TDS

It’s always sunny with TDS TV

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAA while back, I talked about features that can make your life a little easier. TDS TV has rolled out another nice little feature that is certain to make your daily routine just a tad less hectic: an advanced interactive local weather application

When you’re getting ready in the morning, there is one issue that you seem to always need to plan your day around: good old Mother Nature. If you get up early, you might try to flip on the 6 a.m. news in hopes of catching the weather for the day. Sometimes, people even go as far as to plan their alarm clock around when the local weather celebrity takes the air.

Now with TDS TV, a channel is offered that’s nothing but your local weather. No frills, no ads, just honest-to-goodness information. I used to use the Internet news sites as my local weather source, it seems that sometimes I would have to navigate through 15 minutes of commercials and pop-ups just to see if it’s going to rain today—such a waste of time.

Being a Middleton, Wis. customer, I flip to channel 1219 in high definition (219 in standard def), and it tells me what I’m in for during the day. The first time you surf to that channel, you open up the settings, select your city, and you’re all set from there.

Once you’re all squared away, you can check the current weather in your area. It’ll tell you temperature, status of sunlight or cloudiness—then the super science-y stuff like humidity, visibility, wind speed and direction, wind chill, and then pressure. You can click to the Next tab and it’ll show you the forecast as well. This screen will show a quick and easy to read 5 day forecast.

Probably the neatest part of the new feature is the interactive radar. This is nice because sometimes I’m aware that rain is afoot, but I’m not sure when. Since I now have the access to the radar (local, regional, and national), it’s easier to understand just how close the storms are, and when I need to be home by to beat them.

There is even an alert if there is severe weather in your area. If you go to the local weather channel and there’s an alert for your area, you can click the button and read the details about it. Since we’re approaching tornado season, that’s a great service we can all use.

I’ve found myself flipping to local weather channel quite a few times already. I’m not usually the type of person that frets too much about the temperature and if we’re in for some sprinkles, but when my local weather is at my fingertips, it’s too good to pass up.

—Austin

About TVTesters

Austin and Eric are “friendly testers” for TDS TV. They’re both TDS employees who volunteered to be guinea pigs try our newest product and put it through its paces in their homes. They’re not getting paid to use TDS TV or share their opinions, but they’ve offered to share their honest insights here. Austin: I’m a technology nut with a deep rooted passion for sports. Being able to watch every game for the teams I root for is essential. When I heard about TDS TV at the office, I couldn’t raise my hand fast enough to volunteer to test it out. Whether it’s a new set-top box, interface, or channels, I’ll be testing them and providing my honest feedback. Eric: I’m a sports geek and a techie nerd. I play/watch just about every sport and I love to mess around with electronic gadgets. At TDS I have experienced everything from dial-up Internet to a super high-speed connection and have tested products before. My wife is sort of a TV co-tester since we watch most of the shows we record together. I think it’s pretty cool I get to share my TDS TV experiences here!

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3 Responses to It’s always sunny with TDS TV

  1. Sadie May 11, 2013 at 1:50 pm #

    How does one find this channel if one does not live in Wisconsin?

  2. Missy May 14, 2013 at 5:37 pm #

    Sadie, it’s 219 or 1219 no matter where you live!

    • Sadie May 19, 2013 at 1:03 pm #

      Thanks.

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