Another Silver Sensor or an Amplifier?

[bdraw]

I have a Silver Sensor now and I am able to tune in all the HD stations.

But I have two HD tuners. One in my TV, and one in my D* reciever.
I hooked up a spliter from my SS so I could have my anntenna hooked up to both my tuners.

The only problem is now I can't get Fox and NBC has alot of drop outs.

Should I just buy another SS (one for each tuner) or is there an amplifier that I can put on it?

[passedpawn]

The splitter halves the signal to each receiver, AND adds some noise to both. An amplifier will solve the lost power issue, but will add its own noise.

Add another antenna. The antenna is cheaper than the amplifier, anyway.

Maybe by raising the antenna higher, or using a bigger antenna, you can still stick with one (and the splitter). With antennae, higher and bigger is better.

[bdraw]

Thanks for the info.

It turned out that I had bad cables.
The cables I tried were left over from an old Cable install.
I thought they would work.
The cheezy one that came with the SS works better then the ones I was using.
Is cable tv cables different than antenna cables?
I did have them wraped up pretty tight, not sure what the maximum radius bends coax can take.
I guess I am going to make some new cables, I have the cripers, but what is the best kind of coax to use?
Can I go pick it up at Home depot?
I am going to make new cables then try without the amplifier.
See how that goes before I spend anymore money.

[passedpawn]

Thanks for the info.

It turned out that I had bad cables.
The cables I tried were left over from an old Cable install.
I thought they would work.
The cheezy one that came with the SS works better then the ones I was using.
Is cable tv cables different than antenna cables?
I did have them wraped up pretty tight, not sure what the maximum radius bends coax can take.
I guess I am going to make some new cables, I have the cripers, but what is the best kind of coax to use?
Can I go pick it up at Home depot?
I am going to make new cables then try without the amplifier.
See how that goes before I spend anymore money.

Yea, Home Depot has RG-6. If they have it, I'd spend the extra (almost double in cost) and get the "quad shield" cable, which has better shielding (duh) for the best noise immunity. Make sure you are careful about the connectors, cause there are many types that look almost the same, but won't fit when you get them home.

Make sure none of the braid or foil in the shield is touching the inner conductor. I had a flakey connector on my roof that gave me weeks of trouble until I found it (it was my poor crimp!). An ohm-meter rooted it out.

Check this excellent, succint explanation of the different types of coax:
Aussie Coax Page (http://www.accesscomms.com.au/coax.htm)

[bdraw]

Ok now this is wierd.

I replaced the cables with some good coax.
It worked at first, but next time I checked it didn't

Here is what it is doing now.

I have the SS hooked up to two tunner, and I am able to pick up all the UHF stations without a problem.

But I can't pick up 8-1 or 13-1.
So I take this $4.00 pair of bunny ears I have and hook it up and I amble to pick up both but not the UHF.

So I get another spliter and hook up both the bunny ears and the SS.

Now for the fun part.
If the bunny ears are fully extended and split as far as possible I can pick up 8-1 but not 13-1.
If they are extended all but one, and both one click from all the way apart I can receive 13-1 but not 8-1.

By moving the cheesy coax that comes out of the bunny ears I can pick up both, so I am convinced it is the antenna.(can't replace coax)

Also I am having trouble picking up 44-1 and 38-1 now that I have combined the two anntenas. I figured it might be some sort of multipath issue, and the two antennas were interfeiring with each other.

So I was thinking of buying a UHF/VHF combiner instead of using a spliter, or maybe a jointenna.

I was also considering buying a better VHF only antenna.

What is a good Set top VHF antenna?
What jointenna would I need?

[knative]

I have the SS hooked up to two tunner, and I am able to pick up all the UHF stations without a problem.

But I can't pick up 8-1 or 13-1.
The Silver Sensor is a UHF only antenna. Anything below Ch. 14 is VHF.

So I take this $4.00 pair of bunny ears I have and hook it up and I am able to pick up both but not the UHF.
And the bunny ears is a VHF only antenna. Remember the olde days when you had to add a circular antenna to the UHF terminals on the back of your TV, in addition to the bunny ears?


By moving the cheesy coax that comes out of the bunny ears I can pick up both, so I am convinced it is the antenna.(can't replace coax)
I could do the same thing with my SS. If I moved the coax just right (RG-6 left over from 500 foot spool bought for my DirecTV self-install) I could get NBC. I looked like the guys from the Vanilla Coke commercial trying to get it to that magical "just right" spot.

I've since installed both a UHF/VHF Channel Master antenna outside pointed towards Riverview and a UHF yagi pointed to Holiday. Since the antennas were overkill I just used a cheap Radio Shack splitter/combiner I had laying around to combine the two antenna feeds into a single RG-6 feed to my HDR-230. I still need to fine tune things a bit to get Fox cleanly, but so far Fox isn't a priority.

