Which antenna to get around my little forest

[WellThen]

I've started trying to use ATSC for my HD reception. I live in two story house a suburban area, within 5 miles of all of my local stations, and antennaweb.org recommends Yellow for all of my stations. I've tried a couple of different antennas, but seem to have intermittent problems with the signal breaking up on some stations. My latest antenna is a Philips MANT940, which I have in an upstairs window at the moment.

I'm wondering if my reception problems are related to the very tall trees that line the back of my lot. Not sure if a picture helps, but almost all of my stations are in the direction of this picture. This first picture was taken from a second story bedroom, but gives you an idea of the wall of trees I'm facing.

So, I have 2 questions:
1) Is it likely that the trees are causing my intermittent reception problem?
2) Is there an antenna that might work for me? Here's a pic of the antennaweb "map". The first picture above was taken roughly facing of D on the map. I don't care about F, but I want to receive A-E, so I'm not sure a very directional antenna will work.

Thanks for any help you can offer.

[HelenWeathers]

http://www.solidsignal.com/prod_disp...p?PROD=ANC3000

I ended up (after trying several others) using the above antenna as it is omni-directional. I live 15mi from the Digital towers in my area and pick up every current digital/subchannel. This antenna gets the VHF/UHF digital signals. A lot of foliage will reduce your signal somewhat. Hope you are successful as OTA is great.

[bastian74]

The MANT is a UHF only antenna. In Feb half the channels (around here anyway) are moving to VHF so you'll need another antenna anyway. I guess I'd return it if I were you.
FYI, another indoor antenna that is well reviewed is the Terk HDTVa

[WellThen]

Thanks Helen and Bastian for the feedback. Having tried 2 different indoor antennas already without solving the breakups problem, I'm willing to go outdoors if that's what it takes. (Although within 5 miles of the towers, it's surprising to me that outdoor is required).

I'd been wondering about whether I should to with a VHF/UHF antenna. Sounds like the MANT is going back. I'm going to give the CM3000A a try, and see how that goes.

[davephan]

It looks like your television stations are not located in the same place, surrounding you, so an Omni directional antenna may be your only option. I'm surprised the signals are so weak only 5 miles away from the stations. Do you have a lot of other obstructions besides the trees?

I am 13 miles from my local stations, which are located on three 1,300 foot towers, all near each other. Some UHF digital signals are marginal with an indoor antenna on the second floor. Two of the stations are going to be on VHF after next February, the rest on UHF. My VHF/UHF roof top antenna's UHF corner reflector was not well engineered, and the top reflector kept moving down when high winds occurred, causing the analog UHF signals to become very weak. I tried replacing the roof top VHF/UHF antenna with a UHF only antenna, which works very good with all analog UHF and the upper VHF analog channels. All the digital channels are now solid. I don't know how well the UHF only antenna will work after the stations channels move around in February, but the upper VHF analog channels are very strong now. I use the over the air signals for the HDHomeRun and to backup DirecTV when it is down during heavy rain.

Here is a link to the outdoor UHF only antenna I am using:

http://www.radioshack.com/product/in...entPage=search

Dave

[pjpjpjpj]

WellThen,

Some thoughts:

1) First off, try using www.tvfool.com instead of antennaweb. It has much more reliable data in terms of geographic features with respect to your house location. There could be something between you and the towers besides just the trees. Run a couple of trials, one with an approximate antenna height for an attic installation (approximate how far off the ground it would be), and then another if you were to mount it outdoors on a mast (try a few heights, to see if you can figure out how high you would want it). Do a "print screen" to save the results, and post the jpg here, and we'll try to help.

2) But from 5 miles away, that's probably not the case. You are probably getting too good of reception, and having multipath problems (where some of a signal is received as it passes the antenna in one phase, and then it bounces off of something and returns, being received again but out of phase). So from that aspect, you would actually need a "worse" antenna. 5 miles is a distance that many people on the antenna forums jokingly refer to as "stick a paperclip in the tuner" distance, in terms of ease of reception, so with proper "tuning", I can't imagine you would need an outdoor mount.

3) From the antennaweb plot you already posted, as davephan said, you definitely need an omnidirectional antenna (if not for "E", you could be a lot more directional). The problem is, having an omnidirectional antenna (therefore, having no reflector, which helps tremendously in eliminating multipath), you are leaving yourself open to multipath. You may want to actually try a directional antenna (with a reflector) and see if you can still get "E" from a reflected path. Here's a suggestion: get a plain old rabbit ear antenna, and put it up somewhere facing A-D (centered on that direction). Then get a piece of cardboard that is at least 4" wider/taller than the rabbit ear "elements" (extendable "whiskers"), cover it with aluminum foil (keep it flat and smooth), and mount it about 4" behind the rabbit ears. This is a "reflector" that will help stop multipath. Then see if you have better results.

Realize that a lot of houses have aluminum-faced insulation board in the walls, so you may need to make sure you have clear paths from your antenna towards the towers. The walls of your house may be creating barriers to good reception (or a multipath nightmare).

Antennas are a strange science. There are so many factors that you can't just decisively know what a problem is.... you really have to do trial and error.