Broadcast Digital TV

Submitted by Bill St. Clair on Mon, 24 Nov 2008 21:02:03 GMT  <== Science/Technology ==> 

We live out in the boonies, at least 25 miles from the nearest TV station. We've had an amplified rabbit-ears antenna, with which we could get CBS, most of the time, and ABC, occasionally. We got one of those gummint coupons for $40 off of a digital TV converter box. So I got one at Radio Shack. With the rabbit ears, it was pulling in CBS and sports on channel 6, barely, ABC, weather, and Retro TV on channel 10, and three public tv offerings on channel 17, again barely. On Saturday, I bought an outdoor UHF antenna and 30db amplifier, again at Radio Shack, and got a 4 foot aluminum pole and some wire at a hardware store. The photo below shows it assembled. The amplifier has two parts, one on the antenna, pictured, and one that goes at the other end of the wire, near the TV. It works well. The 6 & 17 channels come in well now, and I've got two more stations with 6 more channels. Still no NBC or Fox, however. Hopefully those will come in when I get some grounding wire and move the antenna to the roof. No more ghosts! Digital is great. When it works.

Note: digital TV is all broadcast in the UHF part of the spectrum. VHF is going to be cleared of TV broadcasts when analog transmission goes dark in February of 2009.

TV Antenna

Add comment Edit post Add post