[knative]

I have the SS hooked up to two tunner, and I am able to pick up all the UHF stations without a problem.

But I can't pick up 8-1 or 13-1.
The Silver Sensor is a UHF only antenna. Anything below Ch. 14 is VHF.

So I take this $4.00 pair of bunny ears I have and hook it up and I am able to pick up both but not the UHF.
And the bunny ears is a VHF only antenna. Remember the olde days when you had to add a circular antenna to the UHF terminals on the back of your TV, in addition to the bunny ears?


By moving the cheesy coax that comes out of the bunny ears I can pick up both, so I am convinced it is the antenna.(can't replace coax)
I could do the same thing with my SS. If I moved the coax just right (RG-6 left over from 500 foot spool bought for my DirecTV self-install) I could get NBC. I looked like the guys from the Vanilla Coke commercial trying to get it to that magical "just right" spot.

I've since installed both a UHF/VHF Channel Master antenna outside pointed towards Riverview and a UHF yagi pointed to Holiday. Since the antennas were overkill I just used a cheap Radio Shack splitter/combiner I had laying around to combine the two antenna feeds into a single RG-6 feed to my HDR-230. I still need to fine tune things a bit to get Fox cleanly, but so far Fox isn't a priority.

[passedpawn]

But I can't pick up 8-1 or 13-1.
On your digital dial, I think you mean 12-1. That would be FOX, which is on BHN channel 13.

Knative is on the money with the antenna differences. Sounds like reception is pretty good in your house. You might consider a VHF/UHF combo right on your set. Those usually have the VHF rabbit hears and the UHF loop in the middle. It's gonna look awfully 70's-ish on your HD TV, though.

[bdraw]

I have the SS hooked up to two tunner, and I am able to pick up all the UHF stations without a problem.

But I can't pick up 8-1 or 13-1.
The Silver Sensor is a UHF only antenna. Anything below Ch. 14 is VHF.

So I take this $4.00 pair of bunny ears I have and hook it up and I am able to pick up both but not the UHF.
And the bunny ears is a VHF only antenna. Remember the olde days when you had to add a circular antenna to the UHF terminals on the back of your TV, in addition to the bunny ears?


By moving the cheesy coax that comes out of the bunny ears I can pick up both, so I am convinced it is the antenna.(can't replace coax)
I could do the same thing with my SS. If I moved the coax just right (RG-6 left over from 500 foot spool bought for my DirecTV self-install) I could get NBC. I looked like the guys from the Vanilla Coke commercial trying to get it to that magical "just right" spot.

I've since installed both a UHF/VHF Channel Master antenna outside pointed towards Riverview and a UHF yagi pointed to Holiday. Since the antennas were overkill I just used a cheap Radio Shack splitter/combiner I had laying around to combine the two antenna feeds into a single RG-6 feed to my HDR-230. I still need to fine tune things a bit to get Fox cleanly, but so far Fox isn't a priority.

I appreciate your help.
But can anyone answer my questions?

What is a good Set top VHF antenna?
What jointenna would I use?

[bdraw]

On your digital dial, I think you mean 12-1. That would be FOX, which is on BHN channel 13.

Knative is on the money with the antenna differences. Sounds like reception is pretty good in your house. You might consider a VHF/UHF combo right on your set. Those usually have the VHF rabbit hears and the UHF loop in the middle. It's gonna look awfully 70's-ish on your HD TV, though.

You are right, I hate the fact that BHN moves the channels around.

The bunny ears I have now do have the loop, but they are ineffective.
I am very happy with the SS, I realized it was UHF only when I bought it, but hoped that I would be able to get by since there are only two stations that are VHF.

It was good enough till I started using my internal Tunner in my Mitsubishi to record HDTV to my computer.

Now I record with the Mitsu tunner, and watch the HD5 tunner. For right now I have my antenna set to pick up 8-1, which works out fine, since I can switch over to BHN to watch Fox. But now that the Fox season is starting up, my wife is going to want me to record something for her, and I will need to be able to pick up fox.
Plus it would prevent me from having to switch inputs.

[Max_Gator]

Speaking of moving cable to get reception . . .

I recently, accidentally, found that I could get CBS WITHOUT an antenna connected if the cable was in the right place. When BHN's CBS was giving me problems, I switched to my OTA box and watched. Everything was fine . . . but then I realized - I don't have an antenna hooked up - LOL!!

Couldn't get any other station but I got CBS pretty good. What's really funny is when I hook up the Stealthtenna I got - I couldn't get CBS.