Reddit reviews Xtreme Signal HDB8X 8-Bay VHF/UHF HDTV Bowtie Antenna

You have signals from multiple directions - This one can be aimed in two directions at once and is fairly broad in aiming. https://www.amazon.com/Xtreme-Signal-HDB8X-Bowtie-Antenna/dp/B00CX6UJ5K/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1523715450&sr=8-2&keywords=8+bay+antenna

> OTA only breaks up when people fail to invest the minicscule time and effort into obtaining and arranging a proper antenna.

You are lying your ass off. I had a very good antenna and the rca booster everyone recommends.

Sports and prime time were still attrocious. Not one channel really played without breaking up. I aligned the thing with a compass exactly to the degrees antennaweb said.

Fox and cbs transmitters are 2mi, and it still sucked once the quality was turned up for hd broadcasts. NBC is 5 mi and the rest are like 6-8mi.

Antennaweb labels them all yellow for class of antenna.

I am going to say that the city I am in broadcasts with too low of power.

All,

I'm currently working on getting an antenna system to work in an area that was easily served during the analog era. As it stands right now, there is no antenna outside or attic mounted.

I normally work inside city limits and metro locations where transmitters are full power. (i work in tv fyi) - this rural location is oddly stubborn. I've got a couple different antennas ive used for years that quote being good to the 50 mile range. and I've got an amplifier for them. Normally, this would be all i need to pull a station only 30 miles away... but nothing. not once ounce of signal.

I'm looking for hive mind reccomendations on what route to go here.

I'm currently looking at something along the lines of the Xtreme Signal HDB8X Would I need to add a VHF High yagi on top of this to pull in either of the vhfs below?

I'm looking to pick up 8-25-31-34-43-45-47-49 - these will provide all the oklahoma city stations via translator.

however - I'm also hoping to pick up 11 - which is in the opposite direction. Since the beginning of time, KSWO has been available here. But the cable has dropped it cable comes from where the above translators are... its stupid.

Cable was fine until very recently - theyve switched to all digital - requiring a minibox AND smartcard on all tvs. And that means lots of cash down the drain just to make a tv work.

What are your opinions on antenna setup to get these channels? It should be doable right? even the lowest signal is 11db and with a good 15db antenna - it should come in clear enough at 26db right? with amp? maybe into the 30s?

The amplified rabbit ears might just work for ya. Take your time getting them setup just right : )

I have an attic-mounted multi-directional Xtreme Signal HDB8X . The two panels are currently both facing the same direction as I no longer need to catch two cities' worth of signals, so yeah overkill for sure. I've also got an amplified 4way ChannelMaster splitter that works nicely.

Here it is installed (literally using rope) in my attic:
https://i.imgur.com/rc44giC.jpg

It's amazing for UHF (I'm getting solid NJ signals in addition to the Philly Fox/CBS/NBC/etc stuff), but struggles with VHF, especially 6ABC here. I just bought a VHF-UHF combiner and have a half-wave dipole antenna I made to connect to the VHF side (cut to length for the exact 6ABC wavelength). Once it cools off in the attic I'll install and see if it improves 6ABC...

As others say. That one is likely for radio. I get about 20 channels, many from 70-80 miles away, with this antenna, but I am halfway up a mountain, and facing the right direction for those channels.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00CX6UJ5K/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1

But then again this is a sexy beast of an antenna. Probably needs more mast than I currently have though.

that was like the first antenna i bought.. its almost 100% amplifier but it does pick up some signals.. once i knew i could get some signals i decided I would try for something really stable .. not sure how sucessful i have been heh .. but I pretty much tried every solution

After I bought that antenna i bought a
clearstream 4v $75 BestBuy Blackfriday Sale
https://www.amazon.com/ClearStream-Indoor-Outdoor-Antenna-Mount/dp/B00SVNKT86

then I bought a RCA Amp to put on that $16 AmazonWarehouse Return
https://www.amazon.com/RCA-TVPRAMP1Z-Preamplifier-Outdoor-Antenna/dp/B003P92D9Y

Then I bought a VHF Hi / UHF small Yagi
https://www.amazon.com/Mediasonic-HOMEWORX-HDTV-Outdoor-Antenna/dp/B01C1YL16Y

between the ClearStream 4v and the small Yagi i could get some stations from both Philly and Baltimore but not really great all day long.. mostly better at night and really bad around sun up and sun down.


