DSS?
melp...@cruzio.com
I'm getting tired of paying TCI. Has anyone gotten one of the small
dishes, like DSS?
How do you like it? How much is it? What do you get? Do you get
NBC, CBS or ABC?
--Mel
melp...@cruzio.com
Tim May
In article <35892a94...@cnews.newsguy.com>, melp...@cruzio.com
(melp...@cruzio.com) wrote:
> I'm getting tired of paying TCI. Has anyone gotten one of the small
> dishes, like DSS?
>
> How do you like it? How much is it? What do you get? Do you get
> NBC, CBS or ABC?
I've had DSS for a couple of years. I like it a lot.
Many advantages over TCI or Sonic:
-- almost no outages
-- almost no problems (it's a relief not having to call TCI to complain
and listen to their proposed work schedule)
-- no lobbying to get them to add a channel, and no local "politics"
(For example, I get the Playboy Channel, while TCI would not be "allowed"
by the local regulating committee to add it, and complaints would pour in,
and so on.)
-- lots of channels, of course. At a price.
-- the networks are carried for both east coast and west coast feeds, so I
can catch an NBC show out of New York. Fox and PBS are only carried from
the east coast feed, so this means Fox shows only come on 3 hours
earlier...I've gotten used to watching "The X Files" at 6 p.m.
Disadvantages:
-- those lots of channels add up in price. One can get reduced packages, though.
-- local broadcasts are not carried
-- the network affiliates are only gotten if one makes the claim that
reception is not acceptable, and the networks may decide to send a signal
measurement crew out to check. Here in Corralitos, I get poor reception on
some of the networks, over the air, so I said I qualified. In Santa Cruz
they may have already done a signal strength test and may refuse it.
(One can feed a normal antenna into the back of the DSS and then use the
remote to switch it in.)
That's about it.
--Tim
--
Just Say No to "Big Brother Inside"
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
ComSec 3DES: 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
Higher Power: 2^3,021,377 | black markets, collapse of governments.
john r pierce
melp...@cruzio.com (melp...@cruzio.com) wrote:
>I'm getting tired of paying TCI. Has anyone gotten one of the small
>dishes, like DSS?
>
>How do you like it? How much is it? What do you get? Do you get
>NBC, CBS or ABC?
I have a Dish Network system. Unless you are a NFL junkie, the programming is
as good or better than DSS and slightly cheaper. I'm getting the 'top 60'
selection + PBS (~$30/month), I can get NBC/CBS/ABC/FOX off the air with a good
pair of rabbit ears (i.e. 8/11/35/46... I really don't watch that much of them
anyways). Overall I'm pretty happy with it. We don't go in for pay-per-view so
we don't have to hook up a phone line (although if we ever want to run a 2nd
reciever, we will need to hook them both up to the phone so they will
synchronize).
The dish was surprisingly easy to setup and aim (I have a very large overhang on
my roof so I couldn't mount it directly to the siding of the house, so I drove
in a long chunk of 1 3/4" schedule 40 galvanized pipe, U bolted it to the eaves
for stability, and the dish mount just slipped right onto the top, plus the 12'
pipe elevated the dish above the trees obscuring the satellite).
The picture quality and sound is excellent. I find myself more frequently
watching IFC (Independent Film Channel), Bravo, and AMC (American Movie
Classics), these all show a eclectic mix of art films (last night West Side
Story was on unedited in letterbox with no commercial breaks on AMC). The
kidlets love Discovery, Nick, Disney, etc.
I have mine hooked up to a surround sound system (which is primarily for my
laserdisk/DVD player), and ALL channels have clear stereo (last time I was on
cable, virtually NO stereo survived the cable munge).
We opted for the Dish 5000 reciever which has a broadcast tuner in it to
(channels 008, 011, etc are the local broadcast channels) as well as a aux input
(composite/s-video). Now that I have a A/V reciever, this is of less value, I
almost wish I'd gotten the more basic dish reciever with the IR remote control
as I can't program any of my other universal remotes to run the RF remote of the
Dish reciever. I think I'm up to 5 or 6 remotes (arg!), Dish, Yamaha AV
Reciever, Pioneer LD/DVD, Sony S-VHS VCR, Sony Hi8 VCR, and the TV Monitor
itself. The Yamaha remote can run everything BUT the Dish.
