FREE HDTV & DVR - No Monthly Fees

AND with better picture quality than FIOS or Comcast...

HD-4400 UHF TV Antenna - HD-4400

$52 w/ shipping, in the attic - not even outside - hooked up to one of these silicon dust boxes (pulls 23 channels doing a quick scan on this overcast morning). The main channels NBC/ABC/WETA have always been strong here. Others we don't really watch that much.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815345015
Sometimes on sale for less. Right now the 3 channel version is $100

Van metre homes if wired have ethernet in the attic. Ours does anyway. So, we hook the antenna to the silicon dust to the router.

Computer picks up and records with windows 7 media center (one of the things that Microsoft did right).

Some people don't like the idea of running a computer all the time. It is about $8-10 electricity a month.

If you want a remote for the computer, you can buy an IR unit for $10 for the computer or use an app on your phone to control. We use an app and have not gone back to traditional remotes.

 

Why not just pull directly from basic OpenBand and skip the antenna, you get more channels? I pull directly from OpenBand (I just use the basic OpenBand subscription) into a Ceton http://cetoncorp.com/ 1 to 4 (you can also get a 1 to 6) converter that uses the OpenBand cable card. I can't remember for sure, but I think the OpenBand cable card only costs $2 per month or maybe nothing, just don't remember.
Here's what this gives me:
OpenBand into the Ceton box which is similar to a cable decoder box. This goes into your Windows computer Vista\Win7\Win8 and will supply 4 feeds into other devices such as XBOX or other computers.
The rest is the same as above for using Windows Media Center except Ceton has it's own Windows 8 app (and all mobile devices) to interact with your system.

 

He doesn't have OpenBand, thus just using OTA. For people shackled to OB, the Ceton or HDHR Prime are good choices if you have HTPCs.

Speaking of shady, Verizon upped their monthly CableCard "rental" costs to $5 -- ridiculous.

I'm on FiOS with a HDHR Prime + XBMC extenders (ServerWMC) that pull from the main HTPC for live and recorded TV (everything except premium channels). I wish Media Center would let you use other machines as extenders...

 

SiliconDust HDHR Prime (3 tuners) is on www.woot.com for $79.99 - deal only good for today (5/6/14). add $5 shipping, and taxes as applicable.