About two years ago my wife complained about our cable bill. “This is ridiculous to pay every month” she said. We had a premium cable channel on our plan but we weren’t even watching most of the movies or shows it provided. And the movies it did show played over and over without much variety. I thought about it and it was ridiculous. So what to do? We wanted to be able to watch recent movies without having to pay per movie or leave the house to pick something up. Enter Netflix!
We heard about Netflix from a number of our friends and they all swore it was the best thing since sliced bread (was life so hard before slice bread?). We were intrigued.
What is Netflix?
Netflix is an online company that allows you to rent movies and TV shows for a flat monthly fee. After signing up you create a queue of DVD’s you’d like to receive. As the selection comes up Netflix mails out the DVD to you to watch. You can hold the DVD for as long as you want without and late fees. (If you’re like me it can take a week to watch a good movie, what with work and kids.) When you’re done with the DVD you put it back into the envelope you got it in which you can seal and mail back to Netflix at no charge. Just drop it in a mailbox. Then your next selection gets sent out (this depends on how many DVD’s you have on you plan). That’s it!
There is also an option to watch streaming content online via your computer or a device such as XBOX.
Netflix Plans:
Netflix offers three unlimited plans for 1, 2, and 3 DVD’s out at a time. With these you can watch as many movies as you want a month (limited only by how fast you watch them and return them). With the unlimited plans you also have the option to watch movies online (though the selection isn’t as good). There is also a limited plan for one DVD at a time for a total of two DVD’s in the month. Personally I think the unlimited plans are the best but you have to review your viewing habits to see what’s best for you. We use the 2 DVD plan. We try to time it so as we watch one DVD the other is on the way so we always have one (doesn’t always time out though).
What we like about Netflix:
- We pick what we want to see. No more hoping there’s something we want to watch on cable or making sure we catch it in time. With Netflix we pick what movies and TV shows we want.
- TV Shows. Ever hear about a great TV show from friends but it’s already halfway through the season? Or for whatever reason you just can’t watch the show that day? We wait until the show comes out on DVD then watch the show straight through the season. We don’t have to watch commercials and we can keep up with the storyline better since we’re watching the episodes consecutively rather than waiting sometimes a couple of weeks on TV for the next episode to come out.
- Price. We have the two DVD plan that allows us to have two DVD’s out at a time. What we pay for the plan comes out to what we were paying for a premium cable channel and we’re getting more of the content that we want to watch!
- Convenience. We go online and pick our movies. No standing in line or finding out our movie is out. No forgetting what movies we want when we enter a rental store. We keep track of what we want to see on our queue. If we don’t know the name of a movie we can look up keywords and find what it is we were looking for. Truth is we’re seeing movies and shows we wouldn’t have seen without Netflix!
We were unsure about signing up for an online DVD program but we found a two week trial and figured we would try it out. We’re glad we did! Here’s some details below if you would like to use a free 2-week trial:
Do you use Netflix? What do you think of it?
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Just last Tuesday I dropped all my premiums with cable $42.95 (doesn’t include tax) and switched to $8.99 ($9.89 with tax) with Netflix one DVD at a time (perfect for me who takes my time to watch) and streaming via PC which is connected to the TV and using our Xbox. I’m mad it took me so long to do it. The streaming had something for everyone. I don’t forsee myself going back.
I’ve got to check out more of the streaming movies! We’ve really only been using the DVD’s so far. Probably because we have a laptop and the screen is too small to really watch. It’s great to hear you’re saving so much!
FFB,
Turn your laptop around…looking for a circle opening with tons of little holes. Found it? Boom that is an S-Video wire, hook that bad boy into your TV (most TVs even older ones) have it. There ya go! Now your laptop is streaming into your TV, and don’t need to squint.
Want to hear? A little trickier. Need to find a wire that looks like an ear phone at one end and on the other has a red and white wire – plut that into your audio. Boom! we have sound.
The netflix tv shows streaming are AMAZING, but the movies are sub par. Also you can now watch Hulu, abc, Nbc, and if you are a little shadier there are streaming sites that have current pirated tv. I won’t tell.
Despite figuring this out I can’t cut the cord from cable.
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I’m away from my home computer but I don’t think my Macbook has an S-Video out. Might have something comparable though that I could get an adapter for? I’ll have to look into it.
I’m fortunate enough to have a good library system that exchanges among a few dozen locations and lets you reserve/request DVDs (and books of course) online.
We also have a Redbox which has new releases the day they come out.
Between the two, I barely spend a few dollars a month to see movies at home.
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I’ve heard about Redbox but haven’t looked into it yet. I see them at the local supermarket. For us it would still mean we had to travel out to get a movie. That’s where the convenience of Netflix comes in.
