A simple and direct question, can this antenna do a better job than our trusty old CM42228 ?

Does anyone having any experience with it ?

Does the more thick yagis and the 2 orientable panels makes a real difference ?


http://www.zennodesign.com/s-4228.jpg

I wonder if Channel Master's legal department knows about these clone manufacturers who steal their trade names? This company uses 4228, and another infamous outfit renamed some of its products to the "______ Master" brand... :mad:

Anyways, all I can comment upon is the look of it. To me the hinged centre is bizarre, as it would cause more reception problems than it would solve. I don't think it was an antenna engineer who designed it. If anyone has detailed performance specs on this antenna please post them here.

zenno, you've posted oddball or unusual antennas here twice this week... :)

To me the hinged centre is bizarre, as it would cause more reception problems than it would solve.

It sure would!

The only reason I can see for a hinge there is to fold it up for more compact shipping.

Is this the "digi" bunch that is infamous for stealing stuff?

HTH

Mike

he he he....Nope i'm just the kind of guy that is open that all his options.

When i bought my CM4228, it was because so many people at work had already bought it and were already very enthusiastics. Digital OTA was new and exciting to me at the time, 3 years ago.

But now, since i enjoyed for a few years for most channels, a 100% picture quality but only a 60% signal strength, and this changes at night......I am now ready for more stability and increase (if that's possible for my locations, i live in east suburbs of Montreal).

Also, contrary to what i did for my Toroidal satellite dish, i didn't think it was that important to use good cables, and connectors for a simple uhf antenna, now i know better and, as many of you, i now want to grab as many dB as i could. Especially for that weak WVNY-22 and that second PBS station WCFE-57.

Also, if i could find something better than the 4228, i could use it for U.S. stations and keep my 4228 for local stations from Montreal.

Of course, but i know it's almost impossible, maybe i could get weak signals from Ontario. ; )

So that's my very very very commun story...in a nutshell.

Also, if i could find something better than the 4228How about building your own DBGH?

To clarify what i saw on their website :

http://www.zennodesign.com/3S-4228-over_800x600t.gif

For 3 reasons:

- I'm really not a handy man
- Difficulties to find the appropriate material
- i don't want to put on my roof something that look like a piece of crap because i made it

But, i'm always open to modify an existing antenna to increase it's performance.

:-)

Yeah, hinging it at 90 degrees is liable to cancel out signal from both directions. Looks like theyre using whiskers made from XG91 directors.

Hee hee, thanks to that diagram in Post #6 we have another candidate for this thread:

Wacky, Tacky OTA Gear (What NOT To Buy!) (http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=35083)

Nothing like marketer-engineering! :D

Glad to be of service......... ;-)

And i won't touch that thing.

Heh.. actually, what is shown in post #6 follows solid RF principles (http://www.hdtvprimer.com/ANTENNAS/ganging.html).
Whether or not their antenna designers did so, is another matter.

But if they did get the measurements right, then this could be quite useful.

Eg. here in Ottawa, where many folks have to aim at two towers with close to a 90-degree separation.

Cheers

Nice dually mount for an A/B switch solution, with 2 seperate 4 Bays pointed in different directions.

If anyone has detailed performance specs on this antenna please post them here

This looks IDENTICAL to an antenna on the website of the company-that-must-remain-nameless.;) Even the photos are the same. They claim 20-36dB of gain and F/B ratio of 22dB.

Heh.. actually, what is shown in post #6 follows solid RF principles (http://www.hdtvprimer.com/ANTENNAS/ganging.html).
Whether or not their antenna designers did so, is another matter.Exactly, the problem is that the diagram and the antenna bear no relation to each other. Take a bifurcated antenna like that and just try to accomplish what they're suggesting... no thank you!

I would love to see a 3D model of the reception lobes interacting as the antenna is folded and unfolded. I just would not want to have to repeatedly debug all the problems with that antenna up on a tower or rooftop.
Nice dually mount for an A/B switch solutionYep, that might be the only way to use that antenna, but the reflector of the inactive side would adversely affect reception from that direction. :eek:

This looks IDENTICAL to an antenna on the website of the company-that-must-remain-nameless.;) Even the photos are the same.Aha! That would explain everything wrong about this antenna! :D

A reminder about why we do not welcome that company and its crappy products at this site:

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showpost.php?p=828359&postcount=1

They also have a 4224HD (shown below) and the 2 bay version is a 4222HD. The 4224 has a gain listed at 10-13dB. I don't know what they were drinking/smoking when they put 2 of these together to make a 4228HD and figured it would have a gain of 20-36dB.

To be fair to whoever 3Star is, they don't list the gain figures anywhere, they are only that way on you-know-who's site.

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/picture.php?albumid=366&pictureid=1647

Ok, I'm confused:confused: Not only is the model number the same as the "other" brand, the reflector looks almost identical. Not only that, if you go to these guy's web site and look at the pdf's they provide, the "InstallGuide" is the same pdf you can download from those "other" guys and even still contains the "other" guys web site and address on page 1.

Oh, and about that hinged construction -- assuming that the hinge hardware doesn't affect standard 8-bay performance when it is arranged as a "real" 4228, then I could see one useful purpose for that hinge (other than for shipping as was suggested earlier in this thread), at least as it could apply to my situation. I mount my antennas in my attic. But the attic access is only 29" x 20". So folding over such a construction would allow the possibility of getting it through where as trying to squeeze a "real" 4228 is basically impossible. Currently I use a 4-bay I built -- works great.

Not only is the model number the same as the "other" brand, the reflector looks almost identicalActually many Chinese UHF bowtie reflector antennas have very similar reflector layout and contruction, along with the black plastic end caps. Think of it as the state of industrial design in China's antenna industry. What separates the different brands is usually the gauge of the reflector wire and bowtie elements. The CMs are notably beefier than the clones, as anyone can see in saveandreplay's showroom.So folding over such a construction would allow the possibility of getting it through where as trying to squeeze a "real" 4228 is basically impossible.That's a great point. :) Its not the intention of the design, but it is a nice side-effect.

As for the news that they are using CM's documents with no changes, I'm pretty disappointed to hear that.

The documentation/instructions etc that are provided with these cheap china made antennas are actually provided by the chinese mfg. They simply change the headings to suit the customer's retail/brand name and part number.

I was looking at the possibility of importing antennas last year from a china mfg and I had the option of name branding packaging and documents. Another option they offered was wire-cut or form-stamped elements. The form-stamped element designs are most popular in Australia. The cost of importing each antenna is $3 +shipping/etc., including the cost of custom name branding.

Note added : as I recall, the form-stamped elements are for channels 21 - 69.... the wire-cut elements are for 14 - 69.

BTW,.. Yes, the CM's come from the same mfg...

Stampeder..

No the EaglestarPro is similar but the bowtie's are not flat, they are round a much thiner. Not sure on the diameter but they don't look like that.
After all, the Antenna pic posted was of a DB8 sold and marketed by ******** Tech.
Personally, I would never purchase anything from them due to their return policy and the items that I did purchased, never worked correctly or at all.
The EaglestarPro's antenna's are a little more robust then the competitors but I find they work just as well as a CM4221 - old schoool.

I did perform a test with the elements folded down and to my surprise, I was able to get channel 4 which I wasn't able to when the elements were in the open position. ODD??. Seems my signal strength went from 50 % to 57% by folding the elements in. This was on a eaglestarpro DB4 X 2 side by side.