The picture and sound quality of today’s high definition televisions is truly amazing. That being said, I find the programming available in this area to be rather pathetic.

At around $80 a month for the basic HDTV package from Armstrong Cable, all one gets are movie channels that run the same movies over and over again endlessly with ever-increasing numbers of commercial interruptions; the lame programming of the major networks; boring “news” networks and a plethora of inane “reality” shows.

I almost forgot to mention that Armstrong includes a “free” PVR recording box so that you never miss an episode of “Bridezillas” or “Fat Cops.” Those are real shows.

If you like educational programming, try to find any history on the History Channel. I pay $10 a month extra for a sports programming package I don’t want because NATGEO is tied to it. However, the nature shows that I crave in glorious HD quality are few and far between on that network. MGMHD is a network that runs good movies with only an intermission at mid-film, but it has disappeared from Armstrong’s offerings. And, I don’t find Lifetime Movie Network to be a viable replacement.

I remember when HBO was the greatest thing to hit cable TV. Now, all those new movies are divided among 10 pay networks so you have to buy all of them if you want all the movies. And, the Pay Per View movies are $5.99 each.

Satellite TV has better programming, but it’s not available in my building and I had reception problems when I did have it in the past.

Several Armstrong employees have told me that Armstrong has to buy all this garbage programming in packages from the big networks. At least, that’s the company line.

Personally, I believe Armstrong could do better. Bringing back MGMHD and adding Independent Film Channel would be a great start. And add NATGEO to the standard package.

There are cheaper alternatives from Armstrong, but those packages aren’t in HD, but only HD televisions are available to buy now, and standard TV signal is subpar on HD TVs.

I feel that if we must pay $80 or more per month for cable TV, we should at least get much better programming. In that case, I would say that it’s expensive but it’s worth it.

I couldn’t say that now.