Looking for advice on good digital TV antenna

8 13 2015 | TV LAND

[cardinal4]

Yes, that was it..

[dangerdoc]

We put a full sized, old fashioned, out door antenna in the attic, dropped the wire through a closet on the main floor down to the basement. Boosted the signal and plugged it into the house’s cable wiring. Perfect reception in every room and you don’t have to readjust the antenna after a big wind.

We picked up all stations from the local city, and most from two other cities between 50 and 70 miles away.

Total investment was about $100 including cable and booster. We used it for 10 years before we moved.

[SpaceBar]

There's nothing particularly special about a “digital” antenna. The RF (radio frequency) is still RF.

Actually no. A 'digital antenna' means it has been optimized for good gain, a predictable pattern, and low vswr in the passband of interest specifically for the HDTV broadcast spectrum which in this case is roughly 400-700 Mhz, with a relatively constant feed-point impedance across that band that can matched to 75 ohm coax. It can be done in many ways, some better than others. Gray-Hoverman and it's variants is an interesting design, as are the fractal types, which includes those ubiquitous bow-ties embedded in black plastic as seen on tv (they work quite well actually).

[Half Vast Conspiracy]

ClearStream 2V Long-Range HDTV Antenna

This easily picked up stations 40 miles away over very hilly terrain. It was a breeze to install and point on my roof. I tapped into the old cable tv coax. I got mine at Fry's for less that $90.

[Falconspeed]

Great topic. I get this on my Verizon bill every month:

(Rent): HD Set Top Box $11.99 /month

I wonder whether a Digital Antenna can replace the STB box?

[SunkenCiv]

I’ve been very happy with the flat aerial (brand name eludes me right now) that I picked up at C*stc*, and I live out just past the edge of the boonies. I have a set downstairs, another upstairs, separate aerial on each one, and perversely manage to get a slightly different set of channels on each storey. Each of the aerials has a drop-amp attached, and the ones the same brand sells now comes with a drop-amp. Anyway, I was very skeptical, but got a word of mouth recommendation, tried it, and liked it well enough to get another one. S*ms generally carries a similar product, can’t remember that brand either.

[fso301]

25 miles is not hard to do as long as there isn’t a geologic feature such as a hill, or mountain blocking direct line-of-sight to the transmitting tower.

[Varda]

I had a Antennas Direct DB4E Antenna.
I'm about 25 or 30 miles from the towers. It was great. I loaned it to my brother and he's never given it back.

[windcliff]

Fix it.

[Ciexyz]

I bought my antenna at Best Buy, looks like a closed laptop that I put against the inside pane of window nearest TV for best reception. Plugs into wall outlet and into TV. You do an auto scan on your TV and you’re watching all the major stations and their substations plus a bunch of retro stations, PBS, religious channels, some home shopping. No payment except for the original equipment and the price has really gotten reasonable. I get 27 channels in the Pittsburgh area. I notice that Fox and some substations are adding more sports.

[minnesota_bound]

MOHU Leaf.
http://www.amazon.com/Mohu-Leaf-Paper-Connectors-Materials/dp/B004QK7HI8/ref=sr_1_1?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1439497164&sr=1-1&keywords=MOHU+Leaf

[clearcarbon]

I assisted a acquaintance living in a second story apartment in a week reception area and limited to an indoor antenna. I tried several desktop amplified/non-amplified loop and rabbit ear models. None could receive all available stations unless amplified and re-positioned in accordance with the TV station location. The amplified models also had tuning controls that also might require adjustment

I got the best results with a desktop log periodic antenna similar to this one.

While it worked well alone it worked better with an inline amplifier. Note that it also needed re-positioning in accordance with the broadcast station but there was no additional fine tuning required.

[marktwain]

“save the brain cells and don’t watch TV”

I have used that solution since 1994!

It has worked amazingly well. I recommend it to everyone!

[UnwashedPeasant]

First, determine if you have real VHF channels that you care to watch. If so, you probably need rabbit ears or an outdoor/attic antenna.

At 25 miles, you might get away with using a basic UHF loop or bowtie with rabbit ears ($5-$25) like this RCA ANT111:

The RCA ANT751R antenna ($38.75 Amazon) gets 7.5 dBi VHF and 6.5 dBi UHF:

The Antenna's Direct Clearstream V2 ($50-$65 ebay; $100 Amazon) gets 3.1 dBi VHF and 10.3 dBi UHF:

These models have great reputations on the antenna forums. Yes, those are rabbit ears on the Clearstream V2. If you want to start cheap, buy from a store with easy returns (like Amazon.com) in case you need to upgrade to a more powerful model.

[jpsb]

ping 4 later

[sockmonkey]

That pic reminded me that we used to use a potato instead of tin foil.

[Intolerant in NJ]

...a cheap $3 75ohm to 300ohm converter...been a good while since I played around with this sort of thing, but I thought the conversion used to be from a 300 ohm twin lead antenna line to a 75 ohm coax input line - I'd better brush up before I try hooking up my old attic antenna to the HDTV TV....

[JennysCool]

It seems like every month now new over-the-air networks are popping up. Between them and Roku (which now streams youtube along with its hundreds of other free channels), I can’t imagine anyone needing anything else.

[JDoutrider]

for later

[Company Man]

Add Plex Media server to your PC amd the Roku client for Plex; then add the ‘Unsupported App Store’ for the Roku Plex client and you will be dumbfounded, as I was.. For more info, search Youtube for ‘Unsupported App Store’.