Advice, Warnings, etc- New to Uverse

Hello All,

I just signed on to replace TWC with Uverse. They haven't installed it yet but I wanted to get some advice, warnings or "gotchas" to this service. My main reasons for switching are the better value of Uverse and the issue of TWC cable still negotiating with our local NBC affiliate. My wife is not happy about no NBC.

Just browsing this and other forums, I have seen concerns about following. PLease let me know if there are others. I will be using 3 TV's - 2 are HD, one is not. Also, I'm not sure if this matters but I will only purchasing the television (U400) option. I'm not changing my internet service over to AT&T at this time.

1. The quality of the HD picture
2. the DVR and how many HD vs SD signals you can watch and record at once.
3. cat5 vs coax... I don't think my home is wired for cat5. Is this going to be an issue?
4. the Uverse boxes- issues with the Motorola box?
5. HDMI- one of my HD TV's is wired with HDMI, are there still sound issues with HDMI?

Thanks for your responses. Just trying to be sure this is going to work for me before they come out. I still have time to cancel.

thanks!

The fact the TWC allowed that to happen (deal with NBC) to me shows they are a joke of a company.

I have not been happier overall since switching to U-verse. The customer service is head and shoulders above what TWC offers. Not being wired for CAT5 is not an issue. I live in a condo whose building is over 50 years old. They got it to work Flawlessly over the phone line itself. It doesn't go over the existing cable, there's a little adapter from the phone line. But everyone is handled the best possible way according to your situation.

I have a new Panny 50" plasma and frankly, I couldn't be happier with the picture. Both HD and SD. And SD is much better than Cable IMO. Don't kid yourself, it's still SD, but it's extremely good SD. DVD quality depending on the network and actual programming. TWC was still very fuzzy with SD on the same set to me. Currently, you can watch/record a total of 4 different live streams. 2 of which can be HD.

I've not been thrilled with the DVR, but to me, nothing is as good as TiVo. It works for what it is, just not as easily or elegantly as TiVo did IMO.

I think in Austin, they do have the whole home DVR. You can watch programs that were recorded on the DVR in any room. You can't pause live TV in any room but the room with the DVR though. That is a bit of a downside, and they won't currently let you have more than one DVR per account.

I've not had any issues with the Motorolla/HDMI sound issue, but I know some people have. To my knowledge, if you have issues, it's as simple as them switching out the set top box. Downside to this of course, is if you have things on the DVR that you need to watch still, they're gone.

I wouldn't cancel. I seriously am extremely pleased that I switched from TWC. And I love paying almost $30 less every month for what seems to be more content. I have the U200 and while it has fewer overall channels than what I had with TWC, I get some channels that I didn't get before, and these are channels I actually watch as opposed to the extras I got with TWC that I didn't watch at all. Just a much, much better value for me.

You mentioned that you weren't changing your Internet over yet. I presume that means you are staying with TWC for internet. I have to mention this. I thought I was going to be giving up that piece by switching to a slower DSL package than what I had with TWC. Honestly though, I have found that is consistently faster than the speeds I got with TWC. I was signed up for their 7.0 Mbps tier. I was skeptical to change, but to get the cash back deal, I had to get the DSL too. With TWC, I rarely got anything faster than 3-4 Mbps due to the shared nature of the connection (according to them). With the DSL, I've consistently gotten 5.8-6.0 when I'm paying for the 6.0 speed tier. Much better value and cheaper to boot.

Hope this helps with your decision making. I know I talked to at least 5 or 6 different people before making the decision myself. But I don't regret my decision one bit.

I have to pretty much agree with awol. There are a couple of things that I would add though.

First, I recommend you pay attention to the date of what you are reading about U-verse. There is a lot of stuff on the internet that was written about U-verse when it first came out. Then it gets repeated over and over by people who never had the service. As an early adopter of U-verse I can say at the begining it was pretty bad as far as the HD quality went. I would watch all of the local network shows on my OTA tuners. But earlier this year they upped the bandwidth and allowed 2 HD streams and it is night and day from what it was originally. I now can watch the local networks via U-verse and feel like it is not all that much worse than OTA. It looks better to me than my son's Comcast service, which I could not say in the begining.

As awol said, the SD is better than any I've seen except for upconverted OTA.

The DVR is not TiVo, but it is head and shoulders better than my son's Comcast DVR. One of the things I like best about it is the ability to schedule recordings from anywhere you can get internet service. You can also delete recordings online. One of the largest complaints about the DVR I've seen is with TiVo when you FF and the hit play, the DVR will back up a few seconds, whereas the U-verse will take off from where it is when you hit play. I get around this by pressing the "Replay" button to stop the FF instead of the "Play" button. That will back up the DVR about 7 sec. much like TiVo.

Actually it is possible to pause live TV in one of the other boxes by setting the DVR to record the show you are watching. The play the recording. I use my laptop to start the recording so I don't have to go into the other room tfor this and then delete the recording via the laptop after I'm done with it.

As far as the internet goes, they now offer up to 10 mbps and I have the minimum speed and it is almost as fast as my son's Comcast. My son-in-law got the 10 mbps and it flies! There was an issue with having fixed IP addresses though and I don't know the current status as far as getting fixed IPs with U-verse.

What I have found with U-verse is they have been very consistant. They pretty much deliver what they say they will.

