[charlestwaters]

Anyone that is familiar with using Off-Air HDTV antennas, here's a question for ya...

If you look at this antenna, http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage...t&productCategoryId=cat08084&id=1091101853739 (just using this, since I work at BBY, it's a convenience), will this work for picking up most hdtv signals near me? Here's the breakdown...

For those of you not familiar with the antennaweb.org website, here's the breakout below...

color - band, callsign, channel, station id, city & state, degrees, and miles away.

yellow - uhf KOCE-DT 50.1 PBS HUNTINGTON BEACH CA 13° 31.1
green - uhf KDOC-DT 56.1 IND ANAHEIM CA 13° 31.2
green - uhf KTTV-DT 11.1 FOX LOS ANGELES CA 14° 31.1
green - uhf KCBS-DT 2.1 CBS LOS ANGELES CA 12° 31.3
green - uhf KTLA-DT 5.1 WB LOS ANGELES CA 13° 31.2
green - uhf KAZA-DT 54.1 AZA AVALON CA TBD 13° 31.2
lt green - uhf KLCS-DT 58.1 PBS LOS ANGELES CA 14° 31.1
lt green - uhf KXLA-DT 44.1 IND RANCHO PALOS VERDES CA 13° 31.2
red - uhf KPXN-DT 30.1 i SAN BERNARDINO CA 14° 30.4
red - uhf KRCA-DT 62.1 IND RIVERSIDE CA 14° 30.5
red - uhf KCAL-DT 9.1 IND LOS ANGELES CA 13° 31.2
red - uhf KMEX-DT 34.1 UNI LOS ANGELES CA 13° 31.2
red - uhf KTBN-DT 23.1 TBN SANTA ANA CA 14° 31.1
red - uhf KNBC-DT 4.1 NBC LOS ANGELES CA 13° 31.1
red - uhf KJLA-DT 57.1 IND VENTURA CA 13° 31.1
red - uhf KCET-DT 28.1 PBS LOS ANGELES CA 14° 31.1
red - uhf KFTR-DT 46.1 TFA ONTARIO CA TBD 13° 31.1
red - uhf KCOP-DT 13.1 UPN LOS ANGELES CA 13° 31.3
red - uhf KABC-DT 7.1 ABC LOS ANGELES CA 13° 31.2
blue - uhf KVMD-DT 23.1 IND TWENTYNINE PALMS CA 66° 87.4

I have also included the map that they show of my area. Can someone please assist me on this! I appreciate it!

 

[rlj5242]

The Terk you link to is almost the same as the cheaper Square Shooter. At 30 miles, you may be stretching the ability of this little antenna. A Channel Master 4224 or 4228 should work better and be much cheaper.

Also, AVS (the parent forum) has a local HDTV section. You can easily find out what your neighbors are using so you don't have to go through a bunch of trial and error to get the right antenna.

-Robert

 

[A J Ricaud]

From your map, I would guess you live in the San Pedro area and about 31 miles away from Mt. Wilson. I think a Channelmaster CM4228 will work fine for you.

On second thought, a lot of the local channels are above channel 50, where the Antennas Direct DB8 has more gain.

 

[charlestwaters]

From your map, I would guess you live in the San Pedro area and about 31 miles away from Mt. Wilson. I think a Channelmaster CM4228 will work fine for you.

On second thought, a lot of the local channels are above channel 50, where the Antennas Direct DB8 has more gain.

Close, I'm right near Torrance High School, but still, around 30 miles or so from Mt. Wilson!

The other one I was thinking about is the Terk HDTVO.

 

[rlj5242]

The other one I was thinking about is the Terk HDTVO.

Do a little research on Terk before buying. Here and AVS are two good sources.

-Robert

 

[A J Ricaud]

Do a little research on Terk before buying. Here and AVS are two good sources.

-Robert

Excellent advice.

 

[kepper]

Anyone that is familiar with using Off-Air HDTV antennas, here's a question for ya...

For what its worth, here's my experience. I live in Newport Beach, 41 miles from Mt. Wilson. It was strongly advised that I get one of the Channelmaster antennas mentioned earlier in this thread to use with my HR10-250.

I did quite a bit of research on the subject. I didn't want to hang one of those ugly Channelmasters on the house unless it was absolutely necessary.

I got a Winegard Square Shooter 2000. It looks a lot like the Terk you show in the picture, but everything I read indicates the Square Shooter has superior performance. The company I bought it from didn't want to sell it to me, said I was too far away from the transmitter towers. I opted to give it a try, I figured if it didn't work I would return it and get one of the Channelmasters. I mounted it on the side of the house so it can't be seen, and its directly facing my neighbor's roofline.

It works GREAT, much better than I ever expected.

I get every digital channel from Mt. Wilson. KNBC comes in the lowest with a signal of 80-83, and KOCE comes in best with signals over 90. I haven't had any reception problems at all since I installed it.

Kevin

 

[memory1]

I live in Irvine and use a Silver Senor to get all the Los Angles HDTV stations. In this market the milage to the signal source is not really relivant since the transmitters are on a mountain top.

 

[TyroneShoes]

I think they take that into account. In any market that doesn't have mountains, the stick is usually about 2000 ft anyway.

