Antenna Advice Southeastern North Carolina (ZIP 28409)

[tmwsiy]

Hi, New Forum Member here...

I want to setup a digital tv antenna system for my home. I would like to support the following:

1 Vizio - VP-42HDTV
1 RCA - L26WD21
1 dual ATSC tuner card for pvr machine (yet to be built)
1 single ATSC tuner card for existing pc (yet to be bought)
2 fm tuners (one each at the location of the dual tuner card and the single tuner card)

I am also open to suggestions for tuner card brand/models too. I know in the past I have looked at Hauppauge cards.

If a directional rotating antenna is suggested, are there computer controllable (serial, usb, ip, etc) rotators?

Thanks in Advance for the help and thanks for the resource!

[tigerbangs]

Wilmington, NC is oyur TV market, and you appear to be about 22-30 miles from all of your TV transmitters. The weak link is WILM-LD, a low-power station that provides you with CBS. The other stations in town are all high-power, and put considerably more signal into your area than does WILM. I don't think that you are going to need a rotator, but you are going to need a high-gain UHF antenna that has enough horizontal beamwidth to take in WILM, which is slightly to the north of the other Wilmington transmitters. I would look at an Antennasdirect DB-4, which should be mounted on your roof, aimed at 275-280 degrees by your compass. All of your locak digital stations are on UHF, so this is a good-low-cost solution for you. Run the coaxial cable output of antenna to a Winegard HDA-200 amplifier, which will give you enough signal to power three+ tuners. Run the output of the amplifier to a high-quality 4-way 1 gHz or better, and run those cables to your tuners. As for your FM, I suggest that you use a Pico-Macom UFSJ UHF-VHF antenna joiner to combine the UHF antenna with an FM antenna. If all of your stations lie in one direction, then consider a uni-directional antenna like an AntennaCraft FM-6, which has good gain and decent construction quality. If your stations come from all over the place, as most FM stations tend to do, then pick up a vertical whip-style antenna like a Magnum-Dynalab ST-2, and mount it on top of the mast on which you mount the UHF antenna, run the coaxial cable from the FM antenna to the VHF input of the Pico-Macom UFSJ, and run the output of the DB-4 into the UHF input of the UFSJ. distribute your FM using thesame cable as you do for TV, and you should be just fine.

http://www.antennasdirect.com
http://www.winegard.com
http://www.picomacom.com
http://www.antennacraft.net
http://www.magnumdynalab.com

[tmwsiy]

Thanks so much for the reply, what a great resource!
I am ready to move on this purchase but I am still a little confused.

The DB4 that you recommend says strong performance across UHF (channel 14-69). Then I look on antennaweb results and see that some of my stations are listed as lower channels (3.1 and 6.1 for instance) but then the color coded zone box still says UHF. Am I missing something? Is this antenna designed to pick up those stations as well? I am also interested in picking up the ION station which is 35.5 miles. Would a pre-amp help this situation at all?

I would prefer to not deal with the complexity and cost associated with a rotator and directional antenna, but I also want to insure I am able to get a strong signal.

If I have just two tuners (I have purchased an HD homerun box) and still want to have FM do I need to still use an amplifier?

I think that the omni-approach to the FM makes sense however if the furthest station I want to hit is 20 miles would I be satisfied with something like the AntennaCraft FMSS or similar?

Would a pre-amp placed after a diplexor help both FM and UHF signals?

One last one: Can you give purchase link for the Pico-Macom UFS? Google is not coming up with it for some reason.

Sorry for all the questions at once, trying to understand this stuff

[tigerbangs]

Understand that channels listed as 3-1 and 6-1 are VIRTUAL channels: they are placeholders for the actual digital signal. Your channel 3-1 is actually on channel 46.1 and your channel 6-1 is really on channel channel 44.1. Anything that you should be able to receive locally is on UHF.

If you go to http://www.picomacom.com and find the UFSJ, you will see a link for ordering them: they are about $14.00 shipped to you.

I am not a fan of omnidirectional FM antennas, but the Antennacraft FMSS should work fine if your stations are less that 20 miles from you.

Yes, I would use an amplifier like the Winegard HDA-200 if you plan to power 3 tuners: the line and splitting losses that you will face could compromise your reception on CBS if you don't use one. I don't think a preamplifier is necessary in your situation, but you could substitute a Winegard HDP-269 preamplifier for the HDA-200 if you like.

[tmwsiy]

Thanks so much for your help!