60 miles from broadcast towers...

 

Tim the HD Hopeful
Unregistered guest
I live in a rural part of KY about 52 and 54 miles from 2 of the broadcast towers I would use to receive OTA high def. I was wondering if anyone had used the DB8 from antennasdirect.com. I need the strongest antenna I can get because I live on a 5 acre wooded lot in an area known as "The Bottoms" because of it's flat low lying ground. If anyone has recommendations for a strong antenna I would love to hear them. Thanks for any help you can give.
 

grfunk
Unregistered guest
What TV stations are you trying to get? If you are down low, you might have a very hard time. Are you getting these TV stations' analog signals?
 

Bronze Member
Username: Toolmaker

Providence, RI

Post Number: 20
Registered: Sep-05
Tim,

I have the multi-directional $39 (DB2) sold by antennasdirect.com, and it is great. I am pulling in 6 HD stations that are 42 miles away, and I'm receiving a signal strength of 7-8 on those stations. My Samsung rates an incoming signal from 0 to 10. Zero is no signal, and 10 is the strongest. A signal rated as low as a 2 will usually lock, and when locked will look just as good as a signal that is rated at 10.

Unlike analog broadcasts, a stronger digital signal doesn't mean a better picture, you just have to lock onto the signal. Because of this, my (DB2) antenna rated at 10-30 miles analog, seems to be good up to 50 miles digital. The next model up, the $59 (DB4) may be good enough for you, and the (DB8) I would guess, would probably be good to 100 miles.

My antenna is mounted about 3 feet above my roof peak (20 ft. from the ground), and is mounted permanently due North for my location. I have a few 30 ft. trees just 10 feet away to the left, and a forest full of 40-50 ft. trees a few hundred feet away, surrounding my neighborhood on 3 sides. Our neighborhood is cut into the side of a wetlands forest. Still, I am receiving 14 HD and 18 SD channels. I am not in a very low area, as compared to the towers that I am receiving from, but antenna height does make a difference. If I put the antenna at ground level, I either lose completely or have an unreliable signal from half of these channels. Of course, having a forest full of trees all around me, doesn't help.

The nice thing about these antennas, are that they are somewhat directional, but will still receive channels from other directions. Some others with directional antennas have complained that though their antenna will receive a channel 100 miles away in one direction, it can't receive a channel in another direction that is only 10 miles away, so they have to either keep turning the antenna, or they end up buying a multi-directional, too.

If they had of bought a DB2, DB4, or DB8 first. They may have found that they didn't need a directional antenna to begin with. As you can tell, I am more than pleased with my $39 (DB2), which has a better reception than my neighbor's $99 Terk. If you buy the (DB4 or DB8), let us know how you make out!

 

TonyM
Unregistered guest
Tim,
The DB8 is a UHF antenna. I don't know what stations you are planning on picking up but that will not work for a low VHF channel digital station. I have channels 4 and 13 to deal with and I could get 13 on a UHF antenna but not 4. Most of the digital channels are UHF but there are some low VHF channels out there.
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