My channel lineup is: USA, Comedy Central, A&E, History, SciFi, BET (Black
Entertainment, some good Jazz and Comedy occasionally), TCM (Turner Classic
Movies), TNT, ROIF (Romance Movies / Independant Film Channel), ESPN, ESPN2,
ESPNwest, MTV, MTV2, VH1, CMT (Country Music), TNN, Nickelodeon, NICK west,
Disney, Disney west, Cartoon network, The Learning Channel, Family, Discovery,
Animal, CNN, HNN, CourtTV, CNNfn (financial news), CNBC, CSPAN, CSPAN2, TWC
(Weather), Travel, TBS, WGN, PBS, FoxSports Bay Area (go Giants!), FSBA2, FSBA3,
Nick TVland, Life, Food, Home&Garden, E!, Game.
Glen Appleby
On Fri, 19 Jun 1998 16:05:46 GMT, anti...@here.not (john r
pierce) wrote:
>We opted for the Dish 5000 reciever which has a broadcast tuner in it to
>(channels 008, 011, etc are the local broadcast channels) as well as a aux input
>(composite/s-video). Now that I have a A/V reciever, this is of less value, I
>almost wish I'd gotten the more basic dish reciever with the IR remote control
>as I can't program any of my other universal remotes to run the RF remote of the
>Dish reciever. I think I'm up to 5 or 6 remotes (arg!), Dish, Yamaha AV
>Reciever, Pioneer LD/DVD, Sony S-VHS VCR, Sony Hi8 VCR, and the TV Monitor
>itself. The Yamaha remote can run everything BUT the Dish.
Yikes, John -- do you have room left in any of your walls for AC
wiring?
--
Do not underestimate your abilities. That is your boss's job.
It is your job to find ways around your boss's roadblocks.
______________________________________________________________
Glen Appleby gl...@mtnweb.com <http://www.armory.com/~glena/>
Jeff Liebermann
On Fri, 19 Jun 1998 16:05:46 GMT, anti...@here.not (john r
pierce) wrote:
>selection + PBS (~$30/month), I can get NBC/CBS/ABC/FOX off the air with a good
>pair of rabbit ears (i.e. 8/11/35/46... I really don't watch that much of them
You may have some difficulty getting Channel 11 for a few days.
Their antenna on Loma Prieta fell down. Here's a picture of
what's left:
http://www.cruzio.com/~jeffl/album/kntv.jpg
Probably termites.
--
Jeff Liebermann 150 Felker St #D Santa Cruz CA 95060
(408)699-0483 pgr (408)426-1240 fax (408)336-2558 home
http://www.cruzio.com/~jeffl WB6SSY
je...@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us je...@cruzio.com
Tim May
In article <358a94e...@news.mtnweb.com>, gl...@mtnweb.com (Glen
Appleby) wrote:
> On Fri, 19 Jun 1998 16:05:46 GMT, anti...@here.not (john r
> pierce) wrote:
>
> >We opted for the Dish 5000 reciever which has a broadcast tuner in it to
> >(channels 008, 011, etc are the local broadcast channels) as well as a
aux input
> >(composite/s-video). Now that I have a A/V reciever, this is of less
value, I
> >almost wish I'd gotten the more basic dish reciever with the IR remote
control
> >as I can't program any of my other universal remotes to run the RF
remote of the
> >Dish reciever. I think I'm up to 5 or 6 remotes (arg!), Dish, Yamaha AV
> >Reciever, Pioneer LD/DVD, Sony S-VHS VCR, Sony Hi8 VCR, and the TV Monitor
> >itself. The Yamaha remote can run everything BUT the Dish.
>
> Yikes, John -- do you have room left in any of your walls for AC
> wiring?
As usual, Glen appears to be living in another century, or at least on
another (south of the Equator) continent.
My stereo/t.v rack has a 32-inch t.v., A/V amp, DAT machine, DAT portable,
CD player, DSS receiver, VHS deck, S-VHS deck, cassette machine, CD
player, FM tuner. All run smoothly off the same power strip. Total use of
wall sockets: 1.
