What type of antenna do I need?
Reliable reception for all television frequencies used in the Binghamton Area which now only include upper band VHF and UHF band generally requires a conventional looking directional VHF/UHF antenna on the roof. One having excellent front to back ratio pointed at our tower located on Ingraham Hill in the Town of Binghamton, NY.
In most cases a rooftop directional antenna designed by its manufacturer for all the actual frequencies available in a given viewing area will provide excellent reception when pointed in the direction of desired transmitters. A couple of factors for selecting antenna size include viewer household distance from transmitter and surrounding terrain. Medium directional antennas are fine for most residential addresses close to the transmitter. Large directional antennas are needed for further distant addresses. Deep fringe addresses may also need a pre-amplifier mounted on a large directional antenna. Using a larger antenna than required can overdrive your receiver causing an unwatchable picture. Amplifiers if installed when not necessary will cause even greater reception problems. Some difficult locations may find that a separate VHF antenna along with a separate UHF antenna each optimized for the desired channel bands may be necessary.
Omni-directional antennas will by their design also pick up delayed and multiple reflections of the desired target signal especially bad in the Binghamton Area's rolling hills. These reflections will present reception problems for both analog and digital television broadcasts. In the case of digital these signal reflections will reduce desired signal gain and can null out certain frequencies that are at threshold levels. In analog the signal reflections will produce multiple or ghost images of the signal visible on the screen.
What about indoor antennas?
Overall, indoor antenna use is much less reliable due to factors of building attenuation, lower elevation and signal noise. Indoor antennas have an average gain of - 1.1 dB, which is actually a loss about 10 dB below the FCC's calculated baseline, which assumes households will be using an outdoor rooftop antenna.
Which Converter box is best for me?
People have different feature preferences, here is a link comparing features of Coupon Eligible Converter Boxes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_CECB_units
Please note:
The Zenith DTT900, Zenith DTT901, and Artec T3A Pro have proven reliable in our area.
Use this link to help with pointing a unidirectional antenna from your address.
http://www.antennaweb.org/aw/Address.aspx
Here is link for a Winegard HD7210P, which is a great antenna (medium directional UHF/VHF with excellent front to back ratio) for all Greater Binghamton Area's if you fall in the yellow, green, lt. green or red reception zones as determined from the above link.
http://www.solidsignal.com/prod_display.asp?prod=ANWGHST
The FCC's revamped DTV web site is also designed to help consumers with questions about the DTV transition. www.dtv.gov
For more information, visit the following website.
http://www.dtvanswers.com
OR
CLICK HERE for a 30 Minute video with even more information.
