fringe antenna

[gracie]

Hello--We are in Quartzsite, az and with our rooftop antenna we get yuma ch 11, phoenix ch 10, 3, 15 and pb ch 8. Also we get Lake Havasue ch 36 and a ch 7 called az.

My question is, when I hook up the HD box, I get nothing. Channel 22 trys to come in, but that's all. Am I going to have to get another rooftop antenna? We do not want to go to the satilites such as direct or dish.

Our zip is 85346. Any ideas out there?

[tigerbangs]

When I run your zip code for potential TV reception, I get virtually nothing: you are about 130 miles from Phoenix and about 52 miles from Yuma. If you getting signals from Phoenix now, then they are probably snowy and pretty weak. I wonder what kind of antenna you are currently using? If you want to stay with an antenna, you will need the biggest and baddest deep-fringe antenna we can find for you if you want to see digital stations.

If there is any way that you can snap a picture of the antenna and give us your exact coordinates, as opposed to your zip code, that will be very helpful in getting you an antenna that will work for you....

[tigerbangs]

After thinking about this for a minute, I checked your analog reception and realized that you get your Phoenix TV stations from local translator stations, and not from the actual TV stations themselves. Those local analog translator stations come mostly from Blythe, CA, which is close-by. Unfortunately, they won't be in digital or high-def for quite a while. How is your reception now?

[gracie]

Thank you for the help--We have the biggest and their best antenna with their amplifier #15-2507. These are Radio Shack electronics.
We get channels Fox, NBC, CBS, PBS and 36 from Lake Havasue crystal clear.
Channels Yuma 11 and 13 are fuzzy, but watchable.
With a rotator All channels are clear. It's true we are receiving our signal from translaters at Gold Nugget hill about 12 miles east of Quartsite and there is another translater up near Parker AZ. Also one at Black Mtn near Yuma Az.
I guess my question is: what's going to happen to these translaters when HD is implemented. Apparently the translaters are not now changing to HD--what will happen when all TV is HD as far as the translaters are concerned?

Thank you for your help

[gracie]

I almost forgot, our Latitude is 33.667 and our Longitude is 114.2171
Lat=33 degrees, 40.0 min North
Long=114 degrees, 13.0 Min West

[tigerbangs]

You'll continue to get all the channels that you get now in analog, just as you always have gotten them. There is only a sketchy timetable for the converstion of translator stations to digital, so you should be able to continue to see Tv as you always have for some time to come. The conversion to digital is likely to be a local process in your area, so watch the local newspapers for specific information about the translators converting to digital, but, for the moment, I wouldn't worry too much about it...LOL