Watch Your Favorite TV Show in High Definition for Free

I can't wait for November.  That is when my contract is up with my satellite TV company and I can quit sending them $60 every month.  Why would I want to do that, you might ask.  The reason is, I love to save money, every way I can.  I have found that I can watch almost any TV show I want, any time I want, for free, in HD.  So why pay for a satellite TV service where I have to watch on their schedule?

I know you might be skeptical.   Who wants to use one of those Warez sites where you could be downloading a virus or spyware with your favorite show.  Plus, it is illegal to steal from the networks. You know it wasn't that long ago when the music industry was prosecuting teenagers for downloading their favorite music.  But I can assure you these sites are perfectly legitimate. And you don't need to download anything. You watch your favorite shows in your browser.

And I am not talking old shows either.  These are first run TV shows showing the same week they were broadcast on network television.

I found out about all this free television when i got hooked on Lost. You see, for years I wouldn't watch Lost. I wasn't going to go along with the crowd and watch a show that you couldn't miss. Then last Christmas someone gave my daughter a DVD of the first season. I watched it with her and I was hooked! But how could I take care of my new Lost addiction without going broke? One season of DVDs were almost $50. Renting the DVD's didn't save me that much money either. And then I found Lost online for free.

I watched an episode of Lost almost every night for close to three months. Starting from the very beginning. It was great. The best part was the commercials. There weren't very many. The early shows had only four or five commercial breaks per show, and those were only 30 seconds long! Imagine that, just 2 1/2 minutes of commercials and 43 minutes of Lost! I was in heaven.

So are you ready for the website? It's ABC.com. That's right. The network is putting it's TV shows online. On ABC.com you can watch episodes of Lost, as well as Dancing With The Stars, Grey's Anatomy, Desperate Housewives, and 20 other shows.

Yes and No. Once I found Lost online I immediately went over to Fox.com to see what was available there. Mostly to see if I could watch American Idol on the computer. On Fox I can watch full episodes of House, 24, and Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? But not American Idol. You can't watch full episodes, but you can watch clips of all the performances, which is almost as good. In fact I am writing this listening to Adam Lambert singing Mad World.

CBS has 26 primetime shows that you can watch online for free. Including 2 of my favorites, Survivor and The Amazing Race. If you are a big CSI fan they have not only the original CSI, but CSI Miami and CSI NY as well. CBS also has their daytime shows and specials available online. Thinking I am on a roll, I click on over to the last major television network, NBC.

NBC.com also offer full length videos of their major shows in High Definition. However, if you want to get caught up on a show you are out of luck I was seriously disappointed to see that only 2 episodes of Celebrity Apprentice were available. On NBC, the full length shows are only available for a few weeks. So if you want to start a new show mid-season you are out of luck! But you can watch the most recent episode of The Biggest Loser or My Name Is Earl.

Most of the time I watch my shows online without incident.  But be warned, to watch in high def you need to have a good, high speed internet connection,  a suitable graphics card, and a monitor that can take advantage of the high definition picture.   It can also get annoying if you don't set up your computer properly.  There is nothing like being at the best part of your show and having your screen saver kick in.  And then there was the time my virus scanner decided to update and the computer just couldn't do that and play the video.  But for the most part I watch what I want, when I want, and that's the way I like it.