Just bought a house in Fort Lauderdale area. Can anyone give advise on any of these three cable providers. It was initially between Comcast and DirecTV but has U-verse mentioned at the last minute.

Comcast is the most consistent but it is a deal more expensive.

DirecTV has the right price but I am really worried about them always messing up when it rains. Which is does once daily about 2/3rds of the year. My biggest concern.

U-verse. Price seems good but I know nothing about them at all. Any info would help.

Independent of the rain issue, DirecTV is easily the best provider, IMO. Best channel line-up, best user interface, best customer service, etc. Have had them for five years and will never switch back to anything else.

How much does the rain become an issue? Is it any rain or only very heavy storms?

I live in LA, and it hardly ever rains here, so it's hard to say. Never had the satellite or service go out, but I've never experienced DirecTV in a thunderstorm either.

[This message has been edited by TCTTS (edited 5/28/2013 11:14p).]

My folks have DirectTV here in Houston and it goes out pretty frequently when it rains - not for tremendously long periods of time, but long enough to screw up your show (whether you're watching it live or are DVRing something)

I currently have U-Verse and love it....I had Comcast in my last house and I feel like I was always yelling profanities at my TV (directed at Comcast) for whatever reason

[This message has been edited by AgRyan04 (edited 5/29/2013 1:39a).]

Try the ones that don't ask you to sign a two year contract first.

Eff Comcast.

Not Comcast.

Verizon Fios beats them all hands down. Its available here in Tampa, would imagine its available down there as well.

And with the rain, tropical storms, etc we get in Florida, DirectTV is a horrible choice IMHO. Fios has never had a single issue in the five plus years we've had it, no matter how bad it storms.


[This message has been edited by FL_AG1998 (edited 5/29/2013 7:39a).]

Fios is not available in my area sadly.

Comcast has been good functionally but they keep raising the price and the customer service is bad. I am on the phone at minimum 30 minutes just to add or remove HBO.

I am leaning towards direct tv bc it is around $70 cheaper for more channels, the whole Genie DVD seems great but I am still not sold on the outages because of storms.

[This message has been edited by BigAggieCane (edited 5/29/2013 8:20a).]

quote:

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Fios is not available in my area sadly.

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That's a shame. In that case I would go with whatever carrier has the shortest contract (or maybe no contract, if possible), and keep an eye out for Fios in the future. Like I said above, they beat most if not everyone else in the content department, and with the storms prevalent in Florida (especially south Florida) they beat everyone I've heard of when it comes to maintaining their signal in bad weather.

Fios & Uverse usually don't overlap service areas. It goes back to the old telephone company monopolies.

The main difference between the two is Verizon runs fiber cable to every house. Where AT&T runs fiber to a neighborhood box and then runs copper wire to each house.

That's why Fios can offer Internet speeds that AT&T can't touch.

with DTV you will lose service every time it rains. Their prices are through the roof compared to dish network.

I have DirecTV now because my only other option is Time Warner. I'm pleased with DirecTV. I lost signal last weekend during a thunderstorm for about 2 minutes. Wasn't a big deal. If it had been during an Aggie game I would have had a conniption fit.

I had Comcast when I lived in Colorado. I didn't use their equipment. I used my TiVo boxes. In doing so, I never had any problems. Internet speed was great and I never had problems with TV.

DirecTv annoys me for the following reasons:

• Can't use HBOGO on my roku, yet they support use of HBOGO online
  
• I know my monthly rate will skyrocket after the first year
  
• No support for RedZone channel as a standalone, a la carte add-on
  
• Watch ESPN app not supported with a DirecTv & Time Warner Internet combo

Comcast on the other hand:

• Carries the Redzone channel as part of the Sports + package (or something like that) for $5 a month
  
• Not sure on HBOGO and Roku
  
• Their equipment sucks compared to DirecTv (unless you're in a TiVo test market)
  
• No weather issues
  
• No contract, but greater rate fluctuations and they're not as easy to negotiate with as DirecTv
  
• Comcast was stepping it up when I left Colorado with their expanded VOD offerings and testing of better DVR offerings

Having said that, I'm content with DirecTv for what I use TV for nowadays. I'd prefer to just cut cable but the wife wants to keep Food Network, HGTV, and the Disney channels.

DirecTV wins for one reason alone: you can convince them to give you just about any service either for free or for a huge discount. They're SO EASY to bargain with. Just say you're thinking about leaving and they'll start offering you all kinds of deals to stay. Recently convinced them to give me the Genie, which is a $300 value and ONLY for new customers. I've been with them for five years. In fact, earlier this year, a couple months after getting the Genie, they called me and asked if they could come interview me and do a focus session thing as to what I thought of the upgrade. And they paid me $150 for my time.

Over the years, my roommate and I got the NFL Ticket for free a couple times, and seriously discounted another time. Not to mention all the times we've asked for discounted services/packages, etc. And this is all on top of the recommend-a-friend thing, which I've done a couple times to knock even more money off my bill. Not saying you have to lie to them, just saying they're easy to talk to about getting your bill lowered, and they've almost always come through in that regard.

DirecTV actually amps up their signal to Florida and the Pacific Northwest. If the installer puts the dish on a stud like he's supposed to, or uses an approved mount. You should have little to no loss of signal.

I'd go DirecTV. We switched from Suddenlink, and obviously it was a major upgrade and much cheaper.

Also, brother has U-Verse and they have 4 boxes in the house and only 2 I think can watch the HD channels at one time or some bull****...that alone would piss me off enough to never do U-Verse.

Storms have to be pretty damn rough rain to make the service fail, and even then, just make sure you have good stuff on the DVR(the hard drives are large enough to store a ton of **** for a 'rainy day fund' on there) and you're good.

[This message has been edited by Bunk Moreland (edited 5/30/2013 11:18p).]

Go DirecTV

Also, if you have a loss of service during normal rain you might want to get the dish redirected at the satellite. If the dish has moved as much as a quarter-inch it will not be getting a strong enough signal to find a signal through minor rain showers.

Fix the direction - rain problems become rare.

DirectTV is generally pretty good. I live in Houston and didn't generally have a lost signal issue. I usually lost power before that happened. Customer service is great. Overall, I would recommend, unless you are an Astros or Rockets fan.

I'm really tired of dealing with AT&T. Rarely delivered on their performance promises. The worst thing about Uverse is the pixelated picture when the bandwidth can't keep up. I've seen it at enough people's homes that I can't believe it's an isolated issue. Their customer service is also subpar. You can call DirectTV anytime and resolve problems quickly. AT&T has a lot of "business hours" only times depending on what you need to discuss with them.

I have U-verse and love it (switched from Comcast). I am sure this will change, but right U-verse is the only t.v. provider that has reached a deal to carry the SEC network.

"Sports do not build character. They reveal it."
-John Wooden

i have had all three and directv is clearly the best product

concur on directv. I'd say I have a signal go out once every couple months, and it's usually out for no more than 15 minutes or so. in the whole scheme of things, it's not a big deal, and well worth all the other benefits, relative to the other providers.