[AL]

Surely the AT&T is more than 800 mg for 1290, is that a typo? My AT&T mobile Internet is 100g for 700 per month and it’s been flawless for 3 years. We stream everything and rarely now use the Dish for TV.

[DON]

I wrote back to Open Road and asked for clarification. It could have been 800 gigs. I can never figure out which is which. But it still gets throttled back. What we have now does not. We use it on our I Pads, phones, and TV’s.

Chuck48

[steve]

Chuck,

I use a mix of technologies for just the reasons you mention above. I too have been a DirecTV subscriber since just about the inception of the service. I understand they have recently announced a move to rebrand their AT&T TV service as AT&T Streaming. To me this feels like part of a longer term strategy to move all services (both DirecTV Sat based and cable based service) to a strictly streaming service based offering. I don’t know if you have played around with AT&T TV, but the channel line-up is already well lined-up with the DirecTV channel structure. Wouldn’t take much for them to replicate the DirecTV environment on a streaming service and eliminate all together the expensive DirecTV satellite network. I’m also using an AppleTV for streaming and other content.

Now, that puts a lot of pressure on reliable streaming for those of us on the road. I am using the FMCA plan through Sprint and have been satisfied with the results. Not perfect, but has worked well in the locations I have been in.

Another promising option is Star-Net (Elon Musk’s satellite based internet). That system is designed for moderate speeds (100-300meg download speeds) with VERY low latency. Not fully commercialized for moving vehicles yet but coming soon.

For now, I will stick with DirecTV and ride out their strategy and see where that lands. I suspect their big moves (like abandoning satellite network) will be years off. In that time, wireless internet will improve dramatically and will probably take-over.

I didn’t mention cable based systems available at most RV parks. Many of them are upgrading those systems to HD and are reasonable options. For now, I believe we are in a state of flux that will shake out in the coming years.

[Archived]

Hello,

Television on the road is very important to my wife and I. We love to watch local news in the morning and then after a day of exploring the area, settle down for dinner and an evening of our favorite shows. Problem is we always watch a mix of Network, streaming and Bravo, History, ect.

It has been a long road to get us where we want to be. So here is our fix which works great for us.

1) We have a Dish Wingard Traveler tied into our home Dish. After the equipment is purchased we pay $5 for the monthly service. With the Wally, morning I record shows that are ready to watch on the DVR.. This works great for mindless shows, that we would never watch at home. Also we have built a large amount of movies on the DVR. This gives us hundreds of hours to watch in a pinch. ISSUE is many time we are in a campground and trees block the service. If we are boondocking site lines for dish are rarely an issue

2) If blocked by trees we tie into the cable from the campground for local news and net work. These are really the only shows we count on at a certain times and works well

3) I have a Weingardingard Razor over the air antenna which is a good option for network and local news. Love the way it searches and locks in automaticly.

4) For streaming which is a big part of what we watch, I have two cell services with hotspot. Verizon and T-Mobile. Usually one works well. Rarely do both get good service at the same time, unless we are in a city area.

5) We have been spending time in the mountains and many times we totally lost cell signal in the bus. Walking around with our phones we usually get enough service to get a text or a call. To solve this (which frankly I have not been in a bad area to try) we installed a We Boost RV set up. I hope this helps us. My guess is we may not get enough signal to stream, but just getting texts and calls in the bus will be a great thing.

6) In these remote areas, we will use the Dish traveler (if not blocked by trees) and fall back to our DVR with hundreds of shows to watch.

7) We also have a DVD player and have books of DVD from the last 20 years.

8) We also have a TIVO over the air DVR which allow us to fill up with local network shows that I fill up when parked at my home.

8) Our bedroom we have everything routed to there, with a 4 way HDMI switcher which allow for Roku Stick, DVD Player, Dish, and TIVO unit. I just keep TV on HDMI 1 and use the switcher to change inputs. If we want to use our RAZOR over the air antenna, then I just change inputs on TV using the remote

7) Our coach is a 1998 and the wiring is outdated. All of our wiring to the front TV is outdated, except for the Razor over the air. I added a Wireless HIMI receiver and transmitter that works great. Only issue is we can only send what is being watched on the back TV units. Someday I plan on updating wiring but that will be a project.

Thanks

David Thomas

1998 Featherlight XL

[David]

Dave, We did the same thing you are doing on our last coach. This coach has an in motion Track Vision set up for Direct TV, which is not hooked up. So we would have to keep that or spend more money.

I have a clarification from Open Road Mobile. 129 is 300 GB hard cap. 159 will get you 800 GB soft cap and a throttle back after that. However, I would think it would be unlikely to use over 800 GB per month. Freedom Connect, what Open Road is calling the new service, the hardware cost 549 which includes an external antenna and a 4 G router. It is not only capable of using cell service but also public or private WIFI. We also use OTA and campground cable, but when you’re boon docking that won’t work. Still thinking. Thanks for the input.

Chuck48

[AL]

Hey Chuck,

We just use the hot spot on my T Mobile. My wife has verizon and we have an external hot spot unit.

Our plans are unlimited but they are throttled after a certain amount of data. We have found if the signal is strong, we can still stream just fine with the data throttled.

But is service is bad nothing works. For us this mainly happens up in the mountains. I look forward to trying out my We Boost soon to see what that does.

