Thank you all for great info in OTA thread, better and quicker than books. I just bought a new sharp lcd with ATSC tuner, and tried to use RCA cant501 indoor amplified antenna to get Digital signal (ctv). It came up with nothing but one analog ch-10 with vague picture. I know indoor antenna is last choice regarding PQ.But for me, it is only choice, the complex doesn't allow sattelite and outdoor antenna. I am wondering that maybe my ATSC tuner have some problems. need help!! I am on second floor facing northeast, and there is one more floor above. For my location , I think north is the direction to Mt, seymoore.
Anybody has same experience. Thank you,stampeder ,you did very good job to keep this thread alive
Hi everyone. Just purchased my very first HDTV. I live in a condo on the 23rd floor and face northeast. Location is burnaby. Just wondering if you could recommend an antenna/amp. Thank you.
tjalt, I live in Burnaby as well. 13th floor and also facing northeast. I bought a $15 UHF antenna from The Source and it works perfectly. Stampeder said elsewhere that I could probably get reception with a toothbrush from my location (I'm near Brentwood).
I'm in Burnaby, little south of SFU. I get CTV and Global HD OTA but not CBC. I have been told the CBC signal is much stronger and the antenna higher on Seymour.
I use a small inexpensive rabit ears antenna. However, I tried a much more expensive antenna with amplifier with no luck. Not sure what else to try.
Any suggestions?
Hi MikeBBY, are you able to get signal strength readouts of CTV and Global? Those numbers would be helpful to us for figuring out this problem with CBC.
I am on the 25th floor North west corner Apt. So height is not an issue(I dont think). However, I cant see Semour 'cause Burnaby mnt is in the way. My thinking is it that were an issue I would not get Global or CTV as I am told they are lower down and lower power.
I did get KVOS SD TV for a few days but no longer. Dont really care about that.
I'll check signal strength this evening.
I wonder if a different type of antena would help.
I FOUND IT! I moved the antenna and CBUT-DT 2-1 came up on channel 58! not on 2 where I expected it.
I get a 30% signal from CBC and 45% from CVT and global. KVOS SD is back too but seems it comes and goes.
That's great Mike - it made no sense that CBC wasn't coming in for you. Enjoy!
Just to clarify for everyone, if your tuner doesn't do automatic scans of channels you can locate the Mt. Seymour digital channels thusly:
CBUT-DT (CBC) is on 58.1 and remaps to 2.1
CHAN-DT (GLOBAL) is on 22.2 and remaps to 8.1 (still working on their remapping)
CIVT-DT (CTV) is on 33.1 and remaps to 32.1
Nice forum here, with a lot of useful information about OTA. I would like to try catching some locals on my LCD, but I have not head much success. I read that I might be in the shadow of Mt. Seymour. I am 1/3 behind a hill in Coquitlam (V3K3C1) at elevation 100m according to Google Earth. Is there anything that I can do to be able to receive the signal from Mt. Seymour?
I tried the CM SMARTenna and the analog reception is extremely bad, with no DTV at all. I get the US channels thoug - that I am not interested in for now.
Will CM4228 give me a chance to receive it? I don't really want to invest in this just to find that it will not work from my location.
I believe your problem there is not the shadow of Mount Seymour, but Mount Burnaby. You should be fine with an antenna with a higher gain like a CM4221 or a CM4228 (not HD). You might want to try a CM4228 if you really want to be able to receive the signals from Mount Seymour.
Thanks for reply guys. I wasn't talking about the shadow of Mt. Seymour (hi hi..) but the shadow of the hill I am living on and possible Mt. Burnaby.
Stampeder: do you know if any of the folks that had problems were able in the end to overcome them (without buying a hous on the other side of the hill)?
Building a G-H sounds good and not very difficult, though it might require a bit of time to build - as I am not very experienced.
Sorry, without some testing from your exact location I don't have a recommendation at this point. An experienced pro with a signal analyzer (such as 4DTV HD) could do an accurate site survey for you to know once and for all.
Just for fun I brought a digital set-top box back with me from a trip to Portland a couple of weeks ago. The sort you hook up to an old analogue NTSC TV, though my TV does PAL and SECAM as well.
With an indoor halo UHF antenna, 11th floor, northwest view, I get CBC, CTV, Global and KVOS. If I fiddle with the antenna I can peak any of the signals up to 90% or so. My current compromise has CBUT-DT at 85%, and the others down around 60%. The CBC picture quality makes DVDs look crude. The others are all DVD quality, more or less. I'm almost tempted to buy an HD TV set so I can see Rick Mercer properly.
