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Originally Posted by metcalfg
Lot of trees in the area of my yard, but a clearer view of the sky can be had from the other end of the house. Is it worth the trade-off to get the clearer view though I'll have to add 50 ft of cable?
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Hello and welcome!
There are many possible explanation as to why you're having difficulty with WKOP. Without knowing what is causing your signal degradation, it's hard to say whether moving the antenna will give you a net improvement or not.
My gut tells me that yes, you will probably see an improvement. Your signals are pretty close, so signal strength should not be a problem. It is more likely that signal
quality is your bigger problem.
Sometimes objects in the environment (e.g., walls, trees, neighbors' houses, tall buildings, hillsides, etc.) create extra signal reflections or "echoes" (used to show up as "ghosts" in the days of analog TV) that make their way into your antenna and to your TV. This "multi-path" signal is harder to decode than a clean line-of-sight signal. If the multipath interference gets bad enough, you might see pixellation or drop-outs in your signal.
By trial and error, you might be able to find another spot for your antenna that is picking up less multipath and thus delivering a cleaner signal to your receiver. Open areas that are clear of any obstacles usually work best, but every situation is different. It may take some experimentation to locate the "best" spot for your antenna.
You may also want to double-check your antenna construction. Make sure you've got the right element spacing, angles, connections, etc. Also make sure there are no shorts or open connections that that are not supposed to be there.
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Is there a significant difference between different antennas. I was thing about trying an Antennacraft® HBU22 or HBU33
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The HBU series of antennas are a great choice for your situation because of your channel line-up. The Winegard HD769*P series of antennas are also a good choice for channel 7-69 coverage.
The different sizes of antennas within these families definitely make a difference. Each step up in size usually comes with a couple more dB of gain across most of the spectrum. Your signals are very strong, so gain is not the most critical factor in your setup.
However, gain can help in high multipath situations if that is one of the problems in your environment. Higher gain antennas have tighter beam patterns (gain and "directionality" of an antenna are closely related). Tighter beam patterns can help screen out some of the unwanted extra signal paths (coming from different directions) before allowing them to reach your receiver. If this cleans up the signal, then your receiver should have an easier time decoding channels.
Between Antennacraft and Winegard, it doesn't make that much difference which product you use. Winegard has a slightly better reputation for build quality and design (and they're a little more expensive too), but both companies make pretty high quality antennas, and I don't think you'll have any problems going with either one. The HBU family of antennas starts out smaller (HBU-22) than the smallest Winegard antenna (HD7694P), so just keep that in mind when trying to make apples-to-apples comparisons.
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Is an amplifier an amplifier, or is there considerable variations there, as well?
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There can be very big differences in amp quality. The most important figure of merit is the Noise Figure of the amp. This is how much noise the amp itself adds to the signal in the process of boosting things to a higher level. Lower Noise Figure is better. "Good" amps from the likes of Channel Master, Winegard, and Antennacraft have a Noise Figure of 3.0 dB or less. There are more expensive and harder to find amps that can have even lower Noise Figures (closer to 1.0 dB), and there are a lot of cheaper amps (or antennas with built-in amps) that have Noise Figures as high as 6-9 dB.
Your signals are so strong that you are probably better off without any kind of amp at all. One problem you might run into with an amp is overload. If the signals going into the amp are too strong, it can cause distortion in the output signal. An overloaded amp can make things worse rather than better.
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I care most about WKOP, the local PBS system, which is giving me the most trouble, but not consistently. Some nights it works great...other nights almost unwatchable. I'd really like a few major broadcast networks (I like NBC), but other than that, I don't really care
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All of your channels, including WKOP, are considered pretty strong. Hopefully, your difficulty is related to multipath and it can be resolved by simply moving or repointing the antenna.