then I made this antenna It works pretty well but it has reflections and it picks up signal from behind it which knocks out FOX Philly .. Tried installing aluminum foil on the reflector but it wasn't enough
https://i.redd.it/2fd3jfy03y6y.jpg

Then I bought this antenna it also works ok but no channel 6 or 12 I figured since it was factory made it would be more stable and it is but it is a trade off.. both Baltimore and Philly have high VHF and Low VHF that I wanted..
https://www.amazon.com/Xtreme-Signal-HDB8X-Bowtie-Antenna/dp/B00CX6UJ5K

Then the Repack was announced so I started looking for a large yagi so I could get Low UHF
With all the money I already invested and the fact that I could get signal from a bunch of stations most or some of the time I took about a year to pick both of them up.. when I saw the prices $35 I was like hell i really can't pass that up.. So I pointed the first one at philly and I could get channel 6 and 12.. 6 is off and on .. very glitchy but I do get it .. 6 philly is ABC which I also get ABC from Baltimore but Baltimore News sucks really bad.

So I found one.. then i found the other... they both have amps on them
they are in my attic because we get insane wind here and they wouldn't stay up a year if they were welded to a tower and braced from every direction.


So thats where I am now two huge antennas that are fished between my attic trusses.. hopefully pointed pretty accurately but I am sure I am off by 10 degrees and they are both pointed downwards somewhat ... its the best i can do the trusses are 24 inches apart and the antennas are 115 inches long and wide so its pretty difficult especially when you're trying to not put your foot through the drywall ceiling below you...

but yep tried everything pretty much

60 miles out in 5 directions .. i have so many weak signals all around me that half of my channels cochannel and knock each other off the air.. but I can get signal from philly and baltimore pretty good.. Unfortunately there are a handful of good stations I really want that I can't get.. Like Heroes and Icons... and I get Quest but it flakes out about 30% of the day on an average day and that is normally when nothing else is on but Jerry Springer .. Quest is basically all the old shows from Discovery and History Channel... but I do get it ok sometimes.. and there are other stations.. a country music station and Grit and a korean station for the KPOP girls heh ..

But I do get duplicates of QVC HSN and I get 3 different broadcasts of Comet .. and also duplicates of 4 spanish networks and four advertising only networks that show New Jersey Used Car Dealers 24/7 THEY COME IN PERFECT! .. heh ah what can you do I am lucky to get what I get and I am happy for it.



you might want to look at this page for info about data plans
https://www.rvmobileinternet.com/guides/top-pick-data-plans/

its still real expensive and most of them with unlimited still throttle you at 20gb of data and they are dam expensive too..

there are some plans where you pay like $300 up front and then its $30 per month and you are on Sprint Data and you don't get throttled or capped but .. thats a hell of a lot of money to take that chance.. basically its a third party company reselling Sprint.. and they have been in business 3-5 years but with TMobile trying to buy sprint i know TMobile isn't going to allow unlimited unthrottled ..

anyway :o)

That's great video, thank you. It seems to boil down to:

• use a combiner (is this the same as a splitter? Some splitters I've seen say -4dB or something similar on the "outputs" which would be the inputs in this case)
  
• use the same length cable between the two antennas because of velocity factor.
  
  One of the antennas I'm considering is this which looks like it already has a combiner for two halves. Would treating that as one antenna, and running a length of coaxial cable between the output of it's combiner and a second combiner - and then running that same length from another traditional antenna to the second combiner, be a mistake? Because of the extra two feet of cable used with the first antenna, I feel like it may violate velocity factor, but I'm not sure.

Watching on tv requires me to deal with an antenna and the quality is poor. 1080i sucks.

You have to deal with the random pixelation from a bad signal, so it is not any better than your average internet stream. This my antenna with this booster pointed in the correct direction for the channel according to antenna web. Still sucks. First floor, so I would have to mount it up on the roof or in the attic to maybe get it working better. Right now it is on this kind of pole and I used it just for football. All that work for nothing really. It definitely has a better signal, but still enough random problems to make it annoying. I live on the outskirts of downtown of a major city, there is no valid reason it should be this hard to get a tv signal.

It also restricts me to games broadcast locally, which aren't usually the games I want to watch and doesn't let me easily switch between games. With streaming, I just have multiple streams open and just switch which one is non-muted and full screen.

I was thinking about getting the nfl sunday ticket, but then found out it only allows a single stream at a time. So I still use free online streams.