Digital Direct TV vs HD via Cable

I have Direct TV and also cable, digital for some channels.
I do not have a HD plasma, (my receiver is HD) but the one I have looks good to my old eyes, and was soft on the wallet. Observations are:

HD programs look better than regular ones, even without the HD monitor. I was able to check this out because Direct TV often has the same movie on two channels, one HD, the other not, and I can switch back and forth between channels.

With satelite, all channels are digital, whether or not they are HD. Picture quality is better for these channels.

Local stations are not available for all locations, yet. I was surprised to find that neither PBS channel included on Direct TV had the programming that I like from my local PBS station. I can still get it over the cable, and they say that local stations will soon be available in my location.

Cable has a way of getting knocked out during thunder storms or when people take down poles with their cars. Direct TV has never been interrupted. Surprisingly, my signal strength was unaffected by about one inch of snow clinging to the lower third of the dish.

With cable, you can get broadband connection for your computer.

CATV is highly dependent on where you are--who your provider is and how far away from the headend you are. In my old house, I had Comcast digital CATV and thought it was terrible. So, when I moved, I ordered DirecTV and was very excited by the prospect of improved quality. Unfortunately, it took waaay to long to install, and in the interim, I ended up with digital CATV again because I needed the CATV broadband service and the digital add-on was a cheap promotion that would tide me over to the DirecTV install. In my new house, the digital CATV seemed much, much better, but at the time they didn't have HDTV channels, so I cancelled when the DirecTV got installed.

I hated DirecTV. For channel surfers, the channel update is sloooow, regardless of the box you use. After a year, my DirecTV contract expired and my Comcast system started carrying about 8 channels of HDTV, so I switched back. I'm much happier with digital CATV than DirecTV, and I have yet to see any outages (its been about a year).

Bottom line, you can have a good CATV signal and you can have a bad CATV signal. You can have a good DirecTV signal, and you can have a bad DirecTV signal (depends on foliage and how well the dish is aligned). If you don't have a good DirecTV signal, you will have weather outages--I know people who can predict the weather by when their DirecTV starts cutting out, and I had some issues with high winds.

On the plus side, I think CATV switches faster and has a better HDTV line up, but that is my taste (not a sports fan) and my CATV provider. On the minus side, the DirecTV folks can go integrated Tivo, and there is now an HDTV Tivo. On the plus side, I don't have to run a lot of coax through my house and my CATV is available in all rooms (you need two runs of coax to support Tivo and multiswitches for multiple rooms).

As with most things, its a matter of taste...

HDTV is definitely worth it, however!

Edesilva...You are absolutely right that the local cable provider can make or break cable, and your house's suitability for dish location can make or break satelite.

I bought my own satelite hardware and installed it myself without any problem whatsoever. It took me a couple of hours. My signal strength is in the mid 90's, which is considered very good. The ideal dish location, from a reception point of view, happened to be ideal from a cosmetic point of view (hidden away on a back roof). Not everyone will be this fortunate.

I have Directv and it is very good, but you might want to look at Voom they give you everything free and include an antenna for local channel HDTV feeds. No long term contract either. The only downside is no PPV and no NFL sunday ticket. No NFL sunday ticket was a deal breaker for me. Hope you don't have this addiction.