what sort of outdoor UHF antenna are you all using in the 21st Century?

[mhardy6647]

I've whined before about our OTA DTV woes, but, when it's all said and done, we are receiving a few over-the-air digital TV channels in our deep NW Boston suburban location with our old outdoor Radio Shack directional antenna and rotator. In fact, one station (WMUR in Manchester, NH) comes in much better as a digital broadcast than it ever did analog (it was analog channel 9 and probably 50 miles north of us -- EDIT 31.9 miles).

The most elusive channel for us, ironically, is the one we watch the most: WCVB (old analog channel 5). With some patient fiddling, I finally managed to get it one day on RF channel 20 (according to the converter box) with the antenna pointed sort of slightly north-east (which is NOT where their main transmitter is compared to me). Reception is on the edge; it's typically MIA in the morning and at night, and in rainy weather; not bad mid-day (say, on a Saturday). No sign of it using an indoor antenna (which has pretty much obsoleted the TV in our bedroom).

I do not know if WCVB is ultimately planning to drop back to a VHF frequency (maybe not); I am thinking that a decent outdoor UHF directional antenna is probably worth the fairly modest investment.

I am wondering what's a reasonable place to start? One of those bow-tie arrays, or a Yagi-type of thing. Does anyone make a parabolic reflector UHF antenna? In the early days of UHF (looking at old catalogs) it looks like the latter was the antenna of choice for deep-fringe reception.

We're about 40 miles from WCVB's main transmitter in Needham, MA. (EDIT: antennaweb sez it's 22.7 miles as the waves fly)

Any thoughts are greatly appreciated and gratefully received!

EDIT^2 apparently WMUR is still on a VHF frequency; maybe our problem is strictly UHF, although WBZ (old VHF channel 4), in the same location, comes in fine and it is now/currently on a UHF carrier frequency.