Best TV Antenna for NEO (Columbus, Akron: crawl space, stores, bill)

[deskjockey]

Hoping to cancel cable television for good. Looking for TV antenna recommendations.

[Meemur]

I'll defer to the locals because I looked up NEO but wasn't sure what it was. However, I canceled my cable when I was south of you in Columbus, and I don't have it in the Des Moines metro area.

I mounted an indoor active antenna with rabbit ears (see link) high on the wall. I got about 14 channels in Columbus and 9 out here (decently). There are more but I would need to put the antenna in the attic crawl space to get them, and since I get NBC, PBS, and the local weather channel clearly, I honestly don't care about the rest.

This is the type at Target. Other stores carry them:

GE Flat Panel Amplified TV Antenna : Target

One other point: if you have an older TV that doesn't receive the digital signal, you will need a converter box:

This is one example. There are others!

Ematic AT103B Digital Converter Box for TV with LED Display - Walmart.com

I finally got a new TV and no longer need one!

I'll also defer to others about outdoor antennas. I no longer want to climb on my roof. I always start now with an active (amplified - meaning you plug it in) indoor antenna and see if that does the job first. Then I try it in the attic or attic crawl space before going to an outdoor model, but that's just me.

[Meemur]

Here's a related article:

Kiss Your Cable Bill Goodbye With These HDTV Antennas | TechHive

[SquareBetterThanAll]

Me personally I've found the streaming services to be adequate substitutes unless you need to watch every network's new shows right when they come out. Hulu covers many of the networks' broadcast offerings though.

To be honest I picked up a $20 antenna that seems to work pretty well, even being in Akron, for the occasions I do want to watch broadcast tv over the air.

[WILWRadio]

Check out the following link and fill out the details about the location. When you post the link here it won't display your address. But it will generate a report of the stations you can expect to receive or won't at that location which will make it easier to give a recommendation to the right type of antenna for this situation.

TV Fool

[Meemur]

That's a cool link! I passed that on to several friends.

[WILWRadio]

Originally Posted by Meemur

That's a cool link! I passed that on to several friends.

Yep, it is. Quite accurate too I've found. From this you can determine which signals are possible to receive and then pinpoint from there which stations you would like to watch. Then you can determine which antennas are going to work best for these signals.

[TheYO]

Originally Posted by Meemur

I'll defer to the locals because I looked up NEO but wasn't sure what it was

NEO = Northeast Ohio

OP, I'm not in NEO anymore (Pittsburgh), but I use the Mohu Leaf Plus and it's awesome! I get great picture quality without any static .

[deskjockey]

I tried an antenna from the Shack. It did not work as well as I hoped.

[SquareBetterThanAll]

I've found tv top antennas don't work as well now with digital because it is an all-or-nothing proposition. When it was analog you could get a fair picture from a lot of stations which now wouldn't come through at all digitally.