Satellite TV or Cable TV - Which Is More Reliable?

For ten years I was a very unhappy cable TV customer. Despite the promise of great picture quality, I was never impressed with the reception I was receiving. Complaining to the cable television company never did any good. I was always told that everything was working just fine.

Beyond my displeasure with the quality of the reception I was getting with cable TV, I was also not happy about the price increases that the cable company was imposing on me. There had to be at least three increases a year during the time I was a customer.

I'm sure cable television has changed a lot since I was a customer about 9 years ago. Digital cable now provides a better quality picture and "on demand" service provides greater programming choices. One thing that has not changed is the frequent price increases. I know that because I still rely on service from the local cable television company for my high-speed Internet service since it is the only high-speed service available in this area.

For an unhappy cable TV customer like me, I knew I had to try satellite television. I chose Dish Network because I liked their programming packages better than the other satellite service.

When I first signed up with Dish Network I was very happy with the service and that has not changed at all. I am even happier with the service today because I upgraded my service to high-definition a while ago and I just love it. I have experienced very few problems with my Dish Network service - far fewer problems than I had with cable TV.

One of the claims that the cable television companies like to make is that satellite TV is frequently disrupted by the weather. Well, as a long-time satellite television customer, I can tell you that they are greatly exaggerating that problem. I have experienced very few weather-related disruptions, which only happen with extremely heavy rain. I suffered through a lot more "down time" with cable than I ever have with satellite TV.

Even though the cable companies like to say that satellite TV is subject to a lot of weather-related outages, it's actually the opposite that is true. I was a cable customer long enough to see my share of outages when a traffic accident knocked a pole down or a bad storm caused a tree to fall on the wires and bring them down.

Since you do not have to worry about wires or telephone poles being knocked down, outages are less frequent, and more importantly, a lot shorter with satellite TV when compared to cable television. I can recall cable TV outages that lasted for days following a major storm. Sure, without electric power, you are usually not able to watch TV, but in my experience, the cable TV outages always lasted longer than the power outages, and if you happen to have your own generator, you can continue to watch satellite TV even if the power lines are down.