Quote:
Originally Posted by ADTech
A couple of tips:
1. Antenna reviews are pretty close to useless for selecting the appropriate antenna for a given situation.
2. Marketing fluff, unfortunately, is pretty close to customer reviews as far usefulness in selecting the best-fit antenna is concerned. Ironic, isn't it?
3. The best fit for any given application depends mostly on you: What do you want to achieve, what will you accept as a minimum as success, how much of a learning curve are you willing to endure, how much expense and work are you committed to investing, and more.
Start by letting us know some of those details and we'll be happy to make recommendations and discuss the possibilities.
Here's my discussion of each of the antennas suggested:
1. Sky - lots of marketing fluffery but zero specifications. Cant analyze the performance of hype alone.
2. A very capable copy of our old DB2 antenna. Great for short-range UHF reception only.
3. A very capable, very durable, VERY LARGE all-channel antenna. However, you don't have any low-VHF channels to be received making all those long elements at the rear of the antenna useable only as bird roosts or for wind loading. They could better be put to use for something like beer cans, for example. :beer:
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BEER CANS FTW!!!
Thanks for explaining this to me.
My goals are to put just a little time into this project as I have so many other things to do.
I'd like to get as many stations as I can reliably if even for the heck of it.
Contradictory goals I am sure, but that is part of the fun I HOPE.
Budget....it's hard to say, but as long as I am beating the pants off of cable I'd be happy to put maybe $200-300 into an antenna.
As a rough *guess* it seems like Richmond, C-Ville, and DC stations aren't that hard to get (case in point my $5 antenna getting me 20 stations out in the boonies).
I'd really like to get some of the Baltimore or other Maryland stations because there is a large cultural divide which is reflected in TV programs between VA, MD, and DC and that cultural divide reflects my household pretty well.
I don't know if that is possible with B-More's distance and being roughly in the middle of DC and Richmond.
I'd like to ensure the highest level of reliability as well. Getting a station just sometimes would be fun for me, but it won't fly for the rest of the household.
I hope this helps!