While I've never had cable, I can speak for my satellite experience. I have Bell with the hidef package. I have a couple dishes for different locations (besides the house) and 4 receivers, one of them is also a duel tuner/pvr. I own all my equipment, don't like to rent stuff. My monthly rate is ~$80.00 for an upper level package (but not the top one).
Overall I'm pleased with it. The hidef picture looks good on my 51" screen. With the dish properly aimed, I have rarely ever had signal drop-out. Owning a dish set-up also allows me to move and install my system anywhere and anyway I want.
Right now my biggest complaint is this . . . My family watches almost everything offered on the hidef channels. Almost all these same channels are also offered in lowdef. These are a lot of duplicate channel packages and when we asked to drop the lowdef channels because we don't want to pay for them anymore, Bell said if we do that we'll lose the hidef ones too! You can have lowdef without the hidef, but not the other way around. So we're screwed paying for channels we never watch. Example; must have the regular sports package if you want to get the same hidef package.
