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Roku streaming player?

I am getting a new television in a few days, and was just going to just use it for dvd's etc. I use Directv on all the other tv's in my house. I don't want to get another cable box, so I am thinking of using the Roku 3. I already using netflix and mite use it on the Roku, but I don't want to pay for any subscriptions for the Roku. My question is does the roku have a lot of free tv stations. Im new to seeing the roku and not sure if the television shows are mostly on a subscription or if there a lot are Free.
I'm really just interested about free stuff. Thanks for any info.
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A.B.Mult.Horror

There is a good amount of free content available on the roku. Crackle, popcornflix, and OVGuide all have full length movies. These are ad supported meaning they break for a commercial at several points throughout the movie. Typically the commercials are just a short spot, 15 to maybe 30 seconds unlike four to six minutes on network TV and the spots are usually from the same sponsor or two.

All the big news outlets have some sort of content on ROKU. CNN, FOX, CNBC, RT, SKYnews, and others offer news segments or even may stream live and ceretain times of the day.

Amazon lets you pay per view so it is not really a subscription but you will pay for items you do want at your choice.

There is a lot of other unique, niche and obscure content plus there are "private channels". You will need to google to learn about this.

Thanks for the info. I am curious to know if i buy the Roku 3 it comes with an Ethernet port . If I was able to hook that to my router, that would make the quality better correct? My dsl is very slow. " 6Mbps/1Mbps " if i used wireless i don't know how fast/slow it would be. I like the idea of streaming like Plex Media Server.
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A.B.Mult.Horror

I have ATT 6meg DSL and it works perfectly fine with my ROKU and Netflix streaming. Even when I had the 3meg plan it worked fine.

I do have it hardwired via cat5 directly to my router and never used the ROKU wirelessly so I can't comment directly to the performance there.

My opinion is that a direct cable connection to the router will yield the best results.

Using wireless vs ethernet depends more on the wireless strength in your home than anything else. If the roku has a strong signal next to the TV then that will be fine. More of my devices at home are connected wirelessly than not and they do fine with streaming both over the Internet and within my local network.

Plex is great, especially if you have a lot of your own ripped content. But that's a topic for a different conversation
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♬ Dragon of good fortune struggles with the trickster Fox ♬

One thing about the Roku if you are wanting to avoid charges... when you initially setup the Roku they will require a credit card (unless you call them and request a non credit card setup)... once you have the account setup, just log in and remove the credit card, then no accidental charges will occur (kids/friends/relatives playing with the roku).

The free stuff is generally blah, with an occasional gem... but there is plenty of it out there. I find I am using mostly netflix and huluplus since they have the content I am after generally. It is nice that they have the Amazon instant on there as well, but to be honest I only use it if I find the content I want isn't on netflix or hulu.

I have mine setup on ethernet (I tend to try to keep everything wired if I can) but I have used it on wifi many times with little to no issues, as mentioned above issues are usually caused by the wifi source not the wifi on the roku.

One other thing... the remote can eat batteries so consider getting you some good rechargeable ones for the remote

I subscribe to Netflix and i use Roku 3.. the device is extremely easy to use compared to my old WD TVlive. The downside is that Roku 3 will not play MKV files correctly (as some files have no audio) but WD TV does very well.
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