I love my Roku and have had it for nearly 10 years. If you buy the stick, you don’t need to buy the box. There’s not a whole lot difference in the price of the 2. My last TV has a stick installed inside it. You will need access to WiFi in order to get a connection. There’s very little difference between Hulu on the stick and on my computer. Roku doesn’t replace your TV like cable does. I watch my local channels on my TV and when I’m bored, I turn on my Roku to watch movies, TV shows, original series from various sources. Some of the channels must be paid for such as Netflix, Hulu, CBS All Access, Showtime, HBO, Starz, Boomerang (cartoons). One channel is cartoons from back in my mom’s day but it only costs $2.99/yr. Hallmark or Dove costs $35/yr. The Roku channel is free but there are some ads throughout the show. The ads are maybe 30sec each and you watch maybe 3 during a 1–½ hr movie. Hulu has a version with ads that runs $8.99/mon. If you can’t stand the ads, you can pay $11.99/mon to be completely ad free. Roku is more of an ala cart cable option. You can ad or cancel channels at will. When I’m not watching Hulu that often, I cancel until I know they’re going to show something that I want to see and I sign up again. Same with Netflix. My Amazon Prime includes many free or discounted movies that I can watch on Roku. With Amazon timing is the key to some of the movies that I want to see. When they first come out, you’re going to pay $19.99 to watch right away. After a week or two, the price will drop drastically. Then depending on how popular it is, the price will either go up or down accordingly.
If you’re thinking that you’ll be watching free TV, you won’t; but you’ll have total control over what you are paying and when you’re paying it.