Minneapolis, MN - OTA - Page 4

kevinjanet - try bunny ears. You might be too close.

For the Hudson guy...I live in Roberts (and also have a HD TIVO) and put a Terk TV5 in my garage as I also have home runned all my cabling. I have tried the CM 4228, Silver Sensor, and the SS 2000 and even though I hate Terk...it is the best hands down for my situation.

Does anyone north of Shoreview pickup channel KMWB-DT (23.1)? If so what antenna are you using? I get all of the channels in Ham Lake except 23.1 due to their weak power.

As an update, I ended up getting the SquareShooter, attached to my dish, and it seems to be working great.

CW

Does anyone have any problems with the 17.x (1-4) OTA channels? The built-in tuner in my new Sharps LCD completely freezes randomly when I am watching these channels. This does not happen with the other channels. What are these guys doing? Any ideas?

Yeah, I'm using a Humax HFA100. I get all channels except 17.x and 45.1. The signal strength on 17.x keeps moving between 0 and about 70.

Steve.

Are you guys able to get Channel 11 in HD OTA? I use to get it a while back and haven't been able to for a couple months. Thanks for any replies...

Works fine for me, haven't seen any issues with the signal. Perhaps they changed the PSIP info and your box is confused. Usually a rescan fixes this.

It would help to know where you are and what your equipment is.

-Mike

I get it no problem. Havn't checked in the last few days, but last week it was fine (My Name is Earl is hilarous ).
CW

I have a HLR-6163 Samsung with a Terk Amplified Indoor Antenna Model: TV5, rescanned last night and 11 is back for OTA!! Woo hoo.


Thanks guys!

Has anyone had much luck with an indoor antenna and HDTV? What indoor option works best?

I live in St Louis Park, about 13 miles from the Shoreview towers. With a basic amplified antenna all I can get is NBC and ABC in HDTV. I'm moving in less then two months when I'll most likely get cable, and I'm not looking to spend a bunch of money for a temporary solution.

I'm having good success using a Zenith Silver Sensor Indoor Antenna. I'm about 8 miles from Shoreview. How it would would work from SLP, I don't know. Might be worth a try.

I've seen that antenna recommended on the boards, now if only Sears still sold it so I wouldn't have to buy it online.

This is a little late (both me saying it and KMWB doing it), but on 9 Feb 2006 the digital signal was finally increased from 20 KW to 500 KW, and they promise it will eventually get up to 1 MW.

I get 23-1 solidly now; along with WCCO's 4-1, it's the best.

Hello to all,

I am going to be moving to the twin cities this summer from Salt Lake City. We can, with a silver sensor indoor antenna, pretty much pick up all digital channels here.

We expect to settle in Eden prairie. I have looked up our prospective zipcode on antennaweb and found out that i am pretty much hosed. We will be renting, so installing my RS outdoor antenna won't be an option.

Has anyone had any success picking up anything with a silver sensor out in Eden Prairie?

Thanks for your help!

Michael.

MSilla,
I live in Eden Prairie and just bought a silver sensor and here's my story:

Bought a HDTV 2 weeks ago and placed it in the basement. I first tried a $50 Radio Shack directional antenna with amplifier (it looked cool, like starship enterprise) which pulled all digital channels, no problem. HDTV was real nice. However, I wasn't sure if I wanted a $50 antenna, so I returned it after a week.

Then last week I bought a silver sensor. I can only pickup 4.1 and 9.1 in HD. Dunno why I get only 2 of 6 or so channels available; I was under the impression that if you pulled one, you should be able to pull all because they are all coming from the same direction here in the Twin Cities. Ofcourse, being in the basement probably doesn't help; I've heard that others have had success with the silver sensor, perhaps at a non- subterranean level.

Then I learned that HD is free with basic Timewarner cable (DOH! ). So last night I tuned the cable (minus the box) and lo and behold, we have HD! So if your apartment has free basic cable (which mine did when I was renting in Bloomington), you probably will be able to pick up HD.

Cheers!

I am visiting the area this weekend. Friday night I see FSN-North has a Timberwolves game and the Gophers are playing Holy Cross at 5:30. FSN-North also has a Wild game Saturday night the 25th, the Gophers are playing at 8pm if they beat Holy Cross. Is any local station picking up the game(s) live instead of tape delay on FSN? Thanks

Way cool. Thanks for the heads up. We should be there (permanently) in June. We need Time Warner anyway for the high speed internet sooooo we will get the "hook up" then.

