The subject of streaming TV came up. I have largely dismissed streaming television for two reasons. First, I have a 250G per month data cap on my internet connection. I have no idea how much I use, and I can’t find a meter anywhere on ATT’s site. I’m confident it’s nowhere near 260G of data. I’ve also been hearing recently that ATT is not currently enforcing that cap.  Second, I have been pretty happy with DirecTV even though I would prefer to pay about half what I do per month for my subscription, but that’s probably true for me and everyone else subscribing to their service.

What got me considering other options was not having a satellite connection in my recovery room at the house and planning on one more knee replacement early next year. I tried rigging up a wireless connection from the satellite to the remote TV, but I think the old timber in our house is too dense, and the connection was never solid enough to hold itself together. I gave up and watched DVDs while I recovered in my recliner.

I heard the new Apple TV is likely to be announced next month, so I asked around. What does anybody use these things for? Apparently, some people like them. The Roku 3 is supposedly a little better than the Apple TV. Both devices are long overdue for an update. I decided to take a chance on the Roku 3 and ordered it Saturday on Amazon Prime. It arrived today. If either the new Apple TV or the next Roku are irresistibly good, I figure I can use this Roku somewhere else.

I unboxed it, installed the batteries in the remote, plugged in the palm-sized box, turned on the television, switched the source to the proper HDMI port, and followed the instructions on the screen. I first connected to my router, then I had to do a few other things. All simple.

The only real hassle is switching back and forth between the screen and my phone (Or some other device with a browser for entering codes. Lots of codes.). To activate almost any channel on the Roku, I have to enter a code on a website then log into (usually) DirecTV to validate I’m an authorized recipient of that channel. For PBS, I had to give them an email address. For Amazon (Prime Videos) I had to log in to Amazon. For other channels, I have to create an account. It’s a tedious process. No logging into my DirecTV account once and all the other DirecTV channels I can access via Roku recognizing that login. This, I think, is the downside to choosing your own channels. Once I get through the process, I’m sure I won’t have to give it a second thought, but there are something like 1700 channels available to choose from on Roku.

As a “cord-cutting” device, I’m not sure how you’d do that if you have specific channels you’re attached to on your cable or satellite, because to retain those channels on the Roku device, you have to be subscribed to them elsewhere. There appear to be other channels that may do the same thing, but I’m not certain yet how that is. One channel intrigued me, then I looked up the schedule and it runs the same schedule on repeat every 24 hours. Maybe it shows different episodes of Dennis the Menace at the same time every day, but I’m not sure if it’s as good as it looked. The website schedule was updated in 2013. I guess for free, you’re going to get the lowest maintenance presentation possible.

The Watch ESPN channel appears to be pretty good. I validated for that and had several channels to choose from and a pretty good schedule of what to expect for the next day or so.

I played with it for about an hour and a half and came away not quite underwhelmed but not exactly excited about the device either. That’s not quite right. The device itself is sleek with the ability to connect either via CatV or wireless network connection. It comes with  HDMI and USB ports. The HDMI port connects to the television. You can plug in a USB drive containing personal media, and apparently there is a way to play it via the device. The remote has a headphone jack with volume controls and headphones come with the system. Handy if you want to listen privately for any number of reasons — usually a sleeping significant other. I like the hardware. The software and user interface will have to grow on me. The user interface is intuitive and easy to work with even though the process is cumbersome.

It may be useful for my next knee surgery recovery. At some point, it may be worth talking about it with Mr. L as something he could use for old movies, but as it sits now, he would throw the remote through the television screen long before he got a code entered into a website to access an old movie channel. Maybe after I have more time to get comfortable with it and set up a few more channels. If after that I find some value for him, I’ll show it to him as an option to use in parts of the house not wired for satellite.

I’ll do a Tech Stuff post on this after I’ve had more time to get used to it, but this is my preliminary two cents worth. Eh.