On September 4, 2009 at 22:35, little-infinity said...
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I hear the picture OTA is even better than what TV companies offer these days.
In general this is true when compared with most paid tv providers but there are cases of OTA stations even broadcasting 6 sub channels!!! (not in our GTA area). But yes like the previous poster said your new HDTV has the capability to tune in to the new digital OTA free broadcasts and in general they have better picture quality than their paid tv counterparts since the latter are overly compressed to maximize profits, but this is a capitalist society so we should not complain after all. Third subchannel, Universal Sports on WKBW being an exception since it has a lot of macroblocking and being an sports channels is unaceptable. I still beleive it is due to the source of the material being internet video rather that the buffalo broadcaster compressing it to fit 1 HD + 2 SD channels. BTW just a few days ago , this channel, Universal Sports , started being braodcast In The Clear (un-scrambled) as part of the NBC Mux via satellite , for now FTA or in the clear , so today I will repoint my C Band 6 ft Dish to that satellite just to compare the quality of the satellite feed. Will report back on the main OTA thread the results later.
Being so close to the CN tower were the canadian transmitters are could work also against you. Try non-amplified antennas , preferably outdoors, and you will be amazed of the quantity and quality of what you get.
BTW all those channels are Digital or DTV but not