The box says "DigitalStream" on it. Nothing special; it was what they had at Radio Shack on a Saturday afternoon. The RF modulator channel 3/4 output is awful, but the baseband video output is excellent.
No sign of KBCB-DT (no loss there...), though their analogue signal is loud. I see KCPQ sometimes on analogue, but never on digital.
I'm looking at putting together a portable HDTV setup so I can drive up mountains and see what I can pick up. From the parking lot at Cypress the strongest analogue stations are KCTS and KCPQ on my little portable LCD TV. CBUT is relatively weak because it's in behind on Mount Seymour.
I've also now seen, first hand, the snow job perpetrated by the media and the cable companies that You Must Have Cable To Get HDTV. Even somebody from Shaw Cable was baffled by the concept of OTA HDTV. But that's another matter...
Hi, I'm completely new to the OTA world. I could use some help with a problem I have encountered while trying to get the digital channels in my area. I live in Burnaby near Lougheed Hwy and Austin (just south of that intersection). I just bought a Toshiba 40" HDTV (40RV52U) and a CM4221 antenna.
I have been able to pick up 8 stations in various strengths in the analog band, but have not been able to get the TV to scan in the digital. Is this due to poor signal strength or TV settings? I called tech support from the place I bought the TV but they said analog was all I would pick up with an antenna, so that was a lot of help
Next step was to call Toshiba directly but wanted to touch base with people that actually know what they are talking about first I look forward to any info you all might provide. Thanks in advance.
Just a quick look suggests you may have problems with a) Burnaby Mountain casting a shadow that the weaker ATSC transmission can't overcome, or b) multipath interference from the apartment buildings between you and the source. Naturally, there could be a combination of the two. So, questions for you: which direction are you facing, how high up are you, and what's between you and Mt Seymour? That looks like a decent TV and I know the 4221's an ok antenna, but your location looks like it may be the problem. Let us know, and good luck!
LH
We are pretty close to the south side of Burnaby Mountain. I was able to get one digital channel (12.1) but it had a bit of drop-out. When I tried again to re-program the TV I could not for the life of me figure out how I had done it the first time From what I read in the forums and on the internet it may have just been a lucky bounced signal. I also had not considered the apartments between me and Mt Seymor.
thank you for the reply and I'll try putting the antenna higher (crosses fingers)
This is my first post but i've been lurking on the forums for quiet awhile. Great forum you guys are running here.
As for my problem...
I live in a house in Port Moody up in the Noons Creek area (somewhat near Newport Village) and I've tried this already http://members.shaw.ca/hdtvantenna. Didn't get any HD channels and just a bunch of poor quality analog signals (got one from shopNBC in the states that was barely working). My tv is a Sony 32L4000 with ATSC tuner and i've picked up nothing in HD thus far either from QAM or ATSC using various antenna's. Is it even possible to get "free" HD in my area? and will buying a Phillips antenna from Walmart do the trick? Thanks in the advance.
Port Moody's a hit and miss area, due to the hills you may be in a really strong or really weak area. If you can get strong analogue reception from Mt Seymour stations you should be able to get your digital stations as well. Try tvfool.com to look up your exact address, and the antenna you show isn't super sensitive - if you're in a weak area you may need stronger. Can't say for sure without knowing more.
This has been said many times at this site, but beware that tvfool.com doesn't handle Canadian addresses very well because its data is from the FCC and often out of date.
Very true stampeder, the reasons I recommended it are because it's extremely useful at showing LOS, and 1-or-2-edge diffraction, and giving bearings to the transmitters. It's borderline useless at real Canadian signal strengths but the google earth overlays are useful for showing relative signal strengths as determined by topography. Plus, it can help with setting expectations for pulling in far-away American stations.
So speedy, look up your address to see if the Seymour stations are line-of-sight for your or not (if you don't want to give out your address especially), then make sure you're aiming your antenna correctly, then assess how many and what kind of obstacles you have (houses, trees, etc) and either move the antenna to avoid them (higher is usually better) or perhaps try a DB-series antenna or something else stronger than your reflected dipole.
speedracer, you sound keen to build your own antenna so it would be ironic if you went to another site for plans when you are now in the home of the increasingly famous Gray Hoverman antenna, the best you can build!
If a GH variant cannot do the job, I would say you are in an OTA dead zone.
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