Need Advise for OTA Antenna

[prezdisher]

Hey guys. Need some help from the more experienced HD OTA Antenna gurus please.

I live in Lexington, NC and my locals all come from the Greensboro, NC market. DISH does not offer my locals in HD yet, so I am wanting to go with the OTA route. I checked antennaweb, and it lists me as around 22-23 miles away from all my towers except the NBC tower which it lists as 32 miles away. For everything but FOX, it lists me as needing a yellow-uhf antenna. But for FOX, it suggests a red-uhf.

Using this information, what antenna would you guys suggest? I have called around and was told the Winegard Squareshooter would get everything great except maybe FOX, which is listed as red-uhf, but is only 22 miles away. Do you guys think I could get even FOX with the Squareshooter based on those numbers?

Also, has anyone actually ever had DISH do the antenna install as mentioned in the thread in these forums? I did not know if they will even put one up for me in my market.

Any help would be great. Thanks!

 

[prezdisher]

BTTT. Can anyone answer whether or not the Squareshooter will pick up my FOX affiliate, which antennaweb lists as red-uhf? Thanks again. Trying to get this done this week before I miss any more OTA football in HD.

 

[barrysb]

BTTT. Can anyone answer whether or not the Squareshooter will pick up my FOX affiliate, which antennaweb lists as red-uhf? Thanks again. Trying to get this done this week before I miss any more OTA football in HD.

The antennaweb list will give some indication of antenna size but will not account for every possible signal interference condition you might have at your receiving location.

The best way to check local conditions is to look at the analog signals your local stations are transmitting near the frequencies of the digital stations. Using a standard analog receiver and rabbit ears, look at your local analog UHF channels and check for snow (weak signal) and ghosts (signal reflections). If these are present on any of the UHF channels, hookup a larger more directional antenna, then check again. Experiment with antenna location, direction and height . When you finally get good looking analog channels, hookup your ATSC receiver and check digital reception. You probably won't have to do anything else to get great HDTV images.

Hope this helps.

 

[Hall]

antennaweb errs on the side of caution so I wouldn't worry too much about that FOX station showing up as needing a different antenna.

It's possible that your FOX station is operating at lower output currently too but that will change by Feb 2009. Of course that's a long time to wait too in case it doesn't come in at all or has a lot of breakup.

 

[prezdisher]

Thanks for the responses. I have already verified that my FOX affiliate is already broadcasting digitally if that is what the Feb 2009 comments refers to. That being said, hopefully only 22 miles away the Squareshooter would pick all of the 4 main locals good.

Has anyone had DISH actually do the OTA install as mentioned in one of the pinned threads at the top?

 

[Hall]

No, it takes a lot of electricity to power (2) transmitters. They're still running their analog transmitter, which is their bread and butter, so it gets more attention, money, power, etc. They of course have to have their digital transmitter "testing" but can devote less attention, money, power, etc to it.

 

[digiblur]

Hey guys. Need some help from the more experienced HD OTA Antenna gurus please.

I live in Lexington, NC and my locals all come from the Greensboro, NC market. DISH does not offer my locals in HD yet, so I am wanting to go with the OTA route. I checked antennaweb, and it lists me as around 22-23 miles away from all my towers except the NBC tower which it lists as 32 miles away. For everything but FOX, it lists me as needing a yellow-uhf antenna. But for FOX, it suggests a red-uhf.

Using this information, what antenna would you guys suggest? I have called around and was told the Winegard Squareshooter would get everything great except maybe FOX, which is listed as red-uhf, but is only 22 miles away. Do you guys think I could get even FOX with the Squareshooter based on those numbers?

Also, has anyone actually ever had DISH do the antenna install as mentioned in the thread in these forums? I did not know if they will even put one up for me in my market.

Any help would be great. Thanks!

I'd stay away from the Scrapshooter.

 

[skyviewmark]

Well, I have towers that are 35 miles away from me and my Winegard amplified batwing brings in every station in my area perfectly. And it's mounted in my attic. I am sold on this little jewel. Its a GS2200 Bi directional antenna

 

[gdarwin]

Try the antenna in my sig. At that distance it should pull all of them in.

 

[varcieri]

ota antenna for hd

I too, need advice on OTA antenna - our tv towers broadcast from 2 different directions - some east some west - and I can't seem to adjust it to get all the staions well, just a few well. Football is on my WEAKEST channel, so I am trying to figure out what to do. Have a pretty good sized roof top antenna. Also - why can I get more channels on the OTA plugged direct into my HDTV than running through my dish 622 vio receiver?

 

[Hall]

You probably need a rotor.

 

[Jim5506]

I too, need advice on OTA antenna - our tv towers broadcast from 2 different directions - some east some west - and I can't seem to adjust it to get all the staions well, just a few well. Football is on my WEAKEST channel, so I am trying to figure out what to do. Have a pretty good sized roof top antenna. Also - why can I get more channels on the OTA plugged direct into my HDTV than running through my dish 622 vio receiver?

Give us your zipcode so we can give you informed info.

 

[oljim]

CM 4228 is much better than the crapshooter or any ant with a name, and stay away from TERK

 

[prezdisher]

Hey Guys. Back to my original question. I am dumb when it comes to antennas. Will it matter if my local ABC affiliate is channel 45? Will the Squareshooter still pick it up even though it is UHF?

 

[digiblur]

Hey Guys. Back to my original question. I am dumb when it comes to antennas. Will it matter if my local ABC affiliate is channel 45? Will the Squareshooter still pick it up even though it is UHF?

Let me try again... DO NOT BUY THE SCRAPSHOOTER. You will be kicking yourself if you do.

I've replaced a few of them with CM4221's and CM4228's and you wouldn't believe the difference.

 

[oljim]

Let me try again... DO NOT BUY THE SCRAPSHOOTER. You will be kicking yourself if you do.

I've replaced a few of them with CM4221's and CM4228's and you wouldn't believe the difference.

And the 4228 and 4221 cost less than the crapshooter

 

[Gentleman]

Pardon me for jumping in on this thread, but my question is the 4221 or 4228 capable of receiving vhf high band signal, i.e. channels 7 thru 12, my local PBS is broadcasting on channel 11


Thanks
Bob

 

[skyviewmark]

All my digital locals are on UHF except for my fox station which is on channel 9. And my batwing (Winegard GS2200) picks them all up beautifully. Even the channel 9 on VHF, although their tower is only about 20 miles from me.. The rest are about 35 miles from me..

 

[digiblur]

Pardon me for jumping in on this thread, but my question is the 4221 or 4228 capable of receiving vhf high band signal, i.e. channels 7 thru 12, my local PBS is broadcasting on channel 11


Thanks
Bob

The CM4228 has the better vhf hi-band reception. I know a user that receives a DT signal on RF 8 with 98% signal quality and the tower is about 30 miles away.

Another location about 60 miles out has no issues receiving analog VHF 9, I was actually shocked at the quality.

I personally use RF 13 everyday with no issues on my CM4228.

 

[tstolze]

I am using this hung in my attic, I am around 30 miles from most transmitters. It is a Model U-75R from Radio Shack. At 29.99 not a bad deal either...