OTA reception

[Chawver]

Ok.. Wow.. to much to fast I think...you all have me pretty well confused at this point ...so I have a few questions.. I am fairly new to all this.. I live in Southern Maryland.. the towers for my locals range between 40 to 50 miles from me..I do have tree's around my house, but do sit on top of a hill...I have D* and have the 811 reciever..Looking to get HD from the local networks.. I can get 4,7 sometimes, and 9 sometimes..have never been able to get 5..(90% of Redskins games are on 5 this year) most of the time when I do get the other channels I get a 60 to 62% signal strenght.. I have a Winegaurd HD9095 antenna and a AP4800 amp which sits on a two level house about 6 ft above the roof.. Any help to bring a better signal in and get Channel 5...

Charles

 

[Chawver]

Sorry.. I have dishnetwork.. not direct tv

 

[gdarwin]

Do you have the antenna on a rotator? I have the same antenna and have found it to be very directional. It needs to be pointing directly at the transmitter antenna.

 

[Chawver]

No I dont.. but even if I point it directly at 344 degrees which is the exact location from my roof.. I still get nothing....

 

[riffjim4069]

Chawver, I am down in the Fredericksburg area and receive programming from the DC at 55+ miles using my Channel Master 4228 UHF antenna w/CM-7775 preamp. Everything comes is pretty well, but I must admit that WTTG-DT (FOX 5) can cause me a little grief at times. In my case it's not a big deal since I have a 2nd antenna that receives all the Richmond VA stations, so I'll just watch the game on FOX35 in the rare case I am having trouble.

Ok, here is the problem: although FOX5 is broadcasting a max power (1000kW), there DTV antenna height is over 200ft. lower than WUSA-DT (9-1), WJLA-DT (7-1) and WRC-DT (4-1). The farther you live away from the tower the more adversely you are affected. Also, their DTV antenna is side-mounted and on the other side of the tower. So if you live out toward Winchester VA the reception is excellent, but if you live East and South of the city, again, your reception is less-than-stellar in you are on the fringe (or deep fringe in my case).

What can you do? Well, you can purchase a higher gain antenna (you already have a pretty good one) or you can raise your antenna a little higher. But there is good news, the folks at FOX5/UPN20 are going to co-locate their DTV antennas next year: UPN20 will finally move to their permanent tower and broadcast at full power and FOX5 will move their DTV antenna up the tower 200ft and move it to the other side of the tower by next summer. FOX5 should be coming in loud and clear in a few months.

However, if you can't wait...you could try using a CM-4228. I swear by them. Hope this info helps.