DirecTV Experiences

[volcanicweather]

Just wondering what experiences people have had with DirecTV as I'm considering switching to them for their plethora of HD content. How is the reception? Do you receive a lot of outages? Ever get screwed by them?

I currently have u-verse but it doesn't have some channels I want and other channels are only in SD whereas with other providers they are in HD. Just wondering if it's worth switching for an OK but reliable cable provider to one with more bells and whistles but is supposedly less reliable.

[Zounder]

I have DirecTV, but only because satellite is the only option other than basic cable. For the most part, reception is stable, though sometimes in heavy rain it'll go out. I'd say, over the course of the 5 months I've had it... it cut out 4 or 5 times for a range of about 20-30 mins each time. Chances are it happened more but I didn't always have the TV on. And, of course, occasionally it'll burp and stutter for a couple minutes, but that's pretty rare as well.

Menu's/guide are slow and sluggish when navigating compared to what I'm used to. It's got a huge range of channels, though.

I prefer what I used to have (Comcast, which isn't satellite) but again it's the only option where I live now.

So basically, while it's not great, it's acceptable, at least for me. I would imagine it varies given your location, and it also depends on what your biggest priority is (channel range or stability) but for me, if given the option, I'd switch to Comcast in a heartbeat.

EDIT: Also, as far as customer service goes, I haven't had to deal with it a lot, but from what I did (installation, and a phone call regarding my channel package) everything went very smoothly.

[Olo401]

I've had pretty good experiences with them for the past few years. Service will go out in bad weather (strong wind, rain & snow) but otherwise works great. My landlord just recently got upgraded to the new receivers and we'll be installing the larger dish in a few weeks so we can get Hi-Def service.

That said, if I were to have my own choice of service I would switch to Cox because I'd get a discount on bundling internet & phone service.

[Dolmen]

I had DirecTV service a while back, and I personally would never go back. My DVR ended up going wonky, and the only way they'd fix it was for me to buy a new box since I didn't pay for the box insurance. Eventually I was able to fix it myself, but there were random occurrences after that as well. One time a firmware update left me without TV for two days, luckily they did prorate bills for that (some massive firmware screw up happened).

The big issue with DirecTV though was when I called to cancel my service. According to them I had signed a 2 year contract for service and would be charged ~$250 since I only had service for a year. I told them I did not have a contract and would like proof of my signing up for one to which they responded I'd have to get a lawyer to request one. A week later I received a collections notice for the amount, and my lawyer advised me to just pay since the amount wasn't worth it. Note - I reviewed all of the terms for my service, and a 2 year contract was not in there. There are numerous complaints regarding the contract issue, you can find them all over the web.

tl;dr - The actual service is pretty good. The menus are sluggish and a bit annoying. If you sign up, ask them if there's a contract length and demand all information regarding what you're signing up for. Be extremely careful and note every single thing.

[volcanicweather]

Yeah I read about the contact situation and it seems rather ridiculous... it's basically you have to pay $20/month for each month you go without the service during the duration of your contract... which is idiotic but I guess it's how they can get away with all these crazy promotions.

[Akucaen]

Just because I saw it complained about, if there's only one provider I've ever seen with a fast UI, it's Dish Network across all their receivers. I've never played with a DirecTV box (thank you for mentioning that), but cable boxes are fucking atrocious.

[volcanicweather]

Just because I saw it complained about, if there's only one provider I've ever seen with a fast UI, it's Dish Network across all their receivers. I've never played with a DirecTV box (thank you for mentioning that), but cable boxes are fucking atrocious.

Yeah my u-verse box is awful - have to go to menu to access my favorite channel list, i have to hit guide twice for it to bring up the guide, and it takes a second or two just to flip through channels...

[Akucaen]

Yeah my u-verse box is awful - have to go to menu to access my favorite channel list, i have to hit guide twice for it to bring up the guide, and it takes a second or two just to flip through channels...

Changing actual channels on satellite will always take that amount of time. (Again, don't know about DirecTV, only speaking of Dish here) Dish runs the show you're currently watching in the upper-right (with no ads, fuck you cable companies), and the guide is very, very fast. (It's also intuitive. You can mark favorites, or select HD only, subscription only, all channels, etc., never saw this in other cable boxes, which seemed retarded.)