Reading the posts now
thank you

i will try to stack toword HC and see if this is enough to pull in CF
will post update tomorow

@tvlurker

the cf digitals do come in but only at about 30 when pointed to HC
but at over 80 when pointed at CF
and of course the analogues are no good

so you are aware i do not have a preamp
i am looking to buy one

What kind will you buy?

Should the pre-amp be connected at the antenna or down next to the tv receiver?

The Channel Master 7777 preamp is a nice low noise preamp which will work inside, in an attic or outdoors, and is deemed reliable. It has an included FM trap which is very useful in Ottawa, coupled with dual inputs which you can use for just 1 antenna or later for combining 2 antennas (1 UHF and 1 VHF).

Thanks flavoie. I may order one to see if I get better reception and possibly more channels.

You'll want it as close to your antenna as possible. The coax power inserter can stay inside close to your TV where a power plug is readily available, but you'll want to locate it before any splitters if those splitters don't pass power.

Thanks again. That's good to know. So the power source can be at the TV, but it sends power through the coax to the amplifier. That's cool. I don't have a power source in the attic so that would work. Are there any fire hazards or anything associated with these amplifiers?

@flavoie and tvlurker

i have followed your advice
1 antenna pointed to HC
aimed it for best quality there at HC
with this setup i get
cbc at about 65-70
sun at about 70-75
analogue is very weak
cbc french wont come in at all

i found a splitter that wont kill city from hc that has a loss of 3 on one side and 7.5 on the other
so i added a cheap antenna and attenuated it before inserting on the 7.5 side
this was just enough to add cb french at about 70-75 and slightly amplify the analogue but not affect HC at all




i will eventually setup on the roof
i have a 100mile 12 footer uhf/vhf/fm with tripod that I have been procrastinating on putting up as im worried about properly sealing the roof and grounding the anternna.

any advice on properly sealing and grounding?

any advice on properly sealing and grounding?When you have questions of that sort start in the main OTA Forum and scroll through the thread titles because we have existing threads that give you all the info you need for putting up a roof antenna and so much more. Here are the three most important ones for your situation:

OTA Mounts, Towers, Rigging Hardware (http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=29559)

OTA Waterproofing, Sealants, Adhesives, Paint, Enclosures (http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=104181)

Grounding Info & Standards: OTA/Dish/CATV/Telecom (http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=62265)

We keep those discussions separate from the Reception threads so that we avoid going over such great info all over again. :) Do you know the brand name and model number of your big VHF/FM/UHF antenna?

unfortunately i dont know the brand
and neither does the guy at work that i bought it from
there is no branding info on it at all

i do know that he was using it here in orleans and was able to pickup the us channels with it. so it's a decent antenna i think

Getting any non-local stations from a location north of St-Joseph ( down in the valley where you are, near the river) I think would be quite difficult. You don't even have line-of-site to Herberts Corners. Where in Orleans was your co-worker living when he got US stations?

He lives at top of hill
I dont expect to get the american stations at the bottom of the hill
I just meant to point out the antenna cant be that bad if it did pick them up

charettepa, if you post pictures of this big antenna if this thread, someone could help identify it.
http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=107706

Sorry got busy and havent' been back to check this forum in a while

stampeder - I live near baseline and prince of wales

flavoie - so all I need to run to the antenna is a single coax? That's good news if so!

Slim_511, grounding wire too if you put the antenna outside.
EDIT: that wire goes to a grounding rod and stays outside !

I have a cm 4228hd antenna mounted in my garage. It is picking up a signal well enough from one of the two nearest towers to me. However, because of the size of the antenna and the rafters in my garage I can't turn it to face the other nearest tower.

Here is my tvfool report:
http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=29&q=id%3d3e473bfc7c50b8

My antenna is currently pointing at the tower which is at 346 degrees True North.

I was thinking of buying the smaller 4 bay cm 4221 antenna, aiming it at the other tower, and then combining the cables from the two antennas into my house using a splitter.

Is this possible - or would the signals from the two antennas confuse one and other?

Also, should I get a preamp such as the cm 7778 - to filter out noise?

I'm new to all of this so I very much appreciate any feedback.

Thanks, Rob

@ flavoie and Stampeder

I finally bought the cm7777
and this changed everything
anyone who is unsure, its well worth the cost

my setup is
attic setup in orleans @ bottom of hill
UHF to HC
VHF to CF
cm7777 with seperate VHF UHF that filters out the oposite band & fm trap on

I get all digitals and analogues
even the omni's which can be hard to get especially 66.1
when sky was black for a while on monday afternoon
i was still pulling in 66.1 at 50-60%

A good pre-amp makes all the difference

Hi, I've been away from the forum for a while but started following it once again in hopes of news about the DTV transition and I've read here that Global should be switching over August 15 and TVO on August 16 in Ottawa so that's good news!
However, I was wondering if I would benefit from the use of a pre amp as I only receive all local DTV and analogue transmissions. I only receive US stations during tropo conditions. I have a 4 bay UHF combined with rabbit ears (for channel 6 to 13) facing north west out an apartment window and my strongest DTV signal comes in at 90 % and the weakest at 70 %. Would I simply be overloading my tuner?

Towerdb8, in order for a preamp to be beneficial, you should figure how much losses you have after the antenna.
What type and how long is your coax
Any splitters
What kind of tuner(s)
Any other amps ?
In any case, there are preamps with various levels of gain, but if your downstream losses are less than 2dB you should not bother with a preamp, since that's how much SNR you will lose using one.

In my personal case, when using some PC cards tuners which likely all had poor first stage amps (this may not be the case for all of them), using a preamp was beneficial even with minimal downstream losses because the preamp was making the pc card amp irrelevant thus the lower noise factor of my preamp replaced my noisier pc card first stage amp resulting in a better overall Signal to noise ratio (SNR)

Actually when it comes to UHF (much more than VHF) most TVs will pick up more with a pre-amp even if there are no line losses at all. From what Ive seen, TV tuners are built with a bit of room for amplification in the UHF band - about 10 dB - before it is redundant signal.