Converter Box Plan and homemade antennas

[karmaman]

Just got my first converter box. The "Zenith" DTT901. I put quotes around Zenith because, well you know, it's not really Zenith anymore it's LG. Anyway I bought it new & unused for $20 from someone on Craigslist. I ordered our coupons ages ago during the summer but we never used them and they expired, and my friend claims the ones I had sent to his address never got there. Saw that someone on CL was selling a new, unused DTT901 that they bought from Circuit City. Since CC is closing, they are no longer accepting returns. They were selling it for $20, which works out great for me. Coupon price without the coupon. Anyway picked it up yesterday (from a really pretty chick I might add. I was expecting an old lady, since we had only talked via email.).

Converter box rocks. The PQ is AMAZING! HOLY S**T! It looks like a friggin DVD, the quality is just amazing. It doesn't pick up all our local channels in digital off cable like our Plasma with a QAM tuner does But it does pick up Fox, which accounts for the bulk of my viewing.

Once I get a new TV with AV inputs, this is how I plan to have the box connected:

Converter box is hooked up to large (home-made) antenna in the attic. It should be able to pick up PBS, NBC, and Fox along with all their subchannels. That's 6 channels in gorgeous beautiful DVD-like digital.

I'll have our regular cable and my DVD player (through a modulator) connected to the TV's tuner.

That way, I still have all the channels in analog but I can switch over to the AV input and fire up the converter box when I want to watch Fox or the NBC sports subchannel, which is the majority of the time. What do you guys think? I think it's a pretty good idea, idk if maybe it could be useful to someone here.

ANYWAYS, the whole point of this thread is that I'm going to be building a huge antenna to stick in the attic for my digital reception. So huge in fact that I'm going to have to build it in parts and then nail it together up in the attic. I thought you guys might be interested, so I'm going to make this a sort of work log. I have all week off for Thanksgiving break next week, and this'll be a nice project to keep me occupied. I'll let you guys know how it goes, and of course am always open to suggestions