Quote:
Originally Posted by Randy Rooster
this site will help you pick out a antenna and tell you what stations yiou should get with it.
with the broadcasters going to digital, you will be able to pick up many new stations you couldnt before.
http://www.antennaweb.org/aw/welcome.aspx |
Those are a couple of good web links mentioned so far.
I live in the country, on top of a hill, with a 2 story house, with a mast on top of the roof, with a hardwood grove from the south to the northwest of the house. North to almost the south is more open, but I do have big trees in those directions too.
My stations are high-power ones to the north of my by 80-90 miles, a mid-power station to the east of my about 40 miles, and a low-power repeater array to the southwest of me about 25 miles.
Digital TV sucks.
I could pull analog signals from all those directions with the big $100 radio Shack ant on my roof. With old flat lead wire, no amp. Some days the long distance worked; in other weather condsitions the low power repeater worked from the other direction. Always got 4-10 analog channels, year around.
Digital either works or it doesn't, there is no fuzzy picture watching. For someone on the fringe like me, I'm used to seeing a little fiuzz. Now I see little.
The repeater station SW of me, closest, I can get analog stations through the trees - but no analog signals. It's a winter-only option now.
The fairly close station east of me has a strong signal - but it will 'blank out' or skip, every 3-10 seconds. Real strong, but not stable. For 2 years now, they have been 'working' on things. Currently their digital signals are down, and have been for over a week. Their analog signal also has glitches. Even on cable in town - their signal is terrible, or blacks out for a few hours every now and then.
The digital signals from far away - 80 miles - are _beautiful_. About 20% of the time. Calm weather, low wind, clear, at night. During the day, they are marginal, and blank out at certain sun angles, airplane interference, windy, or cloud cover. Winter is far better than summer.
Gosh forbid it rains anywhere, then all digital signals from anywhere go out.
The best digital signal I get is from 80 miles away, they are broadcasting it on UHF 33, BUT when the change comes they will revert to channel 11 - a VHF frequency. So, I can't even count on that channel coming in after the change.
One UHF channel made the change, and dropped the analog broadcast. I _think_ they are opperating at full power digital. That are not much different than they used to be for coming in.
Most analog signals have dropped to 1/2 power, and come in poorly for me now.
Most digital signals are coming in at 1/2 power, but the 'coverage maps' you can get at the other links don't show much improvement.
I listen to the stuff the TV stations tell us about the changeover. It only covers people living 20 miles from their tower, it seems, nothing _helpful_.
I talked with my Radio Shak guy (I had to tell him that ch 11 (as well as 9 & 12) will revert to broadcasting on VHF, not the temperary UHF number they have now. His comment was, oh, boy, I bet a lot of people will be in again that we sold UHF antenneas to..... Well, I didn't get many of my questions answered there....
My friends with cable TV - nothing but troubles with digital signals. Most cable owners aren't broadcasting true 1080p, but a compressed to 720 or even less. digital signals have no room for error, so any glitch is a major issue, not 'just a little fussy'. One friend wanted full digital all the way through; he is on his 3rd decoder from the cable company, and this one still has issues. His folks had to return a new TV for not working; then the cable company ended up fixing their cable out on the pole after all.....
It's only TV, but for what the cable & sat compaies are charging per month, they need to buck up & provide a real service, not the junk they are.
Free over the air digital is about worthless to anyone who isn't in the shadow of a broadcast tower. They don't have the bugs worked out, and they don't really seem to know what they are doing. The signal has to come so perfectly to you. No more can you pick up a signal from 3 different directions, nor in bad weather, or with any kind of interference from trees or anything.
Everything is still changing so much, and despite all the talking, no one is giving out accurate info - TV stations themselves, nor electronic stores. The maps from the web sites say I couldn't get the analog signals, but I watched those channels for 40 years. Now I sometimes get the digital signals they say I shouldn't get, but I can't stand to watch the choppy reception from the station they tell me should be rock solid.
Blah. It's only TV, I know. But - blah.
--->Paul
If we ever upgrade or drop Directv, I'm going to go ballistic when they try to take the box.
I love my Directv, but there definately IS something changing with them...it's getting much more difficult to deal with them on any support issues, and there's so much red tape now...
(and a lot of luck - Wisconsin Ann)
