Help with new home setup (antenna content)

[boognish]

Hey everyone,
In a few weeks i will be moving into my first house! very excited and already thinking about my tv setup
My htpc right now has 2 analog tuners in it.. I dont have an hdtv yet and I just hooked the digital cable coax into the tuners.

With buying my first house I am not planning on getting cable tv. I am hoping to get an antenna and hook it into my htpc. I have been researching antennas and have a few in mind but I have a few questions. I plan on getting a digital tuner but do i also need the dtv box to get the signal? or would the digital tuner have that built in?

I do plan on getting an hdtv in the next year so i need to keep that in consideration.

basically Im hoping someone has a similar setup and can provide some help picking out parts

thanks in advance

[freedml]

Congrats on the new house.

The first thing to do is see how reception is where your house is. tvfool.com is great for that. You'll see what direction(s) the stations are and how big an antenna you'll need. I'm in a fringe area where all of the stations are in one direction. So I picked a directional antenna with built-in amplification. I also added two more amplifiers with a gain control to get the digital signals to 100% without going too far. You need close to 100% signal with digital and it either looks great or you can't watch it.

Your digital tuners will take care of everything, no converter box. I have 3 and they do a good job considering that I'm in a fringe area. Some stations have frequent dropouts and some shows don't record, sometimes better or worse depending on the weather, but I'm happy with the system overall.

Don't worry about digital TVs yet. I'm watching lots of HD content on my old tube TVs and it's fine. The HD200 set-top box will work with any TV. It doesn't seem like it makes sense at first to run an HD system if your TV isn't (yet) but, trust me, it does.

One of the best tuners seems to be HDHomeRun and it does not connect directly to the computer so you can place it near the antenna and then you need a network connection to your pc.

[bjterry62]

I second the HDHomerun. It's the best digital tuner I've ever used and simple to set up. If you're on a tight budget and just need a couple of tuners to get by, you might search for them on ebay. I've found them for as little as $35ea. and they are good tuners too.

On antennas, I used antennaweb.org to research what channels were available and which direction. It also tells you what type of antenna you will probably need to reach the stations. I ended up with an inexpensive Radio Shack directional that I mounted on my roof. The stations I watch are 40 miles away, but I have good line-of-sight (no hills in the way).

Good luck!

BT

[bhyman1]

The HDHomerun is great. I have two fed with a nice DB-8 antenna and Channel Master pre-amp.