Well, as most here on these boards already know, local network HD's thru E* are VERY limited and it seems that E* is in no rush to get them to us. For those of you who live in a fairly decent sized DMA, you're probably lucky in the fact that you have OTA HD's available to you.
Not so in my case. I'm at a zip of 05773, in a valley, and the terrain sucks for OTA signals. I'm 78 miles from the Albany New York towers, and 74 miles from the Burlington Vermont towers. All my research led me to believe that I was never going to get anything OTA. I've spoken with a number of station engineers and so called knowledgeable people who swore up and down I wasn't going to be able to get anything via an OTA antenna due to distance and terrain issues.
Well, after nearly 3 months of research, I managed to get an antenna up on the roof this past weekend. It was a $150 dollar investment in my book. At this point I'd rather be out $150, instead of giving E* one more red cent of my hard earned cash for the honor of upgrading equipment and subscribing to a higher priced HD package that I could care less about! I figured if it didn't work, I could always sell the equipment fleabay, or keep it for the next home I purchase...In a bigger DMA of course.
Any way, I got the equipment up this past weekend, carefully aimed for the Burlington towers....AND low & behold I'm able to pull in WPTZ-NBC in glorious HD!!!! 1 out of 4 networks. Now keep in mind I'm 74 miles away from the towers in really crappy, hilly, heavily wooded terrain! I still have a little more tweaking to do in an attempt to get the other networks, but hell, it's a start. Even if I can't get the other networks it's still worth every penny in my book....not having to go thru, wait for, or rely on E* for local network HD's!!!
Not so in my case. I'm at a zip of 05773, in a valley, and the terrain sucks for OTA signals. I'm 78 miles from the Albany New York towers, and 74 miles from the Burlington Vermont towers. All my research led me to believe that I was never going to get anything OTA. I've spoken with a number of station engineers and so called knowledgeable people who swore up and down I wasn't going to be able to get anything via an OTA antenna due to distance and terrain issues.
Well, after nearly 3 months of research, I managed to get an antenna up on the roof this past weekend. It was a $150 dollar investment in my book. At this point I'd rather be out $150, instead of giving E* one more red cent of my hard earned cash for the honor of upgrading equipment and subscribing to a higher priced HD package that I could care less about! I figured if it didn't work, I could always sell the equipment fleabay, or keep it for the next home I purchase...In a bigger DMA of course.
Any way, I got the equipment up this past weekend, carefully aimed for the Burlington towers....AND low & behold I'm able to pull in WPTZ-NBC in glorious HD!!!! 1 out of 4 networks. Now keep in mind I'm 74 miles away from the towers in really crappy, hilly, heavily wooded terrain! I still have a little more tweaking to do in an attempt to get the other networks, but hell, it's a start. Even if I can't get the other networks it's still worth every penny in my book....not having to go thru, wait for, or rely on E* for local network HD's!!!
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