Considering moving back to OTA - HDHR still the best ATSC tuner?

[brb84]

So I just discovered I can get AT&T fiber at my house. This could finally be the thing that pushes me over the edge to drop Comcast altogether. But before I can do that, I need to get things working with an antenna picking up the basic channels (which is all I use Comcast for anyway).

I'm super disappointed my InfiniTV card doesn't support ATSC. It's been 7 years or so since I've looked at tuners that do support it. Doesn't seem like much has changed. HDHomeRun is still out there, although $130 for just two tuners seems insane. Ironically, I sold my old HDHR's a couple years to buy the Ceton card because Comcast started encrypting the local channels. Maybe I'll just wait and get a couple cheap ones from eBay...any thoughts from anyone else?

[Taddeusz]

Is this the same thing as AT&T Uverse?

I've seen Uverse in my area and I'm not at all impressed. Video quality, to me, is really bad. Lots of compression artifacts. etc.

The other thing to note about the service is that your TV viewing cuts into your available internet bandwidth.

These are the reasons we've stuck with Cox Cable. I don't foresee us getting rid of cable either. There are times when we just want to channel surf.

[brb84]

Originally Posted by Taddeusz

Is this the same thing as AT&T Uverse?

Nope. This is their new fiber service they're calling GigaPower. I'm one of the lucky few who already have it available in my neighborhood (which is super odd because I'm kinda in the middle of nowhere, TN).

I've got friends that have it locally, and their speed tests show about 950Gb down!

My plan would be to just drop Comcast, use antenna/ATSC tuner for TV and AT&T for the sweet, sweet fiber Internet, so TV sharing bandwidth would not be an issue.

[Taddeusz]

Originally Posted by brb84

Nope. This is their new fiber service they're calling GigaPower. I'm one of the lucky few who already have it available in my neighborhood (which is super odd because I'm kinda in the middle of nowhere, TN).

I've got friends that have it locally, and their speed tests show about 950Gb down!

My plan would be to just drop Comcast, use antenna/ATSC tuner for TV and AT&T for the sweet, sweet fiber Internet, so TV sharing bandwidth would not be an issue.

I bet it's probably using the same video tech. You just get a fatter pipe.

[brb84]

That's possible, but again - I don't care about their video tech. I'd only use it for Internet.

[Taddeusz]

I see.

As far as tuners go we have 2 HDHR's hooked to one of these in the attic:

http://www.amazon.com/RCA-Compact-Ou...9871445&sr=1-1

One is the older beige model. The other is the single input "newer" black model. Neither are the new fancy ones that can do realtime transcoding. They work really well and with that antenna can pick up everything in our viewing area.

I had been using Cox for locals but I had been noticing some pretty serious reception glitches that I eventually realized were most likely problems with their reception, not ours'. Now much happier with the recordings we get.

[brb84]

That's awesome, thanks. My co-worker just linked me that antenna earlier today. Seems to be really solid - will try it out.

Guess I"ll be watching eBay for some cheap HDHR duals.

[JustFred]

I've used (and continue to use) a mixture of the HDHRs (various vintages) and Hauppauge 2250 dual tuners cards. I find they both perform equally well for OTA.

I have several setups and my choice for internal vs external is dependent on such things as number of open PCIe slots and how close the tuner will be to the coax cable. One system has a pair of HDHRs that aren't on a UPS; that sometimes causes issues when there's a brown-out. The PCIe cards don't suffer from the same problem and they aren't subject to flaky/dying wall-warts.

In general, I find software installation and config is a bit easier with the choice of an internal tuner. All my Sage boxes are running Windows. I didn't see mention of whether you're running Windows vs Linux, which might skew the decision.

[dgeezer]

I've been OTA for about a year now. The latest tuners from SiliconDust seem to have a bit better tuners than the earlier ones. Especially when trying to deal with multipath signals.

I experimented a bunch but now have 2 directional antennas in my attic attached to two separate HDHomerun dual tuner boxes. Half of my stations come from due south and are about 5 miles away. The other half are NW and about 40 miles away. I have each tuner set up in sagetv to only receive the channels in that direction. Check out tvfool to see what direction and distances your stations transmit.

My antenna for the distant stations is a cheap yagi type from Lowes, I think. The one for the close stations is a homemade bowtie made from about 3' of 10 gauge copper wire and a balun - total cost less than $3.00.

[jchiso]

The HDHomerun Connect (HDHR4) is a pretty straightforward device that easily lets you add two OTA tuners to a SageTV server. The tuners are really improved at receiving signals compared to the prior-generation OTA tuners. The device is also DLNA capable, so it works with Kodi, Android viewer apps, and Smart TVs; so you could pause or replay live TV without any additional hardware. These units generally go for $70-$80 ...

[pjpjpjpj]

Exact setup as dgeezer here. Built a shelf and installed a power receptacle in a hall closet right below my attic for my hdhomeruns, to shorten coax runs. Both my antennas are homemade, the nearby tuner one is the 8 Bay "coat hanger" style infamous on YouTube (though done in copper), the one facing the farther city is a Gray-Hoverman style. The dual tuner hdhomeruns were about $85 at a local store. I'm lucky to be on a hill, and the tuners give me 90-100% strength almost all the time, year round.