ota hdtv question

[digital223]

if one lives in an area capable of receiving ota local channels sdtv,
and also has a hdtv with atsc tuner, what type of antenna is needed to receive ota hd reception, and will the pq be ghost free?

[Geronimo]

THe antemnna is no different. But the digital version amy be at a different location on the dial. Normally UHF but not necessarily.

[Slordak]

Assuming you have a reasonable quality VHF/UHF antenna, and you are capable today of receiving your analog stations over the air with reasonable quality (i.e. they come in reasonably well), you should have no issues receiving the digital versions of these stations with the same antenna.

If you are close to the transmitters (i.e. within 10 miles), you may want an antenna which is good at multipath / ghost rejection. On digital television, poor reception won't cause the image to ghost, it will just cause the screen to be black with no audio or video.

[jgoggan]

That may be a pretty big assumption in many areas. Two of the three networks in my area are broadcasting on significantly smaller power for their digital broadcast than analog. I pick up their analog signal just fine from 40 miles away. I can't get their digital signals at all. I've called both and asked about power and both told me they were "just broadcasting digital for the local city where the tower is" until forced to do more "maybe in 2005 or 2006."

I would recommend that he at least start with www.antennaweb.org and/or www.titantv.com and see what they say about digital broadcasts in his location. (Although, AntennaWeb's new formulas are a bit too conservative, IMO.)

- John...

[digital223]

thanks guys,
ghost rejection and pq, presently my ota sdtv reception on a scale of 1 to 10,
is around 8 to 9 on most channels including uhf channels.
one benny of living in a big city. :)
i should have no probs when i hook up a hdtv.

[Mike500]

Here is a really interesting site on HDTV and HDTV antenna reception;

http://www.hdtvprimer.com/ISSUES/erecting_antenna.html

This guy is really good. I've installed antennas for over 40 years, and I didn't know some of the things he mentioned. And, it's not too technical, either.

[Slordak]

In this case, though, the question was about an antenna which was already installed, and whether or not the same antenna would be usable for HD / digital OTA. Based on what Digital223 indicated, I would say that yes, he should probably be able to get most of the digital OTA channels in his area without issue.

Jgoggan does make a valid point that oftentimes the digital transmitters are not operating at full power, so that this can negatively impact reception ability. One other thing to note is that channels which were VHF for analog can be UHF for digital, and vice versa as well!