TV Fool - Last step, selecting my antenna

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Originally Posted by michelstlouis (Post 562)

should I get a bay or yagi antenna for my UHF?

Hello and welcome!

Yagi and 8-bay bowtie antennas give comparable gain in the UHF band. When compared directly to each other, you'll find that certain antennas might favor high, middle, or low channels better than the other. This might make a slight difference on some specific problem channels that you might have. If you don't have specific weak channels that require a little bit of extra gain, then overall, I'd generally classify both antenna styles as very similar.

Physically, the antennas are very different. If you are stacking antennas or using separate UHF and VHF antennas, I think that most people will find that the Yagi antennas are easier to work with. They are usually lighter and take up less space on a mast, and that makes it easier to combine them with other antennas. The reflector screens on 8-bay antennas makes them more of a wind load and makes them heavier, so that contributes to the stress on the mount holding the mast.

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What would be a preferable antenna setup ?
is 2 separate antenna is a god decision ?

Almost all of the top 20 channels in your list are coming from the south-east within about 20 degrees of each other. With this kind of arrangement, it should be possible to get all of the channels with one antenna and no need for an antenna rotator. The beam-width of most high gain antennas is roughly 30 degrees across, and that seems to be wide enough to gather most of the signals at the top of your list.

If there are channels outside that main cluster that are a high priority for you, then it's time to consider a rotator.

In your situation, I don't see much difference between using a single combo antenna vs. using separate UHF and VHF antennas. For lack of a good reason to do otherwise, I'd say that using one combo antenna is a easier/simpler approach. For a high performance full-band antenna, a Winegard HD8200U should do the trick.

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- a channel master 7777 pre amp

The CM 7777 is a good amp, but it's probably not going to be able to handle the strong analog broadcasts in your area. Too much signal will cause overload on the amp, which causes distortion on the signal, and ultimately makes things worse rather than better.

Things should get better after the Canadian analog shutdown (Aug-2011) because any analog transmitters that get replaced with digital ones should end up will much lower overall power than what you're seeing now (digital signals need less power to cover the same area).

A lower gain amp like the Winegard HDP-269 will have a better chance of avoiding overload. You might want to try the setup without an amp at first. If you need the amplification, you can add an HDP-269 later. A CM 7777 seems a little risky to me until the analog channels go away.

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- cable : 50 feet of RG11

FYI, RG11 does have lower loss-per-foot than RG6, but at 50 feet, the difference is only going to be about 1 dB.

RG11 requires special connectors to handle the larger diameter cable (if you're putting connectors on the cable yourself), has a larger bend radius, and adds weight/thickness to everything. RG6 is more commonly available, and is generally cheaper all around to work with. You'll have to decide if that 1 dB is worth the added cost / hassle of working with RG11.