Editor’s note: This is a guest post by Spencer Hogg. If you would like to contribute too, please contact me.
Internet TV is a fairly new concept in today’s society. Compared to the traditional satellite TV, Internet TV has its good and bad parts, of which we will discuss within the next few paragraphs.

Satellite TV
Let’s start off with the more traditional of the two, Satellite TV. Depending on the service you are currently using, you might be paying up to $70 for basic cable. Basic cable usually consists of less than 150 channels, but has the incentive of offering live broadcasts and the ability to view many TV shows hours before Internet TV ever gets the chance. Another added benefit of satellite TV is that there are, at the moment, a significantly greater amount of shows available to watch than on Internet TV.
Some of the cons that come with satellite TV, however, include only being able to watch the episode once (unless recorded with a device like a DVR) until the next broadcast of that particular episode is scheduled again. Also, if you live in an apartment, some apartments require a hefty deposit fee (sometimes over $300) just to have the dish set up outside of your apartment. This is for safety reasons, because should a thunderstorm roll through your area, satellite dishes can often catch ablaze. Speaking of thunderstorms, satellite dishes are notorious for being disrupted by minor weather inconveniences such as rainstorms, or even gusts of wind.
Internet TV
Internet TV, on the other hand, has its own pros and cons to consider. First off, to use Internet TV you have to have Internet service, a computer and/or a compatible playback device. These devices include Microsoft Xbox 360, Playstation 3, Nintendo Wii, or something like an Apple TV, just to name a few. Before you even consider switching to Internet TV, make sure that your Internet service provider doesn’t put a bandwidth cap on you each month. If they do, make sure that you do not surpass the limit. Internet TV can be very bandwidth-consuming and one of the main pros about Internet TV is to not go above the costs of traditional satellite TV, which may not be the case if you accidentally go past your bandwidth amount.
Some Internet TV providers are free, and others may charge you a monthly subscription, most of which usually do not exceed $10 a month. There are several Internet TV providers, some of them news stations like ESPN, CBS, and CNN. Others contribute to more of the series-type shows such as Hulu and Netflix. Internet TV is handy in the sense that you can, on certain Internet TV channels, watch entire seasons – past and present – with the click of a button. Some Internet TV providers, like Netflix, offer more than just seasons of TV shows but also unlimited streaming of a wide variety of movie titles. These movie titles are also updated frequently, only being a month or two behind the DVD or Blu-Ray release of some titles.
However, as mentioned, Internet TV does have its setbacks. For example, many shows are only available via standard cable at the moment. Who is to say how long it will be until they are available on Internet TV, if at all? Also, if your Internet service is interrupted for any reason, so is your TV. Also, most TV shows from satellite cable take at least a few hours, if not a few days or even weeks to become available on Internet TV.
Conclusion
In conclusion, if you aren’t very patient when it comes to seeing your favourite TV show and don’t mind paying up to $70 for standard satellite cable TV, then you may want to stick with traditional TV. However, if you’d rather save hundreds of dollars a year and be able to backtrack in seasons of shows that you may have missed, or don’t mind waiting a little while to see that episode that everyone is dying to tell you about, then Internet TV may not be a bad option for you.
Guest post: This article is written by Spencer Hogg from Broadband Expert where cheap satellite TV deals can be found.