Thanks

David Thomas

1998 Featherlight XL

[Bill]

Keep in mind that ANY dome system including your KVH and DirecTV will only get you programming in SD. This can be OK for some but I think it’s nearly unbearable.

With DISH and a dome you can get HD programming but you are limited on receiver usage and DVR capabilities.

I have been a DTV customer forever and use the Winegard Trav’ler for DTV along with their Genie receiver (about the same as a DISH Hopper DVR). I also have an AT&T hotspot based on the old Mobley hardware so I am lucky to have a truly unlimited service for just a tad over $20/month. It’s no longer available and I am hopeful they don’t kill it at some point in the future. We have 2 Fire TV sticks on our 2 TV’s and with Amazon Prime there are tons of streaming options. We were blocked by a tree for our Winegard at our current location but turning the bus around gave us a clear view. We will likely be here for a month or 2 so getting DTV was important.

We also have the Winegard Razar Automatic dome OTA TV antenna which works great and gives us all the local news in the morning and evening. The dome is not as good as the Winegard Sensar (Batwing) but the automatic Batwing we had on the last coach is no longer available so the Razar has proven to be a pretty good 2nd best option.

---

2005 XL Thompson Coach

Rarely tow anything behind us.

Sold: 1993 Liberty that we loved for 12 years.

[Bill]

Bill, I go back to 1990 with Direct TV. A couple years ago Direct TV said they were changing all HD stations to the 101 satellite. I went out and bought a 24 series receiver, because it is the only one that could get HD off the dome antenna once Direct TV changed over the 101 satellite, just like Dish Network. Well, that never happened, and I sold my coach and left the receiver in it, another reason I’m leaning toward sticking with Open Road Mobile, which is great HD TV as long as I have a good cell signal.

I heard back from them today. I cannot use my old router, and it requires different cabling to the roof for the antenna that I have now. I will contact Marathon in Florida about installation. We go by there on our way to Riverbend Motorcoach Resort for our winter home. I’m thinking steaming is the way to go. We can use campground cable, and I have a good OTA antenna for the times when they are available.

Chuck48

[AL]

Actually, DTV never said they were moving all HD to 101. What they said was that all programming on the 101 would be in HD. That left tons of programming not available at all from the 101 location. If you don’t have an antenna capable of receiving the KA band on 99 and 103 (no dome!) then you will only get the small sliver of programming on the 101. That has been announced/threatened for years but it has never happened. DTV+Dome=SDTV. Was in the past and still is today.

[Chad]

Bill, you’re right, still no HD. I heard that the only HD channels that wouldn’t be on the 101 were local channels. Those would usually be covered by OTA channels. Direct TV went from a great service to another AT&T mess. I heard rumors that AT&T sold off Direct TV. That would be a good thing. Thanks for the input. Chuck48

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1984 96" with 8V92TA

(remodeled Liberty Coach)

Greenwood, MO

[Dick]

The info that all 101 channels would be in HD is wrong and about 2 years behind when they said they would do it. If you think about it, they would have to broadcast all of their programming only from the 101 or duplicate it on 101 and 99 or 103 which would make no sense. They put out a short list of what would be available but never a complete list. I assure you, if it ever happens, it will be a short list.

AT&T has sold DTV but it’s hard to say what that means as it has been sold to an investment company.

DirecTV is once again a standalone company.

Six years after AT&T acquired the satellite TV giant in a $67 billion deal, the company on Monday was officially spun out as a standalone video-centric entity in a deal backed by private equity firm TPG.

[Art]

Bill, It sounds like you are right up to date. I haven’t used Direct TV for a couple years. We had a mixed experience on our last trip at the end of June and the first part of July. It seemed everyplace we stayed at had poor cell service, therefore poor internet and TV reception. Open Road Mobile, that we inherited on our coach, is a great way to get internet and TV, providing the cell service is good. I am used to HD TV and would not want to go back to standard either. Still leaning toward up grading my streaming equipment and sticking with what I have. Thank you for the input.

Chuck48

[Art]

Regarding StarLink (Elon Musk’s company) – I have had it for about six months at home and it has been fantastic. Speed varies between maybe 60 Mbps and 250 Mbps down, and about 20 Mbps up. Latency is usually between 30 and 60 ms. I don’t do any video conferencing, so that latency is not noticeable for me. I only watch streaming content, and it is flawless for that. The service is unlimited with no throttling.

Earlier this year the company said they would have a mobile version by the end of the year. I haven’t heard any update on that, but I will jump on it when it becomes available. If you prefer streaming to scheduled programming, I wouldn’t spend a bunch on equipment upgrades until we see what StarLink introduces. The build quality of the fixed-position dish seems outstanding.

It does require a clear sky view though, so shaded campsites will still be an issue. A cellular device as a backup would probably be a common solution. The data caps may be less of a problem if it’s not your main source.

[Chuck & Katrina]

I know I’m not the only one with this use case; There is no other way to simultaneously watch 4 or 5 football games at a tailgate in the middle of a parking lot without a satellite. I hope it’s a really long time before SAT TV goes away

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2000 Featherlite H3-45

2024 Jeep Grand Cherokee

Leesburg, FL

[Archived]

You just need to make up your mind on which team is your team. Go Dawgs, beat Clemson.

Chuck 48