Michael.

From what I heard this morning, the Gophers are on live, and the Wild will be tape delayed.

Hm, just found this thread. I am jumping onboard with HDTV in the next month or so. I was a little concerned about the possibility of using an indoor OTA antenna to get the HD locals in my gal's 2nd floor condo, but it sounds like it should work OK (we are 7.5 miles SSW from the Shoreview towers). Guess it'll just be trial and error to find a relatively economical antenna that does the job.

Go in the classifieds of this forum. There is a guy selling the Zenith silver sensor. Great antenna asd should serve your needs perfectly and it's just under $30.

If your ever in Mound, stop at Scotty B's restaurant.

Scott

JoelCFC25,

I am a similar distance from Shoreview, and I have excellent success with a Zenith Silver Sensor. I pick up all the digital stations broadcasting from Shoreview, and my Silver Sensor is only approximately 5 feet above grade.

The only problem I can see, in your case, is if your antenna will be looking a long way through your condo for the signal. If there is not much "condo" between your antenna and outside, you should be fine with a decent antenna.

Thanks lads. There is a fair "amount" of condo for a signal to pass through, as she lives towards the SW corner of the structure. But that Zenith antenna is certainly priced right. Now to see if it will pass Design Review Committee...LOL.

And Scott, being in Mound is not out of the question, it's a bit off my beaten track but the GF teaches in the Westonka school district. So I'll make a note about the restaurant.

Joel,

I'd be willing to bet she has been in the restaurant before as almost all the teachers come in when the district doesn't have the lunch rooms running. Ask her if she does and report back. Have her ask for me when she's in.

Scott

It just occurred to me that I may want to try and see what happens with no antenna at all. I'm wondering that since the dish is installed on the roof of the building, and we just have the coax from the wall going into the 20" SD television (with NO antenna whatsoever), and it gets PERFECT reception of all local channels---if we might also be hooked up to an OTA antenna on the roof? Conversely, the TV in the bedroom is not hooked up to the wall at all and needs bunny ears to get channels.

Well that didn't work. Upon doing a scan for channels it only picks up the standard def stuff. I did however, just hook up the plain old dipole rabbit ears from the TV in the bedroom, and BAM, all the HD channels appeared! Some of them aren't coming in clearly, so I may need to upgrade to an antenna of a different design to get more gain. But KSTP and FOX 9 for example are coming in excellent, just looks stunning.

I'm going to join in the fun after this post.

As my username might indicate, I embrace technology but I'm slow to own the latest and greatest usually due to budget considerations. I thought y'all might enjoy seeing my HD setup which I put together on a shoestring. It started when a friend brought me his retired Voom Motorola DSR550 receiver to demonstrate how it could receive broadcast local digital stations. My only antenna was an old pair of RCA rabbit ears shown here:

Surprisingly I could pull in all the locals with a little tweaking but the setup looked pretty low rent. My display is a Sony 1271 CRT projector and a standard CRT TV. Obviously I couldn't take advantage of the component out on the receiver which necessitated purchasing an Altinex TR6102HD transcoder to convert from component to RGBHV and VGA outputs. This also meant that I could now use a CRT monitor and the projector to display the HD image. I was able to obtain a retired Mitsubishi Diamond Plus 100e 20" monitor on the cheap (like free) and even though its a huge dinosaur, it still sits on my desk and has a wonderful picture. The projector came to life also displaying any resolution (up to 1080i) I could throw at it. After weeks of enduring comments about my antenna, I decided it was time to upgrade. Knowing that I could already pull in the locals with a modest pair of rabbit ears I decided a Winegard PR-4400 UHF would be enough to meet my needs. A pair of 18" wall mounts, a 10' mast and several trips up and down the ladder resulted in this installation on my pole barn. Everything comes in solid now. It's a beautiful thing. I'm 27 miles from the Shoreview towers in Minneapolis but I sit up pretty high. I'd like to see more choices become available on local broadcast now. Anybody know if this might be in the works? Later, HiLoTech

I live in Farmington, and I'm jumping into the HD realm with both feet this week. There's a blearing array of antenna's recommended. Does anyone live in Farmington, Lakeville, etc have a recommended setup for me? I'm leaning towards the Radio Shack 15-1880, but I don't see it listed on their website.