My upstairs system is a bit smaller, but not a whole lot smaller.
(And my house has a pair of a.c. receptacles about every 8-10 feet, which
I believe is recent "code.")
--Tim May
john r pierce
je...@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us (Jeff Liebermann) wrote:
>On Fri, 19 Jun 1998 16:05:46 GMT, anti...@here.not (john r
>pierce) wrote:
>
>>selection + PBS (~$30/month), I can get NBC/CBS/ABC/FOX off the air with a good
>>pair of rabbit ears (i.e. 8/11/35/46... I really don't watch that much of them
>
>You may have some difficulty getting Channel 11 for a few days.
>Their antenna on Loma Prieta fell down. Here's a picture of
>what's left:
> http://www.cruzio.com/~jeffl/album/kntv.jpg
>Probably termites.
I didn't know termites ate metal! :)
Actually, I was getting a signal on 11 last night, but its pretty cruddy now. I
believe they rigged up a temporary xmitter, or I'm picking up their Monterey
repeater or something?
Hey, Jeff... RF-man! question for ya... Have you seen this hightech powered TV
antenna that Radio Shack sells which looks like a large dipole (about 6' long
end to end, basically a flattened 2" wide tube or so), it has some sort of
active amplifier, you mount it on the side of your house up under the eaves, its
nearly omnidirectional (ok, a major dip colinear with the arms, duh!) ? I've
heard from several folks that these work great, pull in signals folks didn't
know they could get. It comes with a RF mixer/seperator so you can put it on
the LNB RG6 cable that comes down from a satellite minidish, then pull out the
VHF/UHF seperataly from the sat dish signal. They sell for about $100.
-jrp
john r pierce
je...@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us (Jeff Liebermann) wrote:
>On Fri, 19 Jun 1998 16:05:46 GMT, anti...@here.not (john r
>pierce) wrote:
>
>>selection + PBS (~$30/month), I can get NBC/CBS/ABC/FOX off the air with a good
>>pair of rabbit ears (i.e. 8/11/35/46... I really don't watch that much of them
>
>You may have some difficulty getting Channel 11 for a few days.
>Their antenna on Loma Prieta fell down. Here's a picture of
>what's left:
> http://www.cruzio.com/~jeffl/album/kntv.jpg
>Probably termites.
Ah, said TV antenna is right here...
http://www.radioshack.com/Products/Flyers98/June/Booklets/f564p22-23-24-25.pdf
(sorry, its acrobutt format)... Its the "Discrete Amplified Antenna". They
refer to the cable mixers as 'diplexers'
Anyways, do you have any knowlege/comments/opinions on these?
-jrp
Glen Appleby
On Fri, 19 Jun 1998 20:18:40 -0700, tc...@got.net (Tim May)
wrote:
>In article <358a94e...@news.mtnweb.com>, gl...@mtnweb.com (Glen
>Appleby) wrote:
>> Yikes, John -- do you have room left in any of your walls for AC
>> wiring?
>
>As usual, Glen appears to be living in another century, or at least on
>another (south of the Equator) continent.
>
>My stereo/t.v rack has a 32-inch t.v., A/V amp, DAT machine, DAT portable,
>CD player, DSS receiver, VHS deck, S-VHS deck, cassette machine, CD
>player, FM tuner. All run smoothly off the same power strip. Total use of
>wall sockets: 1.
>
>My upstairs system is a bit smaller, but not a whole lot smaller.
>
>(And my house has a pair of a.c. receptacles about every 8-10 feet, which
>I believe is recent "code.")
When Y2K takes out the power infrastructure, it looks like your
power requirements are gonna be a *lot* steeper than mine are.
Yer gonna have to start breeding a mass of *huge* hamsters to
turn the wheel to run your generator when gas/diesel/propane
becomes unavailable.
The best part is that after a hard day of laying in the hot tub
and you want to come in and turn on the TV, the snow will come in
*so* well, because the transmitters won't have power either.
