Question about delivery as opposed to content

[tech3149]

I have been living in my parents house for the last few years and before that couldn't justify the price of cable for the limited value of the content. Now that my parents are gone I'm saddled with maintaining a big old house with a zero income budget.
The first thing on the chopping block is cable service. I live about 40 miles from most TV stations in very hilly terrain. With the conversion to digital broadcast virtually all the stations are on the UHF band.
My location could never receive UHF with an average antenna so I started building my own. I can get pretty much everything except the major market stations.

The first thing I noticed is that the quality is much better than that provided by the cable company(even those not broadcasting in HD).

Has anyone else cut the cord and gone back to broadcast only? Have you tried free over the air satellite?

[murielm99]

1. I live in the country.

We have a rotating antenna, network only (including subchannels).

We get stations from Rockford IL, the Quad Cities and Madison WI, depending on which way we move the antenna.

I don't want cable, even if I could get it at my location. I watch some cable at the gym. Why do people pay for that???

[davidpdx]

2. If you didn't live in the US I'd tell you how to get your programming for free

but there is a good chance you'd get caught for doing that.

[dr.strangelove]

3. I am close to dropping

and going with the cheaper content services like Hulu or Netflix. Have not cut the cord yet. The honest reason is that I like a few shows on premium channels and pay for them.