I am also contemplating getting DTV and the Ticket this year for the first time.
Does the reception go out in bad weather? Any other issues? Customer service?
I have had Direct TV and Sunday ticket for 5 years. The dish is on top of my roof and you can not even see it. I have 99% signal strength, the picture is 10x better than cable.
Q: Does your reception go out in bad weather?
A: Only during absolute downpours like we get here in the South. When the skies open up for one of those absolute downpours, then yes, your signal will go out. I have never lost my signal for more than 10 minutes. It maybe happens once or twice a year, but yes, it does happen. (I can not say what happens when it snows, because, well, it doesn't snow here).
The Sunday Ticket is the best, if you have HD go ahead and spend the extra 100 bucks and get the Superfan. YOu get every single game (the only games that they black out are the ones that are being broadcasted national on your local channels (which you get) and depending on where you live, if your local team is at home and under blackout (I'm considered in the Jaguars braodcast area, so I had a few of their games last year blacked out). The best part of the Sunday ticket is the interactive scorebaord that comes with it, push a button and get all of the other scores instantly while still watching your game.
The Superfan comes with the Red zone channel (flips between all the games as teams enter, oddly enough, the red zone), the MIx channel, which is 8 games at once on one screen, move between the audio with your remote or highlight a game and press a button and you go to the full picutre game. Plus Superfan gives you all the games in HD.
The SUperfan also gives you condensed games starting late night Sunday. This allows you to save the games on your DVR and not eat up all of your disc space. Every snap, every play, everything else cut out. They are usually around 30 minutes long, so you can save the entire season and only take up 8 hours on your DVR.
DirectTV is absolutely worth it, especially if you do not live in Mass. I have both the Sunday ticket and Extra Innings, iif you spring for the extra 12 bucks a month, you can get every signle sports channel too (NESN, CCSNE included) (of course, the games are blacked out).