According to a recent CNN article, the average cable bill is $75 a month, and is increasing.  The high-profile battle between Fox Network and Time Warner over per-subscriber fees paid to Fox by the cable networks spell only one thing for consumers: a bigger cable bill.  Once you add in internet access, your total bill can easily reach $150 / month.  Ouch!

Personally, I’m tired of spending almost $1,000 a year for a few hundred channels that I don’t watch, HD service that periodically cuts out, and commercials that waste my time.  Fortunately, there’s a better way: online TV. Since you’re already paying for internet access, this one is a no-brainer.

If 2009 was the year that online TV became accessible, then 2010 is the year we all watch TV online — at least, for those of us who are savvy enough to kick cable to the curb.

What is online TV? In a word: streaming.  Today, you can get most, if not all of your favorite TV shows from online streaming services like Hulu, or directly from TV network websites like ABC.com and CBS.com.   But while these services are great for watching TV on your laptop or desktop computer, getting the content onto your TV is another story.

Enter what I’ll call the 4 pillars of cable-free TV:  hardware, streaming, storage, and interface.  Together, these 4 pillars form our high-definition home theater PC, or HD HTPC.  Let’s break it down:

1. Hardware.

The basic hardware we’ll need is:

  • Home theater PC (HTPC) – typically a small and quiet PC that can hook up to your TV.
  • HD TV tuner card – an add-in card for your HTPC  that can grab any over-the-air (OTA) digital or analog signal, and record it.
  • Network - We’ll need a wired or wireless network so that we can connect our HTPC to the internet.  Personally, I like to place my cable / DSL modem next to my TV, hook it and my HTPC directly into the router, and then connect all my other PCs wireless via high-speed wireless N.  That way, my HTPC gets the fastest and most stable connection.

2. Streaming.

Streaming refers to downloading and watching content at the same time, without storing it on your PC.  To replace the content from cable, you’ll need to get it from the internet, and streaming is the fastest, easiest way.

  • TV streaming services include Hulu, Boxee (Boxee also taps into Hulu, YouTube, Vimeo, and many other online video sites).
  • For watching movies or non-broadcast TV, use a movie streaming service like Netflix or Amazon Unbox.  Chances are you already have a Netflix subscription, in which case, streaming is free.  Amazon charges a per-movie or per-episode fee.

3. Storage.

Some content you will want to download instead of stream, and others you will store for future use.

  • For sufficient storage, you will need a large hard drive in our HTPC, ideally 500GB or more.  Fortunately, hard drives are cheap, with 500 GB models going for as little as $50, and larger 1 TB (1000 MB) models going for $100.
  • Over the air TV can be recorded for later playback, much like your cable DVR.
  • With enough storage, you can copy and store your DVDs on your media center for easy access to any movie.
  • You can also download TV shows via BitTorrent automatically and easily using services like ted.

4. Interface.

The interface is what ties it all together and makes it easy for you to access your content from your couch.  Some things to consider here:

  • Operating system – something needs to provide the core interface on which you access all your content, and for this we recommend Windows 7 Media Center.  Media Center is included with Windows 7 Professional, Home Premium, and Ultimate.  You can also use Windows Vista Home Premium orVista Ultimate, both of which have a very similiar Media Center built in.  An added bonus is that if you are using Windows 7 Media Center, you can access your music library from any other Windows 7 PC, from any location on your network.
  • Program guides and recorded TV – Windows Media Center has this built in, and program guides are created automatically and updated over the internet.
  • TV streaming – for this I recommend Boxee, which has its own media center interface, but can also be integrated with Windows Media Center.  Boxee links to many online TV and video sources, including Hulu.  Recently, Windows Media Center also added some internet TV options, including CBS, MSNBC, and PBS – although Boxee and Hulu both offer much more content at this point.
  • Remote - everything mentioned above will work nicely with your media center remote, so chances are you won’t even need to bust out the keyboard and mouse.

Conclusion? While getting rid of your cable is certainly not as simple as plugging in another box, it is pretty straightforward.  If you don’t already have a PC suitable for your home theater, our hardware buyer’s guide can help you build one for less than $1000.  Your HTPC will not only pay for itself after a year, but will also give you many more benefits such as a fully-featured music jukebox, media server, and a lot more.