I mean people spent $100/mo. on cable for decades with no option to opt out of ads. And they had to just like jump into the middle of whatever happened to be on at the time.
Well to its credit, PBS is free, excellent programming in 1080i, and ad-free.
And when you record stuff, you can skip the ads. Tablo used to offer auto-commercial skip for an additional fee, but they shut down that service. Not sure if HDHomeRun has something similar.
I might have to switch to HDHR. I have a Plex server too. We kind of went all in on Tablo and bought a lifetime pass for TV listing data, so it makes it hard to switch.
It's especially frustrating as an AppleTV user because their app glitches out hard when you try to pause or rewind live TV. It'll keep jumping back to when you first started watching like hours before. I've messaged their support about it, but they blame Apple. iPhone app works fine though...
The Plex version can sometimes be frustrating too when trying to view live TV (freezing or buffering). I've heard the app called Channels is supposed to be the best of the best for this but I've never used it personally and also like everything integrated into one interface even if it causes the occasional grief.
If you decide to try the Plex route maybe just do a month of the Plex Pass so you're not dropping $100+ on the lifetime pass when it may not improve your situation.