What is the channel of the station you are trying to receive?
How far away are you from the transmitter?
What kind of topology is around you? (Valley, hills, etc.)
How hign off the ground is your indoor antenna going t be placed?
Is the receiver a converter box or a late model digital TV?
Do you need the antenna for other channels, or just the one?
Why not an outdoor/attic antenna? Wife? Expense? Inconvenience?
I'm trying to receive channel 6.
The transmitter is less than 20 miles away.
I'm in South Texas. There's hardly any terrain.
The TV is just 3.5 years old with a built in ATSC tuner and HDTV display.
I could put the antenna up to 12 feet high indoors.
Hopefully the dispute will be resolved and the station will be added back to the Time-Warner lineup.
I don't like walking around on the roof. My center of gravity is a bit higher than it was 15 years ago. Also I'm recovering from foot surgery that was done on December 30. I'm not supposed to walk without crutches, and I don't think it would be a good idea to try moving around on the roof with crutches.
You shouldn’t need an amplifier/antenna. We have a fairly new flat-screen set more than 20 miles away from the station which gets great pictures from an old chimney antenna.
From twenty miles with no obstructions, a plain old set of rabbit ears with bow tie should pull in the signal perfectly. Don’t pay extra for a digital antenna, the old fashioned kind works just fine.
I have a DB2 antenna I made myself from 2x4's coat hangers and cookie cooler sheet that works pretty good inside the house.
Kind of like this one, but I used some chrome plated coat hangers for the elements and some stripped copper home wire to connect the matching transformer.
Then you just need to aim it correctly.
From what you described, ANY good quality indoor VHF antenna should do the job.
C. Crane recommends the Comet, but any old line brand (Winegard, Jerrold, Channel Master) should be fine. Terk seems to make a lot of cheap stuff.
I stringly second the idea of using good ol’ rabbit ears. The bigger the better. In the fancy rigs, the circles or loops are usually for UHF. That does nothing for you. Channel 6 is right in the middle of the VHF band, so you should be okay there. With rabbit ears, the higher the frequency (channel #), the smaller the length antenna.
If you have old plaster walls, brick, or concrete walls in the way, a longer line with rabbit ears and a waltz around the room to find a hot spot can work wonders.
Stay away from the signal amplifiers. They generally include things that inherently weaken the signal before it csn be amplified. Another poster pointed out that you can’t amplify what isn’t there. He’s right. Knobs and dials on the antenna also usually take more than they give. The fellow suggesting that you run a wire outside the window also has a good plan.
In the pre-digital days,