Jeff Liebermann
On Sat, 20 Jun 1998 02:23:06 GMT, anti...@here.not (john r
pierce) wrote:
>je...@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us (Jeff Liebermann) wrote:
>Actually, I was getting a signal on 11 last night, but its pretty cruddy now. I
>believe they rigged up a temporary xmitter, or I'm picking up their Monterey
>repeater or something?
If you're seeing something on Channel 11, it's not coming from
Loma Prieta. I can see Loma out my window and there's nothing on
Channel 11.
>Hey, Jeff... RF-man!
That's ARF, as in woof, bow-wow, arf and howl.
>question for ya... Have you seen this hightech powered TV
>antenna that Radio Shack sells which looks like a large dipole
Radio Shack and high tech in the same sentence? Surely an
oxymoron at best. I'm still downloading the 844KB PDF file at
500 bytes/sec (Metricom at its worst). It should be done
tomorrow.
>(about 6' long
>end to end, basically a flattened 2" wide tube or so), it has some sort of
>active amplifier, you mount it on the side of your house up under the eaves, its
>nearly omnidirectional (ok, a major dip colinear with the arms, duh!) ? I've
>heard from several folks that these work great, pull in signals folks didn't
>know they could get. It comes with a RF mixer/seperator so you can put it on
>the LNB RG6 cable that comes down from a satellite minidish, then pull out the
>VHF/UHF seperataly from the sat dish signal. They sell for about $100.
I built something like that about 1977 BC (Before Cable). The
new MMIC (Mini Microwave Integrated Circuits) and low noise
GaAsFET's make it much easier. The basic idea is to put the RF
amplifier as close to the antenna as possible. Any kind of
antenna will do as there is no sane way to build a broadband
horizontally polarized antenna that will work from 54 to 800MHz
and still have reasonable pattern, gain and VSWR. Therefore, you
start with a convenient length of wire, characterize it to the
last decimal point, and spend a few zillion clock cycles
calculating a matching network. It actually turns out to be
rather a rather simple design. You then mix the signal with your
satellite feed (hint: off the air tv is 54->800Mhz, satellite
block downlconvert is 950-1450Mhz, so there's room).
However, placing it at a random location is guaranteed to screw
up performance. You'll get reflections from anything metal
around, the pattern will look like a mess, and the presence of
the 850-1450 signal on the same coax might cause intermod.
Mounting it under the eves is mechanically convenient, but an
electrical abomination if you have any metal nearby (rain
gutters?). The direction is also important as the dipole has
zero gain in two directions. Getting a signal from the direction
of the house (through the house) seems more than improbable.
Theoretically, the perfromance should be far worse than a decent
amplified rooftope TV antenna and rotator.
What bugs me is the claim that it will "pull in signals folks
didn't know they could get". This is the famous "my product is
better" claim, where there's no clue as what it's better than. I
don't believe it.
There's nothing inherent in this scheme that provides any level
of superior performance. There also has to be a minimum level of
signal to work with. You can't amplify a signal that isn't
there. If you're compareing this scheme with a pair of indoor
rabbit ears or one of those rip-off radar dish like set-top
amplified antennas abominations, I can see where moving the
antenna outdoors would produce new stations. However, a decent
amplified antenna and rotator is far superior to this
contraption, especially mounted under the house eves. Yech.
If I had to recommend an antenna, it would be a reflector backed
bow-tie antenna for UHF only. These look like a flat barbeque
grill with a metal bow tie in front. Stick a decent MMIC
amplifier at the antenna and plant it on top of a rotator. Feed
it with RG6u (not RG59u) and point it where you want to view.
I'll go into why commercial yagi TV antennas suck in another
tirade.
Still downloading the PDF file. Maybe tomorrow.
Julian Macassey
In article <358be06...@news.ricochet.net>,
Jeff Liebermann <je...@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us> wrote:
snippo
>I'll go into why commercial yagi TV antennas suck in another
>tirade.
Please do.
I have only seen Yagi TV antennas at Cable Company head
ends. The only antennas I have ever tracked down for TV use are
what I would call modified Log Periodics.
Yes, Log Periodics suck if gain is what you want. But,
they are broadbanded. So are a "no brain" install.
Now in Europe, where there are fewer TV stations, Yagis
are more common for TV reception.
