Can I Escape my Cable Company with Internet TV?

Question

I just checked my cable bill today after our free trial of a DVR box from our cable company, and while the service has been excellent (they also have my phone and internet), at $67 a month plus tax and service fees for TV alone, I could buy a whole bunch of equipment and still save some $$. My son doesn't have cable tv but watches hulu for most shows.
I was wondering what the possibilities are, what equipment I'd need, and what are the potential pitfalls of going internet tv and getting the signal to 1 HiDef TV and 2 CRT type tvs (no digital receivers on those).
The latest issue of MacWorld says that the Apple TV interface isn't quite all it is cracked up to be and there are elegato tv thingies on sale at OWC, but I have to confess, although I've used Macs since 1984, I have never bothered to investigate the technology for TV so it is Greek to me. I was not enthused about the idea of using my business computer for storing, even temporarily, huge video files on the HD....
I believe my HiDef TV will receive digital signals from Pittsburgh stations, because before I installed cable, I picked up OTA stations, but that was before the switch, so I don't know for a fact whether that was digital or regular broadcast... That was 2 years ago...
I guess what I'm not sure about mostly is creating a the multi floor setup for my particular situation. My cable company provides me with one cable modem in the basement. The rest of the coax cables are set to stream the HD and Analog signals to the other jacks in the house. (my older TVs -one in the basement and one on the second floor-are SD and pre digital. They can see the Analog signals, but the cable company sells boxes to allow the tv's to get digital and hd signals IF I wanted to pay for them.)
My Setup: I have my computer, router and cable modem box in the basement and one analog tv in another room in the basement, the HD TV is on the 1st floor and I have one analog tv on the second floor (2 floors away from my computer).
I assume that the Apple TV is wireless and perhaps can get a signal from the basement through the floor, but how would I wire up the 2 analogs, even if they would work with the Apple TV... I assume both the Apple TV and the Elegato system works through an internet attachment through a computer, or does the Elegato pull signal from the cable company and make is usable on conputer (but not a TV)...?
Would you, could you, run the signals from the computer back up the coax somehow and feed it to the other TVs?
Right now, with phone, internet, and tv on the same coax system, I can't lose one to save money on the other

Answer 1

0r does the Elegato pull signal from the cable company and make is usable on conputer
Yes. The El Gato devices are for getting content from an antenna or cable connection into the computer. If you want to bring OTA television broadcasts into your computer, a device like those made by El Gato might be of interest to you.
The Apple TV cannot (without hacking) access content other than from the iTunes Store, so it would not be useful for getting shows from other sources such as Hulu. You'd therefore need to figure out how to connect your computer(s) to your various TVs. Working out all the various distribution issues involved in HDMI and analog would probably be better taken up on an AV-related from such as the AV Science Forum.
As to the "pitfalls" of dropping your cable service, the largest pitfall is that though a number of TV shows have been made available on the Internet, by no means have all, or even a significant percentage, of the available shows been made available for streaming or download. So before you drop your cable service, you'll want to investigate whether or not the shows you care about are available somewhere on the Internet, at a price that you deem reasonable (some are made available for free by including commercials but some you have to pay per episode).
Another thing to consider; you may find that you're getting a "package" deal if you, as you indicate, have TV, Internet and phone all from the cable company and that if you drop one service, the price on the others will go up. This may make dropping TV service less attractive, so be sure to check that out.
Hope this helps.