 

[A J Ricaud]

Here's some interesting info about Mt. Wilson:

http://www.well.com/user/dmsml/wilson.html

 

[good.deals]

I'm thinking about going with the Winegard Square Shooter 2000 ($100 on eBay). I'm new to OTA signals... I know my locals are coming from the north but of course my dish points to the south. Does my OTA antenna have to point in the direction the signals are coming from? I dont really want the antenna visible from the front of my house.

 

[kepper]

I'm thinking about going with the Winegard Square Shooter 2000 ($100 on eBay). I'm new to OTA signals... I know my locals are coming from the north but of course my dish points to the south. Does my OTA antenna have to point in the direction the signals are coming from? I dont really want the antenna visible from the front of my house.

Your OTA antenna should point toward the transmitter towers... go to www.antennaweb.org to find the exact direction from your location.

I live in Newport Beach and use the Square Shooter 2000... it works wonderfully for me, I get all of the stations from Mt. Wilson with a steady signal of 80-95% depending on the channel. NBC and ABC are the weakest but still very acceptable, the two PBS stations and CBS are the strongest at my location. You might get a better deal on the SS-2000 from some well established online merchants, Google the model number to find them, or email me if you'd like more info.

Kevin

 

[good.deals]

Crap, that means it will have to point toward the fron of my hous etherefore making it visible to anyone who drives by. Any antennas powerful enough to work within my house (I'm only 24-25 miles from my towers).

 

[codespy]

I've had problems in the past with this too. However, info I got is this- and it worked too. In your case, get 3 Radio Shack #2160 antennae's, use 4 way splitter to couple them together, and your set. These antennae's are $23 bucks a piece and can go in your attic or buy a cheap mast and mount outside. I get Milwaukee, Madison, and Rockford locals where I live. Over 35 digital channels on my OTA setup. These antennae's are small, but have a range of about 70 miles depending on terrain. It's also best to align at dusk (near darkness) outside because you can see the clearance lights on the transmitters up to 70 miles away perfectly when on your roof.

 

[marcello696]

Im in Temecula and the Channelmaster 4248 works very well for me and I get all the Los Angeles stations as well as a few San Diego OTA stations. Im probably about 80 miles away from Mt. Wilson

 

[good.deals]

I've had problems in the past with this too. However, info I got is this- and it worked too. In your case, get 3 Radio Shack #2160 antennae's, use 4 way splitter to couple them together, and your set. These antennae's are $23 bucks a piece and can go in your attic or buy a cheap mast and mount outside. I get Milwaukee, Madison, and Rockford locals where I live. Over 35 digital channels on my OTA setup. These antennae's are small, but have a range of about 70 miles depending on terrain. It's also best to align at dusk (near darkness) outside because you can see the clearance lights on the transmitters up to 70 miles away perfectly when on your roof.

I can only see the lights on a clear clean evening (Maybe a couple days per month). Most days it just too darn smoggy to see 25 miles (I'm in the OC). I'll probably just use a compass.

I want something that's really clean looking; as it will be visible from the street. The Wineguard SquareShooter looks pretty simple. Every thing else looks pretty distracting (fugly). My sat dish points towards the back of my property so I was able to hide it.

 

[good.deals]

Can I use a splitter on the coax cable going to my dish and use it for my ota antenna? If so, what kind of splitter should I use? I guess I would need to split it twice, once at the dish, once at my box. I think I read somewhere that this is possible, but I'm not sure.

 

[kepper]

Can I use a splitter on the coax cable going to my dish and use it for my ota antenna? If so, what kind of splitter should I use? I guess I would need to split it twice, once at the dish, once at my box. I think I read somewhere that this is possible, but I'm not sure.

You may be able to use a diplexer, not a splitter. You can read up on the pros and cons and how to do it by searching this forum.

FWIW, I mounted my Square Shooter on the side of my house in an area that is low enough to be shielded from view by landscaping. Because the Mt. Wilson antenna farm is so high up at between 5000-6000 feet above sea level, you probably have a clear line of sight to it from where you are, and you probably don't need to have a rooftop installation to get line of sight.

The other thing I found is that the Square Shooter is pretty tolerant of direction, I aimed mine 40 degrees on either side of the azimuth when I was installing it and the signal stayed the same; it started to degrade at about a 45 degree+ angle.

Kevin

 

[bosny]

I am in Boston and have an HR10-250. Since I only received waivers for CBS and FOX HD channels (from NYC), I hooked up an off air antenna from Best Buy directly to the receiver. I supplement the HD signal s on 80(CBSE) and 88(FOXE) with my local NBC and ABC which come in fine with the antenna is positioned correctly. By the way, both picture sources are very comparable on my Hitachi RPTV. A couple of questions: Is this the best setup to get the major network channels in HD? Waivers were denied for NBC and ABC but should I ask a second time? Also, a friend is now a new DTV subscriber and was told by CS that he would receive all local HD channels through his dish. Is this true? This would be much more convenient than moving the little antenna around for channels not showing on my dish. Would those trump the NY channels I am now receiving? Is this related to the threads on MPEG2 to MPEG4 conversion? Any thoughts? Thanks for the help.

 

[stevel]

Don't bother asking a second time. In fact, be glad that you got what you did. DTV is now not even requesting waivers in cities with HD locals on the MPEG4 satellites, which is what your friend was referring to. Your HR10 cannot receive these, so your current setup is the best. Besides, you'll get a better picture from the antenna and more channels (I picked up over a dozen digital channels with my antenna propped in a window.)