In this article, we are talking about how you can choose a digital TV antenna also known as a digital TV aerial. If you receive your television signal today over the air from broadcasters meaning you don’t subscribe to cable or satellite or any other multi channel pay TV service, you need to know that you can continue to receive free over-the-air television once the nation transitions to digital television in February of 2009 by using a digital TV antenna. But of course in order to enjoy the best possible image for free over-the-air digital TV channels you are going to need to use a digital TV antenna or a digital TV aerial. Now the good news is if you use an antenna today to receive free over-the-air television in the analog world, you may be able to use the same antenna to receive a signal in the digital TV world. In the digital world most stations will be broadcasting a what you call the UHF frequency, Ultra High Frequency. Some will be broadcasting in VHF. If you have an antenna that is capable of receiving both UHF and VHF you are all set. That antenna that works in the analog world to receive UHF and VHF stations will continue to work in the digital world.
You may have heard of some small indoor digital TV antennas referred to as Rabbit Ears. These antennas are very common in over-the-air households using analog televisions and they will work in the digital TV world as well. Another type of digital TV antenna (digital TV aerial) that you may see on retail store shows is an amplified digital TV antenna. Now you may not need an amplified digital TV antenna, again if you can receive a fairly robust signal in the analog television world chances are that in a digital TV world you will receive a good signal as well. It is actually better not to use an amplified digital TV antenna unless you absolutely need one because an amplified digital TV antenna may amplify noise in the signal as well as the broadcast signal itself. If you don’t need an amplified digital TV antenna you might actually be making your picture worse then it would be without an amplified digital TV antenna.
Another question often asked about indoor digital TV antennas is where should I place it? It is better to be higher up and it is better to be closer to a window. Interior rooms in the house blocked by a number of walls may have a little bit more difficulty receiving those television signals. If you are relatively close to a television broadcast tower, you may receive a very good signal using an indoor digital TV antenna. But generally speaking if you want to receive the most possible television signals, an outdoor digital TV antenna will work best. Outdoor antennas can receive more distant signals that will probably give you access to more digital television stations than would an indoor antenna.
In addition to the traditional indoor digital TV antennas that we have seen in the analog world, you will see a small outdoor antenna one that could be attached to the outside of the house to receive digital signals using an outdoor digital TV antenna. But what if you want to know right now what digital television stations you can access from your home and what the best type of antenna you can use will be, antennaweb.org can give you all of the information you need about the signals you can receive right at your home, antennaweb.org is a website that allows you to type in your address and will provide you information with pinpoint accuracy about the digital over-the-air signals that are available at your house. More importantly antennaweb.org will tell you what type of antenna you need. A good news that if you enjoy free over-the-air television today in the analog world the digital television transition will allow you to enjoy even more robust television programming including multiple streams of audio and video from the same broadcast station that send only one signal today. And using a digital TV antenna correctly is the easiest way to ensure that you continue to enjoy free over-the-air broadcasting.
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