A Plea For Help (from You)

tigerbangs

Forget about those Channel Master Advantage line antennas; they are underperformers: Stick with the Channel Master Crossfire line, or the Winegard HD line ( HD-7084P) or a Wade Delhi VU-935 SR with the optional VU8PZ UHF powerzoom attachment. You can probably use a preamplifier where you are, and I suggest a Channel Master Titan 7777. Unlss you are also looking for the Burlington, VT channels, which may or may not come in where you are, then you probably won't need a rotator.

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Real men don't use indoor antennas; neither do real women!

dgcaste

wow! those antennas are huge and expensive. I guess there's no way out of that is there! 130"+ booms aside, how do they stand to the weather up here? I think Radio Shack is selling some Wade Delhi antennas, but the name doesn't really show up I only recognize it by the VU-* model number. They don't have that specific model you mention, but do you think this one would be a decent investment (with a CM Titan2 preamp in-line of course)? http://www.radioshack.com/product/in...entPage=family

GeoffGK6

I figured it was better to post here than create a new topic. I bought an HDTV a couple of months ago (Samsung 5087) and after suffering without local HD...thanks Dish Network...I'm trying to figure out my best option for an antenna. I currently rent a condo, occupying the first and second floors of a three story building. Placing an antenna in the attic is not an option, since the people in the unit above me would probably not appreciate it. Mounting an antenna on the roof might be possible, but difficult. I do have a deck off the second floor that has a clear line of sight to the north, so I might be able to easily mount a smaller outdoor antenna there. My zip code is 06471, and the antenna web info for the stations I am trying to get is:

* red - vhf WTNH-DT 10.1 ABC NEW HAVEN 319° 11.2 10
* blue - uhf WVIT-DT 30.1 NBC NEW BRITAIN 7° 25.8 35
* blue - uhf WFSB-DT 3.1 CBS HARTFORD 11° 30.8 33
* violet - uhf WTIC-DT 31.1 FOX HARTFORD 7° 26.0 31

Any recommendations, or do I need to provide more information?

chumphr

I have a Westinghouse flat screen 32" LCD and a Dish network DVR. The problem is there are no HDMI, DVI or Component connections on the back of my DVR, so the best resolution I get is 480 thru the S Video connection. Is there something I am missing or need in order to get better resolution 780 or 1080? A convert or something? 31539 zip code

tigerbangs

Try posting this in the DISHTV thread: you are more likely to get a good answer there...

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Real men don't use indoor antennas; neither do real women!

Tower Guy

You should consider getting an HD DVR.

jap

I have read a lot of the different kinds of setups here and wish I'd found this particular forum sooner.

I have a Winegard 8200p with RS amp and rotator and I'm not completely satisfied with the results, especially on UHF. I was talking to some others on the deep fringe posting (I think) and of course the xg91 came up. I don't want to abandon the Winegard (It's brand New!). Considering the 8200p is a U/V/F combo, is it worth my while to add/combine the additional UHF antenna for high gathering of UHF signals or would there be no gain benefit at all.

Or maybe just changing out the amp to a better one. I just want CBS, columbus OH (21), and Ion Television, Hurricane WV (39) if possible.

45742

tigerbangs

My first reaction is to tell you to dump the Radio Shack amplifier and get yourself either a Channel Master Titan 7777 or a Winegard AP-8275 preamplifier, as the RS amps are notoriously noisy, and have been known to actually hinder digital reception rather than help it. As for adding an XG-91 to the HD-8200, I will leave that to Rick to answer: I haven't used that combination, but I know that HE has...

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Real men don't use indoor antennas; neither do real women!

jap

I've heard that RS is inferior, that's why i wish i'd found you sooner

Yea, sometimes a station will be so strong that it will just drop and then i have to twist the little gain knob on the amplifier all the way down, or fine tune it as necessary. Is that what you call noise?

tigerbangs

it could be, or it could be multipath: it's very hard to say: What's your zip code: it could be any of the above, but look at your TVFool readings will give us a better idea

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Real men don't use indoor antennas; neither do real women!

Rick0725

I got about a 10-15% improvement on UHF with the 91xg. For example, 76 VS 90 on signal strength from stations 60 miles away.