For more details on my install see: U-Verse IPTV (http://www.highdefinitionblog.com/?page_id=286)

Also there is a feature that allows you to upload photos to the flicker website and then show them on your HDTVs in HD resolutions! For details on that see: U-verse Photos On Your HDTV (http://www.highdefinitionblog.com/?page_id=306)

As awol said, don't cancel without giving it a try.

awol,

Thanks for the reply. Sounds like you are very happy. My main concerns were with HD & SD picture quality and overall reliability.

I had read alot about HD pic quality being average (not as good as TWC) and some reliability issues (outages) but you seem to not have problems.

I mainly kept my TWC internet because I have a well established email address and frankly roadrunner has worked well for what I do. I realize I could have even more $$ by moving this over as well. Just one of those things I didn't want to mess with at this time.

Thanks

rbinck,

Thank you for your response as well. Its true, alot of what I read was more in the 1st half of 2008 but it was unclear if the issues were resolved. If the DVR contol is the worst thing about this I can live it!

I just want quality HD/SD viewing and good reliability (low number of service outages).

Thanks for your time and I'll try this out.

I mainly kept my TWC internet because I have a well established email address and frankly roadrunner has worked well for what I do. I realize I could have even more $$ by moving this over as well. Just one of those things I didn't want to mess with at this time.

ThanksThat's why I moved all my e-mail to web based services. Not only can I get e-mail without having to deal with outlook or outlook express, I am free of being stuck with a particular provider.

I think the best way to sum it up to me is it's the best of both worlds for TV content delivery. To me, it has the reliability of cable, along with the picture quality of Satellite.

To me, it is hands down the best deal out there right now.

And I'm with Rbinck. I would move to an internet based email system when you can. I went through the same thing when going from AOL to Verizon to Comcast to TWC. Each time having to change my email address. I decided to say screw it. I backed up all my emails, made notes of websites that I needed to update with the new address, and switched to gmail. But I know exactly how you feel. It is a hassle.

You could always buy your own domain name and set up e-mail that way, too. Internet-based e-mails don't all play nicely with Outlook.

You could always buy your own domain name and set up e-mail that way, too. Internet-based e-mails don't all play nicely with Outlook.
Outlook does not play nice at all, imo.

That's why I moved all my e-mail to web based services. Not only can I get e-mail without having to deal with outlook or outlook express, I am free of being stuck with a particular provider.

Being a web designer I have many email addresses at many of my own domain names as well as a couple of web based email addresses. I have about 20 email addresses I currently use (most are business addresses). I even once offered a free web based email for one of my domains where people could sign up for a free email account.

My favorite email program which I am now using exclusively to view all of my email accounts (each different account sorts to a different folder for that account keeping them separated) is IncrediMail. While Incredimail has many cutesy functions which I do not use, it is also a very nice program and great for keeping all of my email accounts in one place. I use the purchased version of IncrediMail, they also have a free version as well.

:yippee::yippee:I have to pretty much agree with awol. There are a couple of things that I would add though.

First, I recommend you pay attention to the date of what you are reading about U-verse. There is a lot of stuff on the internet that was written about U-verse when it first came out. Then it gets repeated over and over by people who never had the service. As an early adopter of U-verse I can say at the begining it was pretty bad as far as the HD quality went. I would watch all of the local network shows on my OTA tuners. But earlier this year they upped the bandwidth and allowed 2 HD streams and it is night and day from what it was originally. I now can watch the local networks via U-verse and feel like it is not all that much worse than OTA. It looks better to me than my son's Comcast service, which I could not say in the begining.

As awol said, the SD is better than any I've seen except for upconverted OTA.

The DVR is not TiVo, but it is head and shoulders better than my son's Comcast DVR. One of the things I like best about it is the ability to schedule recordings from anywhere you can get internet service. You can also delete recordings online. One of the largest complaints about the DVR I've seen is with TiVo when you FF and the hit play, the DVR will back up a few seconds, whereas the U-verse will take off from where it is when you hit play. I get around this by pressing the "Replay" button to stop the FF instead of the "Play" button. That will back up the DVR about 7 sec. much like TiVo.

Actually it is possible to pause live TV in one of the other boxes by setting the DVR to record the show you are watching. The play the recording. I use my laptop to start the recording so I don't have to go into the other room tfor this and then delete the recording via the laptop after I'm done with it.

As far as the internet goes, they now offer up to 10 mbps and I have the minimum speed and it is almost as fast as my son's Comcast. My son-in-law got the 10 mbps and it flies! There was an issue with having fixed IP addresses though and I don't know the current status as far as getting fixed IPs with U-verse.

What I have found with U-verse is they have been very consistant. They pretty much deliver what they say they will.


Also there is a feature that allows you to upload photos to the flicker website and then show them on your HDTVs in HD resolutions! For details on that see: As awol said, don't cancel without giving it a try.


It is nice to hear about a RECENT install where there are those that are knowledgeable about hd that are very satisfied with Uverse. I recently signed on and am scheduled for the install of 12/20 - cant wait!
I was a bit disturbed about all the negative views on the quality of the hd, but can now see that most of them were in the early stages of the uverse rollout. I do value good quality HD - maybe not blu-ray, but on the level of comcast, which I currently have and know uses compression.
So, I get to save some money, get more content, decent HD, view photos, have HD in more rooms - with comcast I was limited to two.
Thanks again!

I would love to have Uverse. supposely its coming to my area so hopefully I'll be able to get it soon