--
"People like Julian Macassey are a big reason why I own guns."
Francis A. Ney, Jr <cro...@access.digex.net>
Jeff Liebermann
On 20 Jun 1998 13:57:05 -0500, jul...@bongo.tele.com (Julian
Macassey) wrote:
>In article <358be06...@news.ricochet.net>,
>Jeff Liebermann <je...@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us> wrote:
>snippo
>>I'll go into why commercial yagi TV antennas suck in another
>>tirade.
> Please do.
Groan. I write all that stuff on the Radio Shock antenna thing
and this is what I get. Do you at least agree with my analysis
of that Radio Shack antenna thing?
> I have only seen Yagi TV antennas at Cable Company head
>ends. The only antennas I have ever tracked down for TV use are
>what I would call modified Log Periodics.
I'll meet you half way. On my neighbors roof is one that vaguely
resembles a log periodic with a rather odd looking reflector for
UHF blocking the signal to the VHF log periodic section and with
some kind of fixed frequency yagi ahead of it apparently tuned
for the middle of the UHF band. No clue what this conglomeration
should be called. I have a Radio Shock UHF only yagi contraption
(Cat. No. 15-2160) on my roof which vaguely resembles the yagi
portion of my neighbors conglomeration. One dipole driven
element, no attempt at broad-banding, and lousy performance.
I burned some time trying to model this antenna with Elnec and
NECWIN http://www.nittany-scientific.com. I'm not sure if I have
it right, but the antenna sucks big time. On the UHF channels I
watch (35,44,47,57,65), the pattern looks more like a cloverleaf
than a cartoid, the input-Z varies from 100 to 900 ohms (and
never gets near 75ohms), and the gain is about the same as an
ordinary dipole. To confirm my suspicions, I replaced the beast
with an ordinary dipole the same length as the driven elements.
No obvious difference in reception. When I replaced the dipole
with a biconical dipole (two aluminium funnels with the large
ends pointed opposite directions), reception actually improved.
Drivel: I'm familiar with what's at the TCI head end in Bonny
Dune. There's only one or two channels that they currently suck
off the air (plus some FM broadcast). For VHF, they use fixed
frequency yagis. For UHF, they use Scala parabolic bird cage
reflectors with a dipole feed. The main issue is side lobes to
avoid hearing other stations on the same channel. The higher up
you are, the more crud you'll hear.
> Yes, Log Periodics suck if gain is what you want. But,
>they are broadbanded. So are a "no brain" install.
Some brains are still required. Even the best antenna, connected
to a high loss coax cable, with an amplifier at the TV instead of
the antenna, is not going to work too well. The real problem
with the V shaped log periodic is that it has 4db of gain. The
nice thing is that it has 4db gain over the entire TV band. This
makes it a real good antenna at the low VHF frequencies (CH 2-6),
a tolerable antenna at the high VHF channels (CH 7-13), and a
wasted effort at UHF (CH 14-83) where an equal size corner
reflector, bow tie antenna, horizontal bow tie, or other
reasonable antenna would do as well and occupy less space. This
is why you find conglomerant antennas that attempt to take
advantage of the best technology for specific frequency range.
More drivel: I also have an FM broadcast band yagi, model AF-W7,
on my roof. However, this one is unique in that it was
manufactured by none other than the "Yagi Antenna Co., LTD" of
Tokyo. The rapidly fadeing blueprinted docs are quite
impressive. I think it's probably some kind of collectors item.
I guess I'm suppose to explain why I prefer a bow tie driven
element with a barbeque grill reflector as a UHF TV antenna.
Later. I wanna re-read the section in: "Antenna Engineering
Handbook" by Henry Jasik (1961) before I say something wrong.
> Now in Europe, where there are fewer TV stations, Yagis
>are more common for TV reception.
They also run lower power, tend to be furthur away, are located
closer to the ground, and tend to be scattered at all directions
of the compass. This was the situation in Israel where the
typical apartment building would have 4-6 antennas per apartment
(i.e. about 20 per rooftop) to deal with this.
