HD reception question
 

I am hooking up an antennae to get the Superbowl in HD (yes I have an HD TV:)) Anyway, I am getting not so great reception on the analog right now but since there's nothing on in HD right now the signal strength meter doesn't even register.

Is there any correlation between analog reception and HD? I've heard HD comes in much easier and even though I'm getting a bad signal now I'll likely get a good one during an HD broadcast. Is this true?

Anyone help here? This is driving me nuts.

When I go into my menu to see the signal strength the menu portion that shows signal strength is not selectable. Is this because there is no digital broadcast at the time or do I have something else screwed up?

Nevermind, I got it.

Well do tell, because we are having HD put in next week.....

If the station is not broadcasting in digital you cannot see the signal strength. Second, the channels have multiple sub channels. For instance my Fox affiliate is channel 17 but channel 17 is not digital. However when you're on channel 17 if you click up one channel it will go to 17.1 which IS the digital feed.

So when I kept flipping through the normal channels here (3, 8 and 13) I only got analog, but when I went up through the channels the sub channels appeared.

kinda weird.

Oh and to answer the other question, the digital signals come in where even a very weak analog channel exists. And then it's either crystal clear or not there at all.

How do the analog channels look with good signal strength on your HDTV? Mine used to look crummy, like watercolors (on cable).

On my plasma the directv SD feed looks pretty good. Less so on the ex's LCD.

I can't get HD off-air. I tried some cheap rabbit ears but it doesn't cut it. I won't upgrade to HD until I move.

All the DirecTV channels are digital, which I would think would look fine. My analog signals used to look like poop on my HDTV, but I have DirecTV now.

Why are you guys on DirectTV vs Comcast?

We are on Comcast at the moment, but just picked up a 1080P Sony, and are open to change if the HD offerings are better. Clear local channels are a 'must have' however....

The analog channel look like ass, in fact I have comcast analog cable and those look bad as well.

DVD's and now my digital over the air channels are fantastic.

Get dish network. You'll never look back.

My kids are telling me that plasma is now NOT the best route to go. Is that true?

When I switched, it was because all the channels were digital with DirecTV. Comcast's first 70-80 channels were analog, which doesn't look as good on an HDTV and is variable on picture quality. I tried Comcast's original HD converter box that had an HDMI output, and it constantly had to be restarted. Also, Comcast was nice enough to boost my cable internet to $50/mo as a reward for dropping the TV service. I really don't like that company and think they try to gouge consumers as much as they can.

Wait for this to shake out before going with Dish:

TiVO Patent Upheld, Dish May Have to Disable DVR.

Depends on a few variables. If you do a search you'll see this subject discussed at length.

I have a Plasma and I'm very happy with it. The biggest reason for me was the ability for true black that LCD couldn't do. But I am told that LCD is getting close now.

Also I read about some organic cell display that will be coming out in a year or two that will blow them both away (don't they always say that:))

Good resource:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/

Dealt with that too. I have 6mb dsl. Dsl carriers are also less concerned with downloads, I hear.

Use this site to get started:

http://antennaweb.org/aw/welcome.aspx

Click "choose an antenna" to get started. Input your address and you can get a list of the channels you can receive with color codes for the type of antenna needed to get them.

Very useful tool.