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One last financial consideration: Although Orby TV doesn't require it, many people need a decent broadband connection for everything from video chats with family members to watching shows on Netflix, and you can often get a better deal when it's bundled with other services, such as a TV package and a home phone. Cable and telco companies such as Verizon almost always have promotional bundle offers, and DirecTV and Dish partner with a number of broadband companies to create hybrid TV/internet bundles.
Orby TV doesn't currently have this type of deal in place, which means you could save on your TV entertainment only to pay more for your internet connection.Over the past 18 months, a growing number of streaming services have really been shaking up the TV business, giving consumers a variety of new alternatives to traditional cable and satellite packages. The biggest selling point for all these services is that they offer a cable-style TV package at a significantly lower cost.
The latest entry is a bit different. TVision Home, from cellular provider T-Mobile, isn't really promising to save you money, at least not much. Instead, it vows to be more up-front about the total cost of the service, which is launching at $90 a month for a cable-style tier of about 155 channels. After the promotional period ends—the company wouldn't say when—T-Mobile wireless subscribers will get that rate, while others pay $100 a month.
Unlike traditional pay TV services, TVision Home doesn't hit you with additional charges such as broadcast TV and regional sports fees, or DVR service charges. If you have a cable package, those can sometimes add as much as $40 a month to your monthly bill, and many consumers say such fees are unfair.
However, if you sign up for TVision Home, you will pay a $10-a-month rental fee for the required main set-top box/DVR, plus $10 a month more to rent "Lite" boxes for each additional TV you'd like to connect. You'll also have to pay local taxes.
I recently had a chance to kick the tires on this new service, and generally liked the channel selection and the interface.TVision Home is a rebranded version of Layer3 TV, an internet-based TV service T-Mobile acquired last year. It's currently available only in the eight markets Layer3 served: Chicago, Dallas-Fort Worth, Los Angeles, New York City, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., and Longmont, Colo. The company says it will expand its footprint later this year.
To set up the service, I had to swap out my regular DirecTV satellite TV receiver/DVR with the TVision Home gateway box. T-Mobile offers free in-home installation, but it's not necessary. I found the setup to be a snap, since an account is created when you sign up for the service and is preloaded in the gateway box. There’s also a set-up video tutorial on the TVision Home website and a call-in number, if you need additional help.The TVision box requires a wired connection to a router or Ethernet jack in the room. And you need a fairly robust broadband connection—T-Mobile recommends at least 50Mbps.
The main gateway box comes in black or white. It's considerably larger than most streaming players these days, but that's because it houses a 1-terabyte DVR for storing shows. (That's enough storage for about 400 hours of high-def programming.) Once I connected the box, I just needed to plug the power cable into the wall, load batteries in the remote control, and switch the TV to the right HDMI input. Additional TVs use smaller "Lite" boxes, which connect to the gateway box through WiFi.
The box comes prepopulated with the main account already set up, so activating service was fairly straightforward using the company's website. Once the box is activated, you can easily add profiles for other family members, who each get their own personalized home screen, recommendations, and DVR recordings list.
You can expand the TVision Home basic service of about 155 channels to more than 275 channels with add-on packages and premium channels. For example, a Movies & Music pack includes movie channels from Epix, MGM and Sony, plus a few music 24/7 niche channels, and costs an extra $10 a month.

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