Actually, most stations are broadcasting on the UHF band. So those antennas with the long elements are no longer needed. There are guides to show if any stations in your area are on VHF but most are not, almost none.
Since almost all of the digital OTA stations are on the UHF band, one no longer need those huge antennas. You will find antennas in a range of prices; the prices depend on the quality of the antenna; you want it to be able to stand up to rain and snow and heavy ice build up, and the dB gain of the antenna, the higher the gain the better the reception; you can pull in more distant stations. I would recommend getting an amplifier to go along with the antenna since UHF can be attenuated by leaves and rain and snow.
I have an amplified indoor antenna called a Mohu Leaf and get 37 channels. Dropped the satellite over 3 years ago. My first antenna recently started going bad so I replaced it with another (same as original brand) and get even more channels than before. I placed the new antenna in a window inside the house. I'm considering getting an outside antenna, though. It would supposedly stabilize the signal so I wouldnt drop channels near as much. I'm not sure it's worth the extra expense and aggravation, though.
Any outdoor antenna will work better even if it's omnidirectional , lot of different ways to mount them
Not really. The old VHF antennas needed to be wide and long (horizontal) to pick up the long wavelength of VHF frequencies. Kinda like a CB antenna needs to be 8 feet. Since the big digital transition, most channels now use UHF which does NOT require such wide and long arms to pick up the signal. Instead, when you want better UHF reception for distant stations you end up with a taller antennae. They stay under a few feet wide but end up 6 feet tall like a door. You don't need near as much attic real estate to mount one of these as you did a big VFH monster that could be 10 feet wide and long. I recommend and use channelmaster antennas from online. They are cheap and high quality. For mostly UHF with some high VHF channels the DB4, DB6, or DB8 are excellent. I own the DB4 or 6, I forget. It works superbly from in my attic for channels about 40 miles away. I also made a DIY UHF antenna with copper wire and use it in my shop for the TV out there. It works great too but you may as well buy the commercial product.
Old units were UHF and VHF combined- you could just use the UHF portion ( I think that is called a Yagi type, somewhat directional -Section with short elements) and eliminate the rest as generally they were a parallel feed anyway. CB - 27 meg cycles - apx 11 meter full wave length , 9ft was generally accepted as 1/4 wave length for cb usually with a coil to make up the difference- sometimes adjustable tap on coil for tuning purposes
Do it. We have a couple Roku boxes, with A Netflix subscription and we don't miss it.(none of us are big sports geeks) We share Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Hulu costs amongst our family (3 households locally) and it works for us. There are a few shows I used to watch that I can't get anymore but lately I haven't had much time for TV.
I get the impression you know a fair bit about this. I put a up a digital ota to replace an attic unit that lost a great deal of reception due to a metal roof. I was told later that a nondirectional would have been a better choice, true? Also, the cable from the attena to the tv is 100', was told that at this length or above 50' an amp would also help? Also any tips on what to look for or look to aviod would be appreciated.
I cut the cord January last year and got a Mohu Sky 60 this past summer. I get 18 channels of dreck from 7 transmitters. it was 17 up until a little while ago when WCSH added Antenna TV on their sub channel 3. I'm hoping that WMTW and WGME add an other sub channel so I can get even more dreck. I also have Amazon Prime and Netflix. I dropped cable tv and internet phone service. My bill from TW went from $185/month to $55 It now costs me $17.01 for a land line which is actually cell service, and the Netflix is $7.99 for me for a bit longer. I already had Amazon Prime. So I dropped $110/month from my expenses. I did a few other things at the same time to reduce my electrical bill ( I got a new computer, a Smart TV, and replaced a few CFL's with Led light bulbs) saved $378 in electrical cost last year over 2013.
Yes, I studied electronics in college. New antenna's should be already wired for connection of a coax line; if I recall correctly, it should be 75 ohm coax. If you still have it inside of the attic under that metal roof, it is going to affect the signal. Most stations are now on UHF and UHF is more easily blocked; the different in the wavelengths of the signal. I don't think you would see that much line loss in the coax but good signal amplifiers are fairly cheap these days; some will come with a gain adjustments in case the signal strength after amplification is too high; I haven't noticed that on mine. I have rolling hills here and lots of trees with leaves. Better reception in winter of course than summer due to the leaves. Most of the digital antennas are directional to improve the gain; you have to point the antenna at the stations you want to receive. Some will have rotators like the big old yagi antennas. I have heard that some of the cheap digital antennas with rotors that the rotors give out quickly. If you think the price is too cheap with some of these Chinese made antenna it might be because they are. You don't need as heavy a motor with these lighter units but too cheap is too cheap. You could try gaining two antennas together, if you have lots of stations that are opposite each other. My converter box for my old analouge CRT TV has a scan for channels but you have to programme in the ones that are the other way by hand.
So i can get a spliter, and connect multiple antanna's to feed a single tv? Guess it really wouldn't be a spliter would it, more of a joiner i'd guess. The current cable to the antenna is a 75 ohm. Thanks to whoever listed the tvfool site, need to do some research...
Well Comet TV launches on October 31 and channel 23 (Fox) is testing their 3rd sub channel and will be carrying it from the looks of things so I have to update the number of channels to 19. Comet is like Sci-Fy for OTA. ETA: Program guide http://comettv.com/Comet-Schedule-2-Nov-2-8.pdf
I'm waiting for a couple of other transmitters to add a sub channel or two, one must compete in the dreck slinging contest. Besides it means you can show more commercials.
