Need advice re mlb.tv vs cable

but back in 04 it was horrible, id be sitting in my dorm room trying to catch a matt clement 1-hitter and i swear the picture would cut out the instant he would release the ball from his hands every inning.

i used it the whole 2007 season and thought it was excellent. you can watch the games streaming via windows media player or install their mlb mosaic program which you could watch up to six games simultaneously. the mosaic was pretty brutal at first but got better as the season went. But mlb has the most confusing and infuriating blackout policy which really pissed off a lot of people last year. for example i live in canada and am blacked out of toronto blue jay games although i live in western canada and am closer to chicago, minnesota, seattle, etc. so depending on where you live it might be right for you. that being said, now that the mlb extra innings package is available for the first time in canada on bell expressvu i think i might sign up for it in april.

Thanks everyone so far for the info.

I wonder if there's another free trial during spring training to give it a look see before making a final decision.

...and it was a love/hate relationship, at best.  

I lived in Minnesota at the time and could get most all Cubs games, but it DOES get blacked out if the game is supposed to be on national tv, like ESPN.  Sometimes it crashes or fucks up and you have to restart it, but it is both cheaper than buying a cable package and easier for traveling.  Also, multiple people could be on it at once, which meant my dad and my friend could watch whatever the hell they wanted to while I watched the Cubs.  

It is by no means perfect, but I think that is more due to the black out restrictions than anything else.

Dan

Ultimately, I enjoy this more than the extra innings package on cable. The ability to watch archived games (including some classic games), plus the addition of all archived radio broadcasts makes the package well worth it. The technical problems were largely addressed between 06 (my first year using the service) and last season. There are still some bugs, but I have few major complaints.

I only wish they'd triple or quadruple the bandwidth of the data feed. I have a 10Mbps connection.

Also, if MLB.com wanted to do something truly revolutionary, they'd integrate the data available through their gameday software into the mlb.tv broadcasts. I'd love to instantly have pitcher vs. batter splits available, or other useful bits of info.

Love it when games aren't blacked out.

But TOO MANY GAMES are blacked out. I won't buy it this year because of that fact.

Not only am I blocked out from Cubs games for living in Rockford, but I was also denied seeing the occasional Brewers, Cardinals, or Twins game.  But sometimes I could see them.  It made no sense.  I think they even blocked a mid season Detroit home game on me once.  WTF?????

I always end up buying the package anyway so I can watch games on the west coast while I'm working, and yes, the quality is very good.

Still, the blackout restrictions are by far my biggest pet peeve with MLB.  I can deal with the HGH scandals, inept Hall of fame or gold glove choices, insane player salaries and constantly escalating ticket prices.....but at least fix the asinine blackout policies.

Another question to anyone thinking of getting MLBtv to replace regular cable/tv is - what are you going to watch it on?

I am dependent on it because I can't get WGN or Comcast or Extra Innings on my TV, and while the quality has gone up every year and all the good features everybody has mentioned, I enjoy too, but there's one thing that is a negative.

I can't watch it on my couch, on the damn TV, the way you would normally watch a game.  My current laptop doesn't have the right kind of video out jack to hook it up to the TV, so I have to watch on the laptop or the family PC.  Getting comfortable for 2 or 3 hours around one of these screens isn't always easy.

Plus, one's got a 15 inch and the other has a 17 inch screen.  If I had Cubs games on normal cable, and on a normal TV, I wouldn't trade it for this.

it's showed steady improvement. Last year was around 90% good or excellent picture, 10% unwatchable. The first year when it was free with msn premium it was about 50/50.

The extra bucks for premium and mosaic are worth it.  I didn't watch multiple games, but the mosaic player made watching one game in large (not full screen) size with the linescore and stats in a sidebar a much better experience.

The local blackouts are by the IP address of where you log in, not where you live. Sometimes there are ways around that ;-)

Because I have a laptop and wireless LAN I can go outside on the patio or deck and watch the games,especially in the evenings. Of course I am out here in Colorado and the evenings are pleasant and without mosquitos or other bugs, often cooler than inside that was baked by the Sun during the day. We do not have air conditioning...don't need it.

Other times I can set up in the family room while my wife is watching TV and have the sound on during with a ear plug and still be conversing with her.

Games I miss I watch on archive....the quality was good with the upgrade....only bummer was Saturday blackout....

We also have cable and I will watch it on GN with visitors like my father-in-law....but the quality improves every year.

...I feel that you have to have mlb.tv. Or EI. But in Fargo, ND I only get the WGN games on tv. So most of the time, I'm on the laptop with mlb.tv.

My Mac laptop is about four years old, so it can get bogged down with streaming video. I can have the mlb.tv window open and pretty much nothing else. I'll have to restart my browser (Firefox) every once in a while, but most of the time it'll make it through an entire game. Still, you can watch the games and that's all that counts.

I think most of the problems I've experienced are related to my aging computer. I viewed games last year on my girlfriend's laptop with Vista, and it worked perfectly, for entire games and in full-screen mode. I also have a newer PC with Vista at work, and it works fine here (my boss loves it when i watch baseball games at work).

I don't think mlb.tv is expensive for a full season's worth of viewing almost any game you want. If the Chicago blackout rules applied way over here in the sticks, then I might have a different opinion.

mlb the show championships in the Chicago area.

I'm in the AF, and it looks like I will be moving to England at the end of April.  I know if you're overseas, you have no blackout restrictions, but I'm wondering how this will work for me as my main address will most likely be an APO-AE.  I'll be signing up before moving most likely for the April games, which will be with my Texas address, but if I switch my address midseason to an APO-AE address, will they remove the texas teams blackout?

reason I got cable some years back was to watch the Bears. Who knew cable would take off like it did:)