If you ever want some fascinating reading, I have the original
study for determining "standards" in a "radio physics" for TV
(somewhere). Many of the stupid antenna problems would have been
eliminated if TV used vertical polarization instead of
horizontal. However, there were far too many power, telegraph,
and telephone wires in the way to effectively use vertical so the
NTSC picked horizontal. It became a non-issue when TV went to
higher VHF and UHF frequencies, but horizontal polarization
stayed to haunt us. Many of the UHF stations actually have a
substantial vertically polarized component. I once built a
vertical colinear TV antenna for hiding in a treetop that worked
reasonably well.
Now, go away so I can rebuild yet another stupid ham repeater.
Jeff Liebermann
On Sat, 20 Jun 1998 02:29:23 GMT, anti...@here.not (john r
pierce) wrote:
>Ah, said TV antenna is right here...
>http://www.radioshack.com/Products/Flyers98/June/Booklets/f564p22-23-24-25.pdf
Still downloading... Yawn.
>(sorry, its acrobutt format)... Its the "Discrete Amplified Antenna". They
>refer to the cable mixers as 'diplexers'
Diplexers are frequency band seperation filters. The idea is to
make whatever is hung on one port invisible to the other port and
visa versa. It's not really a mixer. Think of it as a kind of
passive frequency adder or summer where each input port is
visible only in one band of frequencies. The common VHF-UHF TV
"splitters" are a good example. The RS antenna contraption is
not mixing as there are no new frequencies being generated
(mixing means multiplication). Rather, it adds a new band of
frequencies (54-800MHz) to the satellite receiver IF band
(950-1450MHz). Hopefully, this is done without any
intermodulation products which would be the results if they were
"mixed" instead of "added".
>Anyways, do you have any knowlege/comments/opinions on these?
You have to ask? I have opinions about everything.
Jefferson Airplane is now playing at Highlands Park. I'm 2.2
miles (airline) away and it's like LOUD and clear. Cool...
Julian Macassey
In article <358c50c4...@news.ricochet.net>,
Jeff Liebermann <je...@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us> wrote:
>On 20 Jun 1998 13:57:05 -0500, jul...@bongo.tele.com (Julian
>Macassey) wrote:
>
>>In article <358be06...@news.ricochet.net>,
>>Jeff Liebermann <je...@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us> wrote:
>>snippo
>
>and this is what I get. Do you at least agree with my analysis
>of that Radio Shack antenna thing?
Of course I do. I agree with you re modified Log-Periodic
TV antennas too.
>
>I'll meet you half way. On my neighbors roof is one that vaguely
>resembles a log periodic with a rather odd looking reflector for
>UHF blocking the signal to the VHF log periodic section and with
>some kind of fixed frequency yagi ahead of it apparently tuned
>for the middle of the UHF band. No clue what this conglomeration
>should be called.
Modified Log-Periodic.
I agree most "gain" antennas sold to TV viewers can be
out performed by a dipole and beaten handily by a reflector
antenna at UHF.
>
>> Yes, Log Periodics suck if gain is what you want. But,
>>they are broadbanded. So are a "no brain" install.
>
>Some brains are still required. Even the best antenna, connected
>to a high loss coax cable, with an amplifier at the TV instead of
>the antenna, is not going to work too well.
Sure, you can do a poor installation of any antenna and
negate any gain you could have had. But, when throwing up a TV
antenna, you can just grab the wideband antenna and claim you
have done the job. That's where the "no brains" comes in. In
rural situations here in the US (Called "fringe" in the days
before cable), they sold lots of big modified Yagis and for the
one or two stations that people wanted, they would have done a
better job with real Yagis.
> The real problem
>with the V shaped log periodic is that it has 4db of gain. The
>nice thing is that it has 4db gain over the entire TV band.
But in many cases hardly worth the bother for that 4dB. I
have always considered that for the "Dollars per dB" ratio
Log-Periodics really suck.
> This
>makes it a real good antenna at the low VHF frequencies (CH 2-6),
>a tolerable antenna at the high VHF channels (CH 7-13), and a
>wasted effort at UHF (CH 14-83) where an equal size corner
>reflector, bow tie antenna, horizontal bow tie, or other
>reasonable antenna would do as well and occupy less space. This
>is why you find conglomerant antennas that attempt to take
>advantage of the best technology for specific frequency range.
