If you do stuff, stuff gets done.......

If you do stuff, stuff gets done.......

Friday, February 25, 2011

ROKU - or how we watch TV

We canceled our TV cable back in 2009 and now use an antenna to get the local channels.  We live in central Oklahoma and get channels from both Tulsa and Oklahoma City including ABS, CBS, NBC, 2 PBS stations,  local Fox, several Christian channels, 4 channels from ION and several others. 

My husband heard about ROKU boxes,  they run on the internet so they require either being hooked in your internet source or with wireless, we use wireless internet for ours.  The boxes are a one -time purchase,  I think ours was about $60 from Amazon, and then you own it. There are no monthly fees unless you have paid channels.


This is our ROKU box and it's remote,  that is a Santa Pez beside it so you can see how small the Roku is. 
My favorite thing to watch is photos on a loop from Flickr. 
Whatever groups you belong to on Flickr can be on your Roku box.
Gavin likes pictures of tractors and animals.
I like groups that feature Pyrex and sewing projects.
My mom liked looking at the quilt groups.
When I am rocking a baby, I usually turn on Flickr, it has no sound
so it is very peaceful.
Nina however is not a fan of Flickr, she says it is as much fun as watching paint dry.


Roku offers lots of channels and most of them are free,  a few require monthly subscription.  

 

Roku has news channels,  quite a few fitness channels and social network channels.

Here are some of the news channels.
It is not exactly the same as turning on CNN to see the news minute by minute. 
I like the NBC one best,  they broadcast the first hour of the Today show all day without commercials,
so if I am busy early in the morning, I can catch up on the news later in the day.
Some of the other news channels show feature stories as well as specials and repeats of their news shows.


The only paid channel we have is Netflix.  Netflix offers so many shows in their watch it now category.
Jeff likes movies,  Gavin likes Bob the Builder,  I've been watching  seasons of Hoarders,  Jamie Oliver and Cake Boss. 
When my parents were here last,  my dad really liked American Pickers.
Netflix costs about $8 a month and I think it is very much worth it.

One of the free channels is Blip.  The offer many independent shows,  some are just quirky but many are very good.
I really like some of the cooking shows. 



We tried a free trial of Hulu on Roku but they show so many commercials, we did not like it.

Shows on Roku are all on demand.  We like that we can watch what we want to when we want too. 

The only thing we really missed out on my not having cable is that most all the college football bowl games were on ESPN.  Roku has some sports channels,  some of them have fees, and we have not really investigated them. I am sure they are the right option for some viewers.

There are so many channels and shows on Roku, and they truly add more just about every week.  I have not looked at every single one to know all they offer.

We do sometimes watch programs on a computer and they are pretty much free that way,  but we like being able to watch shows on our big tv. 
So if you are already paying for internet and don't plan on stopping but would like to watch TV shows or movies on your bigger screen,  a Roku box might be a great option for your home.

We like it so much, we got a second Roku box for the bedroom tv. 


10 comments:

  1. I've never heard of Roku before. I think I'm going to tell my husband about it. Thanks for the information.

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  2. Hi Rhonda,
    That sounds very interesting, we don't have TV at all and we can't get hulu in Canada, so we watch a few free shows on the computer or watch dvd's from the library or the few that we have purchased. I mostly just read, there are so many amazing Inspirational books in our public library, I will never read them all. That is our favorite form of entertainment.
    Hugs, Cindy

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  3. Hey Rhonda,
    We do the same thing. We love it. We've been watching old Columbo episodes. LOL! I think it's a great deal too. I have a free account with Pandora radio where you can get 40 free hours of music per month. You can listen to your favorite music on Roku.
    Thanks for mentioning flickr. I'll have to browse. That's funny about watching paint dry. LOL! Have a great weekend.

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  4. We also love Net Flix. It took us a while to "get on board" with it because we have cable, and there are so many movies on there. But the girls can now choose movies for kids on Saturday mornings instead of the 'stuff' cable has to offer them.
    Dianne

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  5. I had not heard of Roku until you mentioned it. Sounds like this works for you. We are in a 2 year contract with our cable. After that, I would like to change.

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  6. I have a Roko box too. But...I can't figure out how to hook it to my flat screen. That is where I wanted it so I could watch movies through netflix. Our t.v. is on the wall so I can't get to the back of it. I need to research this more though. I also have netflix and love it. If you have any pointers on how to hook mine up to my flat screen let me know. I have it hooked up to a small t.v. downstairs right now but don't really need it there. I had no idea that there were free channels on it though. Thanks for the info.

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  7. Hi, Rhonda~
    I hopped over from Mary Ann's blog. It's nice to meet you!
    I have never heard of a ROKU box, but I am going to tell my husband about it.
    Thank you for the information.
    Hope your week is going well. :)

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  8. Hi, My name is Sandy and I was checking out your post on the Roku tv connection I was wondering if you could tell me how more than one tv can be connected with this? I dont have a blog but, seriously considering one; my e-mail address is thekingsgirl111@gmail.com. Thank you in advance for your reply.

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    Replies
    1. Hi Sandy - you must have a Roku box for each TV or you can move the Roku box around from set to set if you choose.
      We like the Roku so much and now have 3 of them for the 3 tvs in our home.
      I will be happy to answer any other questions you have.

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  9. I've been wondering about the Roku system. Thanks for the easy to understand explanation.

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