and it’s from Charlotte! Additionally, when I click on the game I can choose to watch it from live, or from the beginning. They just announced that next year there will be a similar program for hockey. Price: $120 for the whole season
Netflix Boxee Plugin – Also pictured above is the Netflix plugin for Boxee (official Boxee picture, not my Queue). I can view any movie that they put out for “Instant” viewing. I can also check out old TV shows that they put out there, I’m making my way though season 1 of 30 Rock right now. Price $8.99 per month or $108 for the year.

That means that I’ll spend $928 for television this year and that includes THE TV and THE COMPUTER. What’d you spend the first year you setup your TV? After this year the costs drop to $228 (assuming the emachines computer continues working for 2 years) to watch virtually every baseball game and TV show that you do. $228, would you say that’s less then your cable bill?

There’s a time to welcome in the next generation of television, and that time is now.

http://twitter.com/chedigitz Juan Vasquez

Viva La revolucion! Kill your TV. I too welcome this new low cost a la carte pricing model of TV 2.0?
Joespeh

I'm working on doing this myself, but I really need college football/basketball in HD, who cares about baseball?
http://www.JonathanCavell.com Burgher Jon

First off, I care about baseball. It's my sport.

Second, the trick with sports is this. While WE are all excited about this
new paradigm of TV, the networks aren't so much. Baseball and Hockey, where
each team has their own TV contract with little local cable companies, can
make deals that allow the broadcasts to be shown outside the viewing range
of the little local cable companies. The problem with the NFL and college
sports is that they, for the most part have TV contracts with national
networks. Those national networks preserve to have the right to air the
games they own at any time, to any part of the country without competition.
It's a backwards way of thinking, but it's how they think.
Matt

Sounds like a great setup if you're mainly interested in MLB and Netflix (I'm guessing you're not married?). You might think about adding an over-the-air tuner to at least get network TV.
P-diddy

than your TV
http://www.JonathanCavell.com Burgher Jon

Your grammar is better thAn mine
http://www.JonathanCavell.com Burgher Jon

If a woman doesn't like baseball and movies (or at least won't allow me
them), I don't really see marrying her.

Good thought on the antenna. That would solve my football problem at least
partially.
http://www.mynext.co.uk mynext

28″ monitor – £250 from 2008, old computer, bbc iplayer, wireless keyboard and a proxy server for american tv. $384 for tv setup o/
http://jonathancavell.com/wordpress/tech/2010/08/on-the-netflix-and-epix-deal The Blog of Burgher Jon » On The Netflix and Epix Deal

[...] locking in your price now is favorable. Imagine if more then the expected number of people have TVs like mine in 3 years. Netflix will still have access to two more years of exclusive access to the distribution channel [...]
http://jonathancavell.com/wordpress/technology/2010/11/google-tv-looks-awesome-except-for-its-giant-buts The Blog of Burgher Jon » Google TV Looks AWESOME, Except for its Giant Buts

[...] (a fairly direct Google TV competitor) and I love it. I even wrote a post in this space titled, My TV is Better and Cheaper Then Yours. Google TV looks even better (though that’s a little unfortunate for the startup scene). [...]

My TV is Better and Cheaper then Your TV

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