worth the hassle or just stick with Time Warner HD over cable lines?


same holds true in general for Fios HD vs over the air free HD?

In general, you will get the best possible HD from an antenna, but a major question is how much HD do you want? HD available with an antenna is limited to 7 networks; ABC, CBS, FOX, MyNetworkTV, NBC, PBS, The CW. Either cable or FiOS will give you a lot more, like ESPN, TNT, USA, Discovery, etc.

i know but for the superbowl, playoffs, and big events might be worth it.

big upgrade in video quality or not really?

how about audio?

i know but for the superbowl, playoffs, and big events might be worth it.

big upgrade in video quality or not really?

how about audio?Audio would be the same. As for video, it depends on a number of factors. With cable, you need to check the local topic for your area, to see what results others are getting. Cable HD quality can vary from area to area.

If you were asking about DirecTV (or Dish), it has the same HD quality no matter where you are.

FiOS claims to pass HD as they receive it, which means for local HD, it should look pretty much the same from either FiOS or OTA.

thanks for the info.

wasnt sure if it was worth the hassel.

would go with fios anyway

I'd put one up anyway. Eliminate the middleman, at least as much as you can.

I'll second kycubsfan. The antenna-making thread has some very effective, inexpensive options, so price isn't a factor, and outdoor mounting be not be required, depending on local signal field intensity.

For myself, I wanted to watch football in HD, and Fox wasn't sharing their local HD signal the year I got my HDTV, so an antenna solved a problem. After living with two options (TW Cable and OTA) for a while, I usually use OTA for my quality-sensitive viewing because the quality is always as good as it gets, especially after an antenna upgrade. (Note that I'm comparing two, single-channel (no sub-channel) stations. PBS pushes 1 HD + 3 SD and all suffer as a result.)

TWC's gotten better, but I still get dropouts/macroblocking on occassion. I can't say defects are only in the cable signal, and I'm told TWC gets a fiber feed from the locals, so quality ought to be same or better, but personal bias fades only slowly.

Frank

HD available with an antenna is limited to 7 networks; ABC, CBS, FOX, MyNetworkTV, NBC, PBS, The CW.Not necessarily - we've got a local, independent 720p channel here that shows some HD - WCIU-DT.

I get higher quality HD off an antenna than from DirecTV. I'm 53 miles from the broadcast towers with a pretty clear line of sight. I use a $30 Radio Shack antenna in the attic with a little pre-amp.

Free TV, as God intended!

Un link analog OTA tuners OTA digital tuners can be overloaded if you they recieve two strong of a signal and nothing is received. Therefore make sure you don't install too good of an antenna or you will end up haveing to install a signal attenuator do reduce the signal strength of the antenna.