We’ve also taken stuff out of the library; mostly for the kids though. The DVD’s there usually have to be returned in 7 days so we still have to watch out for late fees. But it is a free source of movies and it’s great when you can reserve online (I’ve done that with books).
ffb,
If you travel out for your job and pass the supermarket, Redbox, is a steal versus Netflix. Redbox charges $1, plus tax, a night and gives you to 9PM the next day to return the movie before you are charged a second night. My wife and I have recently cancelled Netflix because we were not watching enough movies to justify the cost. We now pick up a movie, from Redbox, on Sunday night and I return it on the way to work on monday morning, it literally takes less than a minute to return it. I recommend dropping the movie off in the morning if possible, helps reduce the urge to pick up misc. items that one may need for the house.
Netflix streaming is fantastic, I wish they had a stream only plan and would provide ALL movies, even if delayed a period of time, and charge a flat monthly fee. But until that convenience is available, Redbox it is.
You would think living in NYC it would be easy to pass a Redbox location but alas it isn’t. The local supermarket is a bit out of the way and we don’t pass it too often. I can see how it’s great if it’s convenient for you though.
I have to agree netflix is great. I especially like that I can keep a movie for as long as I want. Sometimes I just can’t seem to carve out the time to watch the movie, but it’s nice to know I don’t have to return it any time soon in order to avoid late fees (like a typical movie rental place, or even redbox). The streaming is also great. Although sometimes the picture doesn’t look as nice when I hook it up to the TV, but hey! still a lot less expensive than cable!
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There are times when we go through DVD’s like water and can’t wait for the next one. Other times it takes us a week to get through one movie. Not having late fees is a real selling point for me.
We use both netflix and redbox. Redbox we use if we want to rent a movie on the spur of the moment, and we want to get a new release. It’s great for that type of thing and only costs $1.06 every time you rent.
Netflix is great for reserving movies you want to see in advance, and is even greater now that they have streaming movie and tv show options as well. We are in the middle of watching the entire series of “LOST” via the online streaming option that netflix has. We love it!
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To me, a show like LOST is so much better when you can watch the whole season at once. No commercials and you can follow the story line so much better. I hate when there is a 2-3 break between episodes and I forget what happened on the last one.
As for reserving, if there’s a movie out in theaters we want to see we put it on our Netflix queue. This way it’s already on there when it gets released (with 3 kids we don’t get out to the movies much).
I’m totally with you on cutting costs by getting rid of cable. To the horror of my friends and family I haven’t had cable in over 2 years. It’s not because I can’t afford it, but it simply adds no value to my life.
Instead it actually served as a distraction and once getting rid of it my productivity increased a little. I’m just as happy vegging out to a movie or specific streaming show I want to watch, than flipping through hundreds of channels I can’t watch all at once.
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We cut our premium channel but we haven’t cut cable out totally yet. We’re getting close though.
I’ve done Netflix before and it’s good for watching seasons at a time and hard-to-find movies. I really like Redbox because it’s cheap, an instant. Well — you do have to go get it, but it’s not bad. And, you can get free codes online! Check it out already!
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Wow, there’s a big push for Redbox huh? If I shopped at the supermarkets that had them more often I’d really consider it but I’m not going by there enough.
The redboxes in our area are everywhere. We have 5 of them within 2 miles. two at gas stations, one at the grocery store, one at walmart and one at mcdonald’s. You can’t avoid them if you tried!
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Go figure! I’ve seen maybe two total and both at supermarkets.
the best part about netflix is the watch now option that we connect the TV and the computer together and watch great, clear picture online on the tv instantly. now thats worth $10 a month
If you can use the computer-tv connection then it does sound awesome. We’re not there yet but maybe if we need to replace out tv…
I love Netflix and have been a long time member. I used to live closer to a distribution warehouse and would get DVDs delivered overnight. Now, it takes 2-3 days at my current location. I’m wondering if Netflix will drop their prices ocne the post office starts delivering only 5 days a week. I should definitely try the streaming option to get the most out of my subscription.
Overnight DVD’s would be awesome! That’s an interesting point you make about post office closings. I’ll guess we’ll have to wait and see.
My family was just able to eliminate our premium cable channel package and save a lot of money. We don’t use NetFlix, but do rely on iTunes, specifically for TV shows. It ends up being much cheaper than that large, monthly bill. It’s quick, simple and sensible–not to mention empowering.
Thanks for the post.
These days a premium cable channel is all about what you can watch right now. If you have a little patience and can wait for a movie to be released on DVD or wait for one of their shows to come out then you totally don’t need a premium channel.
I love Netflix. My only complaint is that DVDs are sometimes scratched beyond playability, but that doesn’t seem to be TOO frequent a problem.
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