a lil back ground of my OTA experience.. started at this location with a JackTV, a Radio-shack Roter, 3 wire romex connection, and 50ft of rg59 that i added to a line running in to the house.. i put it about 20 to 30 ft and barely got and Sac Chanel's.. it would come and go, pixelaiting and drop out.. a few times i was even picking up Sutro Tower on a good day for a few minutes.. i pointed it north and got Chico and the reception was fairly good.. kept it there for a while, about 2 years, but the drop outs and bad weather destroying the signal kept annoying the heck out of me! i ordered the Antennas Direct DB8e and the Winegard 200 LNA, 64ft of RG6, put it Up and wow the Chico channels "20.1 kcvu PARADISE" became very dependable.. pointed it south and still had drop out, fade and pixelating (there's a lot of trees pointed that way and a power line in between me and the transmitters in SACRAMENTO)...
i kept it at Chico and went through a cpl re-scans, and one station drooped its HAG lower and i lost that one completely till another one came on.. this last round of Re-packing i did the re-scan after loosing what i was getting, and NO CHANNELS Present at all from that direction now...
so having to look south west-ish again (WalnutGrove Calif), i have a sweet spot for Chanel 25/13.1CBS and its good and solid and the 64 is coming in most of the time (for now) with lil to no drop out for the last 4 days,
but i cant get 31.1, 3.1, 40.1 when im getting the 25, i need to move it a lil back n forth to get them in but there hit n miss one comes on and another drops off and have drop n fade..(the antenna set up now is looking across my metal snow roof from the north roof peak looking south west-ish at about 2ft above it, not ideal i know but ive had it higher with out much benefit ((im saving for a tower some day, lol))..the towers are in the same location so i should be getting all of those channels and the others from those "4 towers" in the same location, i would think..the signal is about the same, 25% on the TV = 40% on the Mediasonic HW130STB (i got it as the first upgrade thinking the TV had a weak receiver, but they seem to do just as well as each other, except they scan and get diff channels, the new box will get 13/64, but the TV will get 3/40 so that seems a lil weird to me..) and i wondering if was getting channel overload, but at my distance,??? with low signal reception im guessing i still have signal overload from 1 higher powered station compared to the other ones.???
so my first thought after a new receiver box that i need a new pre-amp.. Ive been looking at the Televes with AGT (Televes 560383 single input has higher gain then the Televes 560483 Dual Input, but if i need to add a second antenna set ill need the duel port..) so it balances the signals from the 4 towers, but if im so far away that the added AGC Might not work and be wasted circuity, so my next idea is the KT-700-COAX Dual Input AMP keeping it basic with less thingies (no AGC) in the amp to go wrong, but the more i look at my sig report RabbitEars.Info and the tower locations of the channels i do want, i might need the AGC to keep some Sigs from over powering the others due to Atmospheric reasons giving me a better balance so the receiver will pick them up evenly?
Or is my 8Bay just getting to much Multi-Pathing and i need to upgrade to a Yagi Long Beam to Get Better Signal, (im looking at the Televes 149883 DAT BOSS MIX LR antenna (the DAT doesn't say It Has The AGC like the Peramp does, but says it balences the signals), so i dont know if id need the Duel Input Televes or the KT-700-COAX Dual with a Morgan Systems/ICE M-320, HF/VHF/UHF, 75 Ohms, 3-2000 MHz, DC blocking, F connectors, receive only that would be placed between my antenna (BD8e now/ or the DAT BOSS if i get on, running Passive and amped by the Duel Port Amp After the Static Discharge Unit on the mast with the proper grounding! tho all the channels i really want are on uhf (that i know of as right now) so adding 1 or 2 vhf channels might be a waist as they might be in a different direction so i might want a separate UHF & VHF in 2 direction (the less i turn the roter to change chanels the better.). i do pick up one VHF (on occasion with the DB8e) 6.1/9PBS....its on one of the 4 towers and im still not sure how many channels are coming off the 4 towers because when i change my antenna height in the setting for higher the channels on the 4 towers seem to change per there listing when i click on them???
So im asking advice first, on the AGC in one amp helping me compared to the same "all channel amplification amp" like im getting now? yes i know the amp i have is now considered crap from all im reading (im prety sure any new amp will help)...Second is my antenna just not up for getting theses channels at 83 to 86 miles away.. like i said im getting 13.1/25 right now great so that tells me my antenna is working good....???
fixed income here like alot of others so i dont want to buy stuff i might not need compared to buying things i do need..that's why at this point ive looked up and concidered all i think i can, and i know at this point i still dont know all there is to know, i seem to have narrowed down a bit....
so im a little bit confused at all iv learned reticently about signal, preamps, coax, and everything else involved in this new Hobby..HELP. .lol
thank you in advance for taking the time to read my lil problem...
