# Newbie Need Help - Dropping Cable



## RCFlyerDan (Sep 9, 2014)

Hi All,

Hopefully this will be the start of a very long relationship ;-). Mid month, we are dropping Charter cable but keeping Charter Internet. With a wife and kids, the whole family is a little scared but I have promised them we will be just fine.....now I need your help to keep my promise lmao.

Ok, so I am very new to this. I am very handy and will have no problem hooking everything up but what I don't know is what I need. All the televisions have some sort of Internet device (laptop, Wifi DVD, Desktop, or Xbox) so I presume Netflix, Amazon, and Hulu wont be an issue. With Charter, I basically had two lines coming into my house from the street, split off to about 10-15 lines that are home-run throughout the house. I am guessing that the two Charter lines that came into my house supplied both Cable and Internet. I have identified the internet line (inside the house) and will connect the Charter lines to it to keep the internet going. My first question, will I benefit from, and is it even possible, to "T" the two Charter lines coming into my house into the one home-run that connects to the modem for internet?

Next, I am hoping to be able to use the existing wiring which consists of two splitters in the outside box ( originally connected to the two lines coming into the house from Charter), to run OTA programming to the 6 televisions in the house. I was originally looking at the Spectrumn 613 outdoor TV antennae (http://www.spectrumantenna.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=SP613&Click=564), and have already run two coaxial cables from my living room to the spillters outside to accomplish this. The box that comes with the Spectrum 613 has two TV outs. After reading this forum, i understand this may not be the best antenna for the job.

I am looking for any advice what so ever to get the best OTA programming to as many televisions as possible. I have attached my TVFool.com analysis because I read in another post this would be beneficial. I used a height of 30 feet in the analysis. This was a guesstimate.

Thanks in advance for any and all assistance,
Dan


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## Jim5506 (Jun 7, 2004)

All of your receivable stations are in the same direction, except for ABC and a Univision station that are to the north. The ABC signal is a duplicate of WSB on channel 31 so no rotator is needed at all.

If you have multiple TV's using a rotator can be a big problem - if the Mrs. is watching her show from Atlanta NBC and you turn the antenna to pick up another station, she may lose her signal - not good.

Buy an antenna from a major manufacturer, not a cheap Chinese piece of junk, with claims out of the wazoo. Most of these little antennas wit built in rotators are highly deficient in reception and try to over come that by amplifying the inadequate signal - silk purse out of a sow's ear type of thing.

Your signals are two edge, but relatively strong for 2 edge reception due to their nearness.

I would get a Winegard HD7694 at the least, maybe even an HD7696 or HD7698 especially if I'm splitting the signal over 3 or 4 or more TVs (every split cuts signal in half - 4 TVs each get 1/4 of the signal down the wire). These are large antennas, but for weak signal at the TV, you need large, not amplification

Point it toward the Atlanta towers and your ready to go.

30 ft up as in your TVFool report is OK, higher is better. Run your TVFool report at 45 ft and see if you get 1 edge or line of sight (LOS) signal.

If you get dropouts from the splitting, then you add a pre-amp at the antenna.

RCA has come out with a pretty good pre-amp recently and it's less than $30 if you need one - don't recall the exact model off the top of my head.


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## Cholly (Mar 22, 2004)

In addition to the Winegard antennas, you might want to check out the antennas from Antennas Direct. I have one of their ClearStream 2 antennas (bought directly form Antennas Direct), mounted on the side of my garage, about 10 feet above ground. Currently, it's feeding two TV's in my house via a simple 2 output splitter. I receive over 12 stations (plus their subchannels) with no problem whatsoever. I get all 4 major networks, plus 2 public TV channels, CW, MyTV and an independent. Many of these stations are over 30 miles away, according to TVFool. One of the PBS channels is on VHF channel 11, is 17 miles away and reception is perfect even though the antenna is designed for UHF.
The ClearStream 4 is a longer range antenna.
With 6 TV's to feed, I'd recommend you check out their CDA8 8 output distribution amplifier as well.

www.antennasdirect com.

The antennas and amplifier I mentioned are also available from Amazon. Some of the Winegards are available from Home Depot.


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