HDTV transmitter/antenna information

Philjoet, definitely get an antenna and put a preamp on it and a roter so you can rotate to fine tune it, I watch almost all my HD OTA, its free and has tons more to offer than satellite or cable.

Yes, I have 2 of the cheap, but well regarded Rat Shack double bow-tie antennas. They haven't made them for a few years now and the guy at the local store didn't even know he had them. The in-line stock search pulled them up so off to the store I went. He was more than happy to sell both to me fo $5. I cut off the ribbon wire and soldered a 75 ohm adapter. They work very well, but the wife wanted them out of sight. So I went to channel master in the attic.

I have a cute story regarding my HD antenna, which I have related on another thread. I have a terk 35 antenna that points towards the main major area transmitter and it gets really good reception from my location which is about 15 miles from the transmitter. I got it from a fellow living quite close to me who for all intent and purposes has the same exposure and angle of reception as I, but he could not get any qualaity reception what-so-ever on his system. My picture is fine.

Still, I wanted to watch the Olympics in HD and the only station broadcasting them is located about 40 miles from me and there is a hill just behing my house that is in the way.l I went to Circuit City and bought another HD antenna that is square-looking(I don't remember the model...) which advertised that it could be used in an urban setting with inferior signals. I used a Radioshack inverse splitter(it allows me to combine to feeds into one cable) and I have the Terk antenna pointed at my main antenna and I tried to get the Circuit City antenna to bring in the remote feed, using the combined signal.

I logged into antennaweb and got the precise compass settings and I pointed the new antenna in the right direction, with a modification to compensate for the hill. Nothing.

I laid the antenna on my pitched roof and went inside to get a beer, having decided this was useless. When I got inside, the picture was perfect! It seems that the pitch of my roof matches just what I needed to get the picture, with almost no room for error.

The point(!) being that there is little room for error but luck and a beer helps.

One more observation, I tied my FM tuner into this system and it now gets great reception.

Just a little update...

I bought a Winegard 8200P antenna (one of the top antennas you can buy) on the advice of a local dealer, and put it into my attic first - to see what channels I could receive. I can get all the networks except for CBS which is very much what antennaweb.com told me when I entered my address etc. on their website (FWIW I think the info from antennaweb is spot on and worth a look).

I fine tuned the direction my antenna aimed with a compass and went from no signal to a peak of 40 so I am close to getting CBS. My next step is to buy an amplifier and as a last resort is to mount it on the roof with a rotor.

I think the OTA HD is very much decided on where you are located, I am in a smallish city (120,000 or so) and the nearest transmitter is about 25 or so miles away and is reported to be pointing due north (away from me) at the nearest 'big' city, also Kalamazoo is located in a valley in SW Michigan, this all makes a big difference.

Elizabeth, I agree that any antenna will do to get some channels and do not know your situation but, you do need VHF and UHF to get all of the channels in my area and I am sure throughout the USA this applies as well.

the bottom line is you have to do a little research, antennaweb.com is a good start, and have a little luck with your location to get OTA HD channels.

thanks again everyone

Phil