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Old 4-Jul-2014, 1:34 AM   #25
Pete Higgins
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Join Date: Apr 2013
Location: California, 58 miles @112 degrees from Mt. Wilson
Posts: 83
RE: Difficult location 15 miles west of Seattle

kenj66,

I also live in the shadow of a mountain. My mountain is 3.5 miles from my house and is home to 1 full power UHF TV station and several high powered FM stations (plus numerous other communication services). I have to point my antennas right at those stations to get the 1 & 2 Edge LA stations 58 miles away. I have found two amplifiers that don’t show pronounced overload under these conditions. The first type is a PCT MA2-M + 15 dB cable drop amp. which is smaller but similar to what you already have (without the variable gain feature). These are ideal in mixed strong/weak signal environments because they are designed to work with the typically much stronger cable TV signals. I mount mine right at the antenna, and tape the connector's with electrical tape to whether proof the connections. I’ve had one tie wrapped to a pushup mast for 3 years and it’s performed flawlessly.

The other one is the RCA TVPRAMP1R that GroundUrMast recommended. They are cheap (<$25.00), have switchable dual inputs for combination or separate VHF/UHF antennas and also have a switchable FM trap to reduce overloading by FM stations.

Here is a link to my TV Fool report for comparison:

http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...1dda169109ca5c

Since you already have it, I would definitely recommend using the PCT MA-B1015-1A-VG @ your antenna.


When you get your antenna all setup check out this link:

http://www.highdefforum.com/local-hd...r-10-00-a.html

I bought one of the RTL2832U + R820T DVB-T Software Defined Radio (SDR) USB Tuner cards (for $8.72 from China) just after the first of the year and had so much fun with it that I bought two more (a pair & a spare?). They tune from ~22 MHz to 1.7 GHz and mine works really well just hooked to my TV antennas through a splitter. I use a free open source wide-band spectrum analyzer software program with it called RTLSDR Scanner. It has proven invaluable comparing different antenna & amplifier configurations. See the attached for a low res version of what it can do.

Even more fun is a program called SDR# (read SDR Sharp). This application also offers a Spectrum Analyzer display but additionally, can produce a Waterfall display or can simultaneously display both. When you see a signal on the FFT you can click on it, automatically tuning to it and opening the audio channel. It also lets you store frequencies (in groups) for later recall. I’ve already created groups for FM Broadcast, Weather Radio, VHF & UHF Air bands (I live 4 miles from March ARB), 10 Meter Ham band and 6 Meter, 2 Meter 220 and 440 MHz Amateur repeaters. This amazing program also demodulates CW, AM (including DSB, LSB & USB) and both Wide (FM broadcast) and Narrow band FM (police, fire & Amateur radio).

I use it all the time for listening to FM radio on my computer.
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