Anyone have antenna only TV?

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sdmini

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In effort to stay in a budget I decided I would give up either my cable or high speed internet a year ago. I couldn't imagine going back to "low" speed so cable got kicked. Now that regular analog broadcasting is getting kicked and if you have an older TV you need a converter box and the government is handing out coupons for $40 off a box. I was curious at what this was costing the government as well as all the t.v. ads and promotional literature on the switch.

The digging I did sadly turned up exactly what I figured it would...........$1.5 Billion.
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The proposed 2009 federal budget for adult basic and literacy education is $574.6 million. The government has spent 1.68 Billion on broadband since 2002.

Now I like my TV and would love to have Broadband (have high speed not broadband) but wonder why is the government paying for my "luxuries"?
 
The government required the FCC to change over. So, since it was a mandated thing, the taxpayers have to foot the bill for the change over. The frequencies were needed for other uses, such as maritime. So "they" say...

We have antenna only. We only get one channel, but hey! it's digital! We use our tv to watch netflix movies of our choice. The world would do itself a big favor if the citizens chucked their tvs. Think about all that subliminal propoganda that wouldn't be absorbed.
 
We have antenna only TV. We got our coupons for our converter boxes back in the summer. You are allowed 2 coupons per household.

We get 5 channels on analog and when we hooked up our converter box and did a search for digital channels, we only got 1 channel. I found out after calling one of the TV stations that the reason we couldn't get their channels digital station yet is that they were not allowed to turn up the power on it yet, and it was only covering the city limits of Terre Haute right now. They won't turn up the power until it gets closer to feb 2009. We are about 35 miles away from Terre Haute.

Hopefully once these stations turn up their digital channels to full power we hope to get all the same channel we now get.
 
I just sent for my "coupons" for the boxes. Currently I receive 8 or 9 channels with just my rabbit ears. So, I hope to get something more for this effort
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Seems I will also need to buy new antenna. BUT cable is not part of my budget and I really can't justify it for the small amount I watch the thing. At other farm we had satellite (all there when we bought the property, only pd for qtrly use) and I would like to have a couple of the channels that were on there -- mainly animal ones and 24/7 weather.

But, I have weather on the computer whenever I want it. I just got a Verizon broadband USB plug in thingee and am trying it for the high speed computer. So far, only the upload/download speeds are obvious, plus things like video. Not positive I will keep it beyond the 30 dy trial but, most likely will. It is portable, at least
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Plus, I can drop one of my landlines and drop AOL, etc. which would more than offset the cost. Trying to get used to the different "look" of the start-up pages, where everything is, etc. This is definately "change". May need a course to learn the differences.

Before I buy the TV boxes, I will c k with manufacturer to see if all the TVs need them......or if some are already digital.

Expect not as main one is already about 5 yrs old.
 
My husband researched the boxes and none are perfect; they use the antenna at his work to pick up local channels. Considering picture quality and features, the Zenith DTT 901 is best for the money. With the coupon, it ran about $10 more than the RCA. Walmart doesn't carry it--he had to order it online.

Second best is RCA sold at Walmart. It doesn't come with all the necessary connecting cables, so the cost is comparable.

As if we didn't have enough to think about right now, we have to figure out more electronic gadgets :arg!
 
Wilmington is a test market for DTV. For us, the analog signal got turned off almost 2 months ago. I've learned a few things that are a real pain in the patootie about Digital Television!

For one, the signals are all in the UHF frequencies. When the weather is windy, rainy, or otherwise just "not right," the signal quality gets iffy. With analog, you get a snowy picture, but it's still watchable. With Digital, the sound drops out, the picture freezes, it gets very annoying to try to watch anything. Not great, especially in an area prone to tropical weather systems, I guess I'll have to rely on something other than TV for National Weather Service watches and warnings.

Another thing I find annoying is the lack of range of the digital signal. I was told (by an engineer at a local TV station) that the "good" signal range is only about 20 miles from the broadcast tower. We are just barely within that range, and like I said, our signal is often not watchable. When it's good, it's lovely, but there are certain places in the room that you just don't go (with rabbit ears) or you'll interfere with the reception! Some kinds of rooftop antennas are supposed to help, and we have one TV that's hooked up to one, but it isn't any better than the one with the rabbit ears on windy days.
 
What bugs me is that we have to buy a new antenna in addition to the box. If it were up to me, I wouldn't own a TV; it was bad enough to have to buy a converter box for something I don't really want, but now we have to pay more for the @#%^* antenna!

As Bunnylady noted, the signal doesn't reach beyond 20 or so miles, and beyond that you need an antenna appropriate for your distance and geography. We're about 30 miles from Portland, but we're surrounded by hills and trees, so I can only hope that we can get an honest, ungreedy answer as to which antenna we need.

If we need more than that, the POS is going out the window!
 
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Sounds like a lot of us are facing the expense of government for small results....what's new?
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Cable/Satellite companies are jumping in there with "low introductory" offers. Feeling the kicker coming?
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