New to HDTV in Charlotte 28269

[TvWare]

I'm new to HDTV and live in the 28269 zipcode of Charlotte, NC. I don't expect any hills or large structures to be an issue. I just want to be able to get all the major networks. I am going to use it with a HDTV dual tuner card on my PC with Windows Media Center. It needs to fixed antenna since I could record any two stations at one time. I would also prefer a non powered solution that I could maybe add a powered distribution at a later point if I add more drops. I would love for it to work in my attic, but I an prepared to put it outside if I need too.

Thank you for any suggestions!

[tigerbangs]

Because there are two transmitter locations in Charlotte, we will need to use one very broad-beamwidth UHF antenna like a Channel Master 4220 or a AntennasDirect Clearstream 2 mounted on your roof. While you might be able to get away with mounting it in your attic, you risk some nasty multipath issues if you mount there. You will need to aim at 200 degrees: midway between the two sets of transmitters so the one antenna will see both sets of transmitters. If you attempt to mount indoors, I can almost assure you that you are going to see some dropouts from multipath. All of your stations are on UHF except channel 11, WTVI-DT, which is a PBS station. I suggest that we use a separate VHF yagi like an AntennaCraft Y5-7-13 aimed at 125 degrees if that station is important to you. Combine the two signals using a Pico-Macom UVSJ UHF-VHF antenna joiner, and you should be in good shape to power one TV tuner: more TV sets are possible if we design a proper distribution system for you.

[dullgeek]

I lived in 28269 about 3.5 years ago. And at that time, I could receive almost all of the local digital broadcasts with a simple dipole antenna mounted to the wall behind my TV. This was on the bottom floor of a 2 story house. I eventually constructed the coat-hanger bow tie antenna for which I found instructions on YouTube. And I had no problems at all. I never mounted it externally. It was just stuck behind the TV and I got all of the local stations. I could not get the Rock Hill PBS station, but I got all of the local Charlotte stations. FWIW, I lived in Davis Lake.

The back wall of my house happened to be roughly perpendicular to the transmitters up near Stanley, which were roughly 30-ish miles away. So leaning my coat hanger antenna against that wall ended up optimizing it for those antennas. Experimentation suggested that those were the ones to concentrate on. The antenna array that was in the south university area, and the one over in Concord I could pick up no matter which direction the bow ties were lined up.

From my experience, a bow-tie antenna without a reflector should work well. If you mount outside with a short cable run, you should be able to get everything in Charlotte.

Given how close the antennas in the University area and Concord are, you could try a ClearStream 2 pointed at the Stanley antennas and hope that the back end will pick up the other ones. I currently live in Harrisburg and I'm using the ClearStream 2 pointed at the Stanley broadcasts. The back end actually does pick up some stations from Greensboro (not all). If I point the antenna at Greensboro, I get all Greensboro, but then lose the Charlotte NBC affiliate. So I'm pointing it at Stanley and taking the few redundant Greensboro stations as a bonus.

$0.02