Yeah, sucks on all frequencies. Obviously asking one
antenna to cover everything from 50 to 1,000 MHz and provide good
gain is a tall order. Only people like you would consider having
a roof that looked like a Russian trawler. You know that most
civilians consider antennas unnecessary. They are ugly and they
can always show a poorly performing device to "prove" that
antennas aren't needed.
As an aside, I have an AM radio with an outside random
wire (long wire - but it isn't) antenna. It pulls in stuff that
no portable AM (loopstick) antenna can get. Yes, antennas work.
>
>More drivel: I also have an FM broadcast band yagi, model AF-W7,
>on my roof. However, this one is unique in that it was
>manufactured by none other than the "Yagi Antenna Co., LTD" of
>Tokyo.
And in places like LA, a good Yagi with a killer F/B
ratio helps with multipath, adjacent channel crud etc.
>I guess I'm suppose to explain why I prefer a bow tie driven
>element with a barbeque grill reflector as a UHF TV antenna.
Why? the bow tie has a good "K factor" and the reflector
provides some gain and a good F/B ratio. Nothing to explain. They
even work at VHF, they just get really big.
>
>If you ever want some fascinating reading, I have the original
>study for determining "standards" in a "radio physics" for TV
>(somewhere). Many of the stupid antenna problems would have been
>eliminated if TV used vertical polarization instead of
>horizontal.
In Europe, they use both horizontal and vertical. The
reasoning for this is to avoid co-channel interference from
distant stations. Of course should there be sporadic E or
Tropospheric ducting, polarity tends to wander about and negate the
advantage of polarity diversity.
>Many of the UHF stations actually have a
>substantial vertically polarized component. I once built a
>vertical colinear TV antenna for hiding in a treetop that worked
>reasonably well.
This could also be because many UHF stations IIRC now
have circular polarisation. I think that may also be true of
FM-VHF broadcast too - because of all those vertical car
antennas. Traditionally FM broadcast has been horizontal. I did
once see a horizontal FM broadcast on an Italian tourist bus.
>
>Now, go away so I can rebuild yet another stupid ham repeater.
If you have the time, you could look at the audio
distortion of my local repeater. But it has been bad for so long
that the geezers think it is supposed to sound that way.
Jeff Liebermann
On 21 Jun 1998 03:42:30 -0500, jul...@bongo.tele.com (Julian
Macassey) wrote:
> Of course I do. I agree with you re modified Log-Periodic
>TV antennas too.
Likewise. If I don't comment on something, I usually agree with
it.
>>No clue what this conglomeration
>>should be called.
> Modified Log-Periodic.
Naw. If it doesn't sound high tech or have a catchy acronym,
it's not going to sell. I was thinking of something like "RAID"
(Random Antenna of Imaginative Design). I have about 5 books on
antenna design all of which have mercifully ignored an analysis
of the typical Radio Shack TV antenna.
> I agree most "gain" antennas sold to TV viewers can be
>out performed by a dipole and beaten handily by a reflector
>antenna at UHF.
Worse. I've heard numerous rumors that at some antenna
measurement party, the 2nd place winner was a 6ft aluminum step
ladder with a rather unusual matching section. I don't know if
this is urban legend or fact. I can see it now; "Turn your
aluminum step ladder into a high performance TV antenna".
>have done the job. That's where the "no brains" comes in. In
>rural situations here in the US (Called "fringe" in the days
>before cable), they sold lots of big modified Yagis and for the
>one or two stations that people wanted, they would have done a
>better job with real Yagis.
Yep. I used to drive to Smog Angeles regularly. I would pass
through the area between King City and Paso Robles and see
several 100ft towers with the largest TV antenna available. One
day, I decided to pull over and look at the top with my
binoculars. No amplifier visible and fed with foam dielectric
twinlead wrapped to one leg of the tower. A pair of rabbit ears
would have worked as well.
>a roof that looked like a Russian trawler. You know that most
>civilians consider antennas unnecessary. They are ugly and they
>can always show a poorly performing device to "prove" that
>antennas aren't needed.
