Antenna Placement Advice

Either the 800bv or 400bv (same technology). 800 is for dual connections. The VHF extension rods should help with ABC & FOX.

True, my 400BV gives me a solid signal on the Hi-VHF NBC station near me. I have the rods attached. My old Winegard Flatwave Air never could do that.

Do you have a balcony?

Very nice installation. Does this balcony face the antenna farm??

This photo is from an Antop promotional brochure. I do know one person who has done this successfully using flat coax to get under the door. I suspect that the success of the Antop antenna is in part due to the pleasing design of the antenna’s case which makes balcony mounting look fine.

It is a FAKE photo showing a poorly Photoshopped cutout of an Antop pasted to a stock photo of a balcony. Look no wires! Look at the shadow at the bottom of the Antop - Not real.

If you go to their website it seems all their photos are done this way “for illustration purposes.”

I did a reverse image search and here is that balcony shot without the Antop on multiple websites:

Balcony

http://anchoriron.com/gallery_railing_balcony.html

I thought the antenna was real but the house and balcony were fake…:wink:

I do have a small landing at the back door of my apartment that leads down to the shared yard where I could probably install something like this. I actually would be perfect since it would face right at the broadcast towers. But it would entail a long cable run, which I was trying to avoid. So, more food for thought on the best way to install an antenna.

The Antop comes with a preamp so a 100 foot cable run would be nothing for it. Here’s an interesting video of someone trying it in several places including a garden patio. From Tablo to router, are you using a wired or wifi connection which would influence your antenna placement?

And another placement vid:

I was in Home Depot for an unrelated errand today and came across this antenna: https://www.homedepot.com/p/RCA-Mini-Yagi-Antenna-ANT752Z/303087500.

I know y’all are all about the Antop, but I am on a bit of a budget, and I’m concerned about cable runs. I haven’t written the Antop off, by any means. Just exploring options.

At least the have a real photo of the antenna installed.

I think the Yagi is very directional. If your antennas are spread over a somewhat wider area you will need a multi-directional antenna like the Antop.

I have the Antop connected to my Tablo. But I have my old Winegard FlatWave Air FL6550A Amplified Digital Outdoor HDTV Antenna sitting on a bookcase in my office and hooked directly to a TV. Surprisingly it gets excellent reception and receives almost all the channels I get on the Antop even though it is facing a wall.

It is only $67.98 (USD) at Amazon: Winegard-FlatWave-FL6550A

Here is info on the Winegard site: Winegard Flatwave Air

Talking about internal flat panel antennas, Antennaman had a good review of the Mohu Supreme Pro ($80). He was pleasantly surprised how strong it was in his apartment. It has the shape required for VHF which is @Michael_Allbritton’s problem.

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I may have solved my problem with my present antenna.

This morning, just being curious, I mounted the antenna to the window frame of my laundry room which is at the other end of my apartment and faces North. I ran a coaxial cable to my Tablo, did a channel scan and all of the Big 5 popped up in the list, including the ABC and Fox affiliates.

It looks like I did need to give it a more unobstructed view of the towers 35ish miles away. Now I just need to figure out the best way to run the coaxial cable around all the door jambs. (I think I’m gonna need more coax.)

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I’ve run coax in an apartment under the wall baseboard which typically has space inside it (push the coax under and inside it).

VHF suffers more from noise than UHF. It’s possible that your first placement of the antenna (distant from the direction of the signal’s entrance into the house) had some appliances in the apartment along the way to the antenna that could have generated noise for the signal coming in and the antenna at the other end. That could have disrupted the two VHF stations by weakening the SNR of the signal through noise.

Test your current antenna placement in the laundry room by running washer or dryer and see if that has an impact on reception.

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Yer reading my mind. :slight_smile:

I’m watching a college football game on Fox with the washer going right now and it appears to not be affecting the reception.

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On another note, I’ve been pleased to see that the Wi Fi connection between the Tablo and my Apple TV has been rock solid and stable.

Just out of curiosity, where are the Tablo and router placed in relation to the laundry room?

They are in my “office.” I used a 50’ coax cable from the antenna to the Tablo. The Tablo and Wi Fi router are both sitting on an end table with the Tablo connected to the router via ethernet.

Hm. Not everything is perfect, sadly. Now CBS is pixelated. Not sure why. :-/