Amplified TV antennae

I bought one and added a line amplifier too. It does make a significant difference - assuming there is a signal to amplify.

I bought one that is a big - 28" maybe - disc thing from radio shack for about $100 a few years ago. There are probably better ones out there, but I mounted mine inside my attic because I didn't (read my wife didn't) want an antenna on the roof.

http://www.hdtvantennalabs.com/index.php

 

My experience was the same as this - got an amplified disk antenna and love it for broadcast digital tv. I installed in the attic too.

 

I'll take "Things that don't work in my neighborhood" for 200, Alex.

 

I'll take "Thing dat we do in da hood" for 400.

 

This is a timely post (at least, for me).

I returned our cable boxes (two DVRs plus a
regular box). As of yesterday, we have no cable TV.
We're going cold turkey. It's our big experiment
to see if we can radically reduce the insane cost
of watching TV.

What we have now instead is (1) an antenna on the
roof (with preamp) and (2) a few devices to stream
shows over the Internet.

1) The antenna
Last week, I installed a TV antenna on my antenna tower.
I connected the new antenna to the house cabling.
We get 15 channels off the air (at least 7 are HD).
We get NBC, ABC, CBS, Fox and more. Four channels
were marginal without the preamp (two TVs were having
trouble viewing those stations) so I'm sticking with the preamp.
I have a remotely powered preamp from Radio Shack.

2) Streaming devices
We have multiple devices (Roku, PS3, Blu-ray player, computers)
that allow streaming TV over the Internet. The most notable
and capable is probably the Roku box. It's a sexy, little $99
box that allows access to about 500 Internet "channels."
Many channels are free, several are subscription and several
are pay-per-view.

Incidentally, while the DVR (Digital Video Recorder) boxes
were ultra nice, you don't need a DVR when you get on-demand
video over the Internet. The DVRs cost me $14/month each --
that's $28/month. Even for pay-per-view content, $28
goes a long way.

The Roku box has a remote control but they also offer a
slick iPhone app which acts as a remote control (that
is actually more powerful than the provided remote
control). Very cool.

I've signed up for two subscription channels: Netflix and
Hulu+. The boy and I have been hooked on Netflix for a
number of months now (that was a pre-experiment
experiment). These two "channels" each cost $8 per month.

I tried a free month of Amazon Prime (normal cost: about $80/year
which includes other perks like free shipping for purchases
from amazon.com). I didn't get to fully run Amazon Prime
through the paces so I didn't really see the value yet so
I dropped it for now. We may revisit it at a later date.
Meanwhile, I still have an amazon account for PPV
shows (typically $2 for current TV shows; $3 to $5 for movies).

The trick now is to get familiar with the over-the-air
programming and learn how to get any missing
favorite shows/movies/events over the Internet. I'm
pretty sure it can be done. I've read of many success
stories.

So, our monthly bill has gone from $120 to $16*
(*plus PPV shows). It would take a lot of PPV
shows to lose that monthly $104 advantage.

We'll see how this experiment goes.

 

Great consumer tips here. The roku and Netflix are great. I also got amazon prime for the free books. My wife loves to read. The other thing to look at is to combine your telephone, internet, and cable into a bundle. We found fios bundled (cable plus phone plus internet) was close to the same amount as just phone and internet separately.

I still keep my over-the-air set up for emergencies.

 

I too rock the streaming content primarily. Roku in the living room. Wii in one kid's room, App-ed Blu-Ray in the other, and my laptop in the den. I have the cable I once had...still connected to my t.v., and I set the t.v. to do a channel search off whatever was coming off the wire. I was REALLY surprised the amount of HD channels and...well, channels in general. So that is what we watch. Not hurtin one bit.

 

PS3 and Netflix!