Yep. Microflect has a series of "disguise" cell/paging towers
and antenna farms. The "building" on Mt Tam looks like a
fiberglass flying saucer. All the antennas are inside. I've
seen cell site antennas diguised as a tree. Ugly is becomeing a
real problem.
I could design a proper TV antenna. It would be big, ugly,
messy, complex, expensive, awkward, difficult to install, etc,
and work better than anything around. The technology is actually
trivial. However, nobody would buy it. The few lunatics that
did install it would probably have the neighbors protesting.
Little wonder cable and pizza dishes are popular.
> Why? the bow tie has a good "K factor" and the reflector
>provides some gain and a good F/B ratio. Nothing to explain. They
>even work at VHF, they just get really big.
Don't forget enormous bandwidth, an almost constant impedance,
exellent F/B ratio to eliminate ghosts, and cheap. You're right
about the size. A proper reflector for either a bow tie or
corner reflector is 1 wavelength on each side. At Channel 2
(54-60MHz), that's about 15ft on each side. It's fine for UHF
but forget it for VHF.
>>Now, go away so I can rebuild yet another stupid ham repeater.
> If you have the time, you could look at the audio
>distortion of my local repeater. But it has been bad for so long
>that the geezers think it is supposed to sound that way.
I hate to admit that the link audio between two systems I
maintain in Santa Cruz sucks. I've been "planning" to fix it for
about 3 years but could never get enough time or equipment to
figure out where I blew it. I now have a pink noise generator
and spectrum analyzer so I can do it right. It's next on my
list. The current problem is that the local 6 meter repeater
died (GE Master Pro) and I stupidly volunteered to fix it.
Instead, I'm rebuilding it. Too many problems. It's mostly
working and as expected, the link audio has problems (although
the local repeat audio is fine). Are you sure you want me
working on yours?
john r pierce
je...@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us (Jeff Liebermann) wrote:
>Jefferson Airplane is now playing at Highlands Park. I'm 2.2
>miles (airline) away and it's like LOUD and clear. Cool...
Were the Starship any good? I used to be a BIG fan of the Airplane circa
1968... 'Sunday Afternoon' in the Panhandle, they was out on a flatbed jamming
nearly every week. Never much cared for them after the breakup, without Jorma
and Jack it just wasn't the same.
-jrp
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This posting has a invalid email address to discourage bulk emailers
Due to the ever increasing volumes of spam, I do not mix mail and news
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Jeff Liebermann
On Mon, 22 Jun 1998 15:08:10 GMT, anti...@here.not (john r
pierce) wrote:
>je...@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us (Jeff Liebermann) wrote:
>
>>Jefferson Airplane is now playing at Highlands Park. I'm 2.2
>>miles (airline) away and it's like LOUD and clear. Cool...
>
>Were the Starship any good? I used to be a BIG fan of the Airplane circa
>1968... 'Sunday Afternoon' in the Panhandle, they was out on a flatbed jamming
>nearly every week. Never much cared for them after the breakup, without Jorma
>and Jack it just wasn't the same.
Sorry. I meant the StarShip. It was kind hard to hear over the
various dogs howling and barking. I guess they liked it. I
certainly did. The last time I actually attended a Starship
concert was at SCO Forum 97 at UCSC where they were the featured
band. I certainly liked what I heard, but I'm culturaly deprived
and musically retarded (my tastes in classical music ends with
Rachmaninoff) so almost anything sounds good to me. Oh, I double
checked the distance and it's more like 1.0 miles.
Tim May
All this talk about DSS--Dean Stark Syndrome.
I know DSS is a recurring problem in this newsgroup, but there are things
to talk about besides Dean Stark!
Glen Appleby
On Tue, 23 Jun 1998 10:46:22 -0700, tc...@got.net (Tim May)
wrote:
>I know DSS is a recurring problem in this newsgroup, but there are things
>to talk about besides Dean Stark!
Yeah?
Prove it.
Bob O`Brien
Jeff Liebermann <je...@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us> wrote:
> (john r pierce) wrote:
>
>>Were the Starship any good?
>Sorry. I meant the StarShip.
You did? I thought I read that they changed the name *back*
several years ago.
Bob O`Bob
--
"What do you want to reinstall today?"