OTA Antenna

do you mean they physically relocated the TOA antenna? I wonder why they would do that.

 

Yes, by all means;

Call DIRECTV and have them get the tech(s) back out there. They should never have messed with the OTA antenna.

 

Now I understand. not sure if calling would do any good as most installer do not have the necessary equipment to point an OTA antenna. Perhaps you can pay someone and have DirecTV reimburse you for the expense

 

No special equipment is required to point an OTA antenna. You aim it in the direction of the transmitters, and adjust the pointing if necessary for best reception. I assume you can tell the installer where the old antenna was located, and the direction it was pointed (or look up the direction in tvfool.com, and point it with the aid of google maps). I've done this a zillion times.

I would definitely call Direct tv and insist that they send the installer back. He messed with your personal property, without your permission.

You only mention losing sub channels. You lost the main channel as received OTA as well, correct? No amount of miss-pointing would ever cause you to lose the sub channels but not the main; the channels are all muxed together before transmission.

If you live in SW Florida, let me know. I'll come over and put your antenna back for you.

 

Will 1953 please report the status of his OTA?

 

I would assume he meant he lost the ota subchannels only since he likely gets the main channels from Directv.

 

I suspect there is a stealth policy to prevent subs from using OTA. No DVR in recent years has included an OTA tuner, and CSRs insist you don' t need it because they provide LIL. They used to provide an outboard OTA tuner for an extra $70 or so, and will tell you that you can order one, but none will ever be shipped. Seems like they think if you want OTA sub-channels you are some kinda nut and should be ignored. I ordered the outboard OTA Tuner from a D CSR and it never arrived. They did schedule a tech. to install it, empty handed, and said I was supposed to have bought one on-line via ebay! He also strongly felt that with all the LILs D provided it was un-necessary for me to have the sub-channels. Here in Los Angeles we have a huge population from all over the world with many different native languages. Our broadcast stations offer over 20 languages on sub channels. Also there are 4 educational stations here offering terrific programs on sub-chans. Annoying at best. D certainly owes you to restore your OTA antenna. I also remember that some cable companies has a sneaky little item in the contract that required their installer to remove any OTA antenna as a provision for you getting a free cable install. Nice to keep you from cancelling later!

Good luck!

Tony

 

Tonyn,

I sincerely doubt there is a conspiracy to deny people OTA,

 

Ridiculous.....I ordered and received one just last week.....They took it out because so few actually used it it made better business sense to take it out to reduce costs and sell it as an optional component. Because so few actually use them anymore very few CSR's will know much about them. Just go to your on-line account page and order it from the accessories section, it'll arrive in a couple of days and they are only $50 shipped via Fedex.

 

It would be nice if they made a modern version of the AM21 that wasn't so big. It was ridiculously sized when it came out, and even moreso today. You can buy ATSC/QAM tuners meant to connect to a computer that are not much bigger than a cigarette lighter which are powered through the USB port for as little as $25. Clearly it would be possible for Directv to replace the AM21 with something more convenient.

If I understand correctly, residential customers can't cancel their locals, or at least if they can they don't save any money doing so. That, and the fact they have left the AM21 as such a large box, which now dwarfs the footprint of the H25 and HR44, certainly demonstrates that they don't give a damn about people who want to use OTA. It may not be a conspiracy, but they don't seem to want to do anything to make it easier for those who prefer the higher quality OTA signals and/or the subchannels Directv doesn't deliver.

 

Again, it is not some grand conspiracy, or not caring. It is simply a matter of economics. They don't sell very many AM21s (which is hwy nearly no CSRs or Techs know what they are). It wouldn't make much sense for them to spend a ton of money to redesign, retool, and start manufacturing a different version to match the HR34, or HR44, much less the H25 or others. (The AM21 was designed to match the HR21,HR22, HR23 receivers, which it did quite well).

Most people now days that are that worried about getting the OTA channels are doing it so they can get rid of pay TV altogether. It doesn't help them much to have a DirecTV add on that they can't use if they don't have DirecTV service anymore.

That said I have two AM21s at my home now and they do get occasional use. It would probably get more use if I bothered to move my antenna to a better location, but so far I haven't felt the need to mess with it.

 

That makes no sense. Why would anyone call DirecTV for an AM21 and then cancel service? What good would that do?

 

None, that is exactly the point I was making. Most people that are really worried about getting OTA these days are the ones that are trying to get rid of pay TV altogether. For those people the AM21 is useless since it won't work if they get rid of DirecTV service.

People who are happy with pay TV tend to not care about getting OTA stations. Most DirecTV subscribers are perfectly happy with the local channels they get from the satellite, and they don't care about getting the others or the subchannels. That is why DirecTV doesn't sell many AM21s, and why DirecTV has no interest in making a newer smaller version.

 

As Beerstalker is trying to point out, the people on here are a very small and usually highly technical and informed subset of Directv customers. We are not anywhere near the norm....and lots of us use the AM21....but in the big picture, we are just a drop in a big pond and besides the initial sale of the AM21, Directv gets absolutely nothing monetarily out of providing an ATSC tuner for any of its devices.

 

I have indoor antennas hooked to each of my TV set ups ( 3 ), no AM21. I use them rarely when the rain blocks the signal.
My son was watching a football game on the local NBC station Sunday and it went out. Switched the input to the antenna and kept watching.
I did not need it then because I was watching a recording.

 

I myself just like the fact that the AM-21 puts your OTA stations in the channel guide and you can record shows to your DVR. The fact that in a snow or rain storm you can still receive your local stations. All good.

 

I record all my locals from the OTA version of the stations....never have to worry about missing a show due to weather, and never had to scramble to switch to the OTA version to not miss if there is a weather related outage.

 

We use an AM21 to record local news -- we are in the NYC DMA, but consider our local stations to be Hartford, since NY stations don't cover CT weather, politics, local sports, etc. We use OTA on our bedroom TV (and rarely, a modulated output from a DVR downstairs), and during power outages when it's more convenient than getting the DTV equipment on the generator. Knock on wood, that hasn't been an issue since Sandy.