73
N
i kept it at Chico and went through a cpl re-scans, and one station drooped its HAG lower and i lost that one completely till another one came on.. this last round of Re-packing i did the re-scan after loosing what i was getting, and NO CHANNELS Present at all from that direction now...
so having to look south west-ish again (WalnutGrove Calif), i have a sweet spot for Chanel 25/13.1CBS and its good and solid and the 64 is coming in most of the time (for now) with lil to no drop out for the last 4 days,
but i cant get 31.1, 3.1, 40.1 when im getting the 25, i need to move it a lil back n forth to get them in but there hit n miss one comes on and another drops off and have drop n fade..(the antenna set up now is looking across my metal snow roof from the north roof peak looking south west-ish at about 2ft above it, not ideal i know but ive had it higher with out much benefit ((im saving for a tower some day, lol))..the towers are in the same location so i should be getting all of those channels and the others from those "4 towers" in the same location, i would think..the signal is about the same, 25% on the TV = 40% on the Mediasonic HW130STB (i got it as the first upgrade thinking the TV had a weak receiver, but they seem to do just as well as each other, except they scan and get diff channels, the new box will get 13/64, but the TV will get 3/40 so that seems a lil weird to me..) and i wondering if was getting channel overload, but at my distance,??? with low signal reception im guessing i still have signal overload from 1 higher powered station compared to the other ones.???
so my first thought after a new receiver box that i need a new pre-amp.. Ive been looking at the Televes with AGT (Televes 560383 single input has higher gain then the Televes 560483 Dual Input, but if i need to add a second antenna set ill need the duel port..) so it balances the signals from the 4 towers, but if im so far away that the added AGC Might not work and be wasted circuity, so my next idea is the KT-700-COAX Dual Input AMP keeping it basic with less thingies (no AGC) in the amp to go wrong, but the more i look at my sig report RabbitEars.Info and the tower locations of the channels i do want, i might need the AGC to keep some Sigs from over powering the others due to Atmospheric reasons giving me a better balance so the receiver will pick them up evenly?
Or is my 8Bay just getting to much Multi-Pathing and i need to upgrade to a Yagi Long Beam to Get Better Signal, (im looking at the Televes 149883 DAT BOSS MIX LR antenna (the DAT doesn't say It Has The AGC like the Peramp does, but says it balences the signals), so i dont know if id need the Duel Input Televes or the KT-700-COAX Dual with a Morgan Systems/ICE M-320, HF/VHF/UHF, 75 Ohms, 3-2000 MHz, DC blocking, F connectors, receive only that would be placed between my antenna (BD8e now/ or the DAT BOSS if i get on, running Passive and amped by the Duel Port Amp After the Static Discharge Unit on the mast with the proper grounding! tho all the channels i really want are on uhf (that i know of as right now) so adding 1 or 2 vhf channels might be a waist as they might be in a different direction so i might want a separate UHF & VHF in 2 direction (the less i turn the roter to change chanels the better.). i do pick up one VHF (on occasion with the DB8e) 6.1/9PBS....its on one of the 4 towers and im still not sure how many channels are coming off the 4 towers because when i change my antenna height in the setting for higher the channels on the 4 towers seem to change per there listing when i click on them???
So im asking advice first, on the AGC in one amp helping me compared to the same "all channel amplification amp" like im getting now? yes i know the amp i have is now considered crap from all im reading (im prety sure any new amp will help)...Second is my antenna just not up for getting theses channels at 83 to 86 miles away.. like i said im getting 13.1/25 right now great so that tells me my antenna is working good....???
fixed income here like alot of others so i dont want to buy stuff i might not need compared to buying things i do need..that's why at this point ive looked up and concidered all i think i can, and i know at this point i still dont know all there is to know, i seem to have narrowed down a bit....
so im a little bit confused at all iv learned reticently about signal, preamps, coax, and everything else involved in this new Hobby..HELP. .lol
thank you in advance for taking the time to read my lil problem...
73
N
At distances like that from the towers I would definitely be looking into a directional antenna and good pre-amp. I use these antennas for 2 edge reception at 42 and 57 miles. 
