[mythtv-users] OTA and attic antenna

[William Powers]

On Oct 3, 2012, at 11:14 AM, Marc Paré <marc at marcpare.com> wrote:

> I am considering moving from cable to OTA and was wondering if any on this list would have any recommendations for an attic antenna. 
> 
> All of my PC TVCards are analog and it's time to move to digital. I am hoping to go with OTA with an attic antenna running to HDHomeRun (my linux box only has PCI slots, so this seems the best option) with MythTV.
> 
> Any advice would be appreciated.

Are all of the important channel antennas located in the same direction or all over the compass?  In the latter case you may need a rotor.  Check antennaweb or your local equivalent.

Are all of the important channels in the UHF band or do you have any in the VHF-High band?  If the latter, you won't be able to get away with any old UHF antenna.  The eight bay bow-tie recommended earlier is actually quite good in the upper part of VHF-High but it degrades rapidly down around channels 8 and 9.  That is the antenna I have in my attic but the local PBS station is on channel 8 and I had to get an LP VHF antenna plus a combiner to bring it in.

How far away are your transmitters?  Analog OTA degraded relatively gracefully compared to digital which works great right up to the point it doesn't work at all.

Will the antenna be looking through roofing or siding?  The latter works fairly well.  The former not so much.

How many times will you be splitting the signal?  If the signal is weak to begin with, you can kill it by splitting it too much.  If you need a distribution amp, get a good one and don't assume more powerful is better because you can easily overdrive a tuner.

There are PCI digital tuners but I recommend the HDHR anyway.