The hd8200p is mounted about 1' above the rotor and spaced about 4 ft apart. The hd8200 works good for both vhf and FM. I was never satisfied with the hd8200p either for vhf. the 91xg makes me more content I guess.


with a dual input preamp
hd8200p to vhf port
91xg to uhf port

with single input amp
the 2 antennas are combined with a pico uvsj or cm0749 uhf/vhf combiner and amplified off the combined signal input

if you are interested in fm suggest the winegard ca8800 fm/tv splitter with only .5 db insertion loss.

if you are not satisifed with the reception install the 91xg and a better preamp. you need to be mindfull of these stations close up when selecting a preamp.

yellow uhf WTAP 15 NBC PARKERSBURG, WV 59° 8.9 15
yellow uhf WTAP-DT 15.1 NBC PARKERSBURG, WV 59° 8.9 49

Attached Images

P1010079.JPG (33.9 KB, 21 views)

jap

so basically you abandon the uhf on the 8200p, as opposed to combining the uhf signals of both antennas -- which i would think would be hard to do considering the winegard only has one line coming out of it for all v/u/f signals ... I mean, how could you seperate out just the uhf anyway? That's really besides the point i guess.

What do you mean when you say be mindful of the WTAP station when selecting a preamp?? That's definetely my local news station... don't want to lose that.

btw, which way is forward with that xg91 -- i'm guessing the backside if the curvy thing and the front side is the narrow one.

Rick0725

I filtered off the UHF signal on my HD8200P and use the antenna only for VHF/FM. Leave the entire antenna intact and did not remove anything.

You would use a PICO UVSJ uhf/vhf combiner with a single input preamp. The cm7777 preamp is a dual input preamp and the vhf/uhf combiner is built into the unit and you would not need one.

for single input preamp
-HD8200P would be connected to the VHF port
-91 XG to the UHF port.
-Common out of UVSJ to the preamp to splitters to TV

The UVSJ will isolate the vhf signal from the HD8200P and Filter off the UHF Signal. And will isolate the UHF signal off the 91xg. Then combine the signal into a combined uhf and vhf signal onto one coax.

You can not use a standard 2 way combiner to combine the 2 antennas otherwise the 2 uhf signals from each antenna will interfere with each other. The UVSJ is inexpensive and can be purchased from solid signal when you purchase the 91xg. Separates and isolates VHF from UHF. Filters and mixes VHF and UHF signals allowing mixing of multiple antennas onto single cable.

http://www.solidsignal.com/prod_display.asp?prod=UVSJ

Front ---------------------> Back.

The only thing to look out for.

When you assemble the antenna the metal surface of each element faces forward with the plastic frame behind. There will be an arrow on top of the element facing forward. The coax goes from the balun straight back thru the screen loops around and attaches to the mast

installation instructions

http://www.solidsignal.com/manuals/9...structions.pdf

http://www.solidsignal.com/prod_disp...p?prod=AD-91XG

Rickfla

Received the Terrestrial Digital 91-XG today. Put it up at same height, (about 35 feet) as the RS U75R and tell you the truth its just marginally better than the RS. The analogs are a little better but the antenna is so directional I may be misjudging until I get a rotor and a pre-amp. There is a channel 40 south of here in Sarasota that I'd like to get off-air; the analog is a little better where its aimed now but still can't get the digital on channel 52. There are a lot of factors, the power of their digital transmitter is not that great I noticed (2880kw at about 600 haat.) The distance from here is 44 miles I believe it said on antennaweb. So that is a couple of things maybe. There is a channel 29 digital (500kw, 1200 haat) that comes in perfect that is 20 miles north of channel 52 digital. So the tower height and power may be all the difference here; maybe the pre-amp will help bring it in. There is a total of probably 60 feet of RG-6 alot of which is coiled up behnd the tv set that I haven't dealt with yet. So hope I'm making a hasty judgement about the antenna. Now I haven't played with this at all since putting it up, it came late this afternoon. the assembly was easy, all the directors are aimed forward like they are supposed to be by the arrow on the top. Maybe I expected too much until the final touches are applied with the pre-amp and rotor. Anyway, glad I've got it, now the fun begins.

smdp1

the xg91 is very very very directional...sometimes I have a hard time aiming it with the rotor....17.1 is 325kw at a distance of 102.5 miles and I can get it at 50% signal (30% is decodeable on mine) but i have to get it pointed just right to get it....3 or 4 deg off and it goes out so you will have to be right on the station to get it. Fortunately for me the tower is very stable and the rotor's brake is good so wind doesn't affect me that I can tell because if it were to wobble just a bit it would cause dropouts. Just to tell you about the test I gave the xg91, I held it in my hand standing in my front door and pointed it to Huntsville (58.5 miles) and could get all the digital with 60% signal with no preamp..but if i turned 10deg off, it got 0%....very very very directional....which is good here as I have 2 channel 33's only 30 deg apart one 50 miles out and the other 103 miles out....guess what....I can get them both just fine with this, but with my old RS I couldn't get doody on either because of cci

Also, did you tilt up the front?....I have mine tilted up about 12deg and it helps bunches....not sure why, but guess they must have expected it because they send them with a tilt bracket.

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my antenna is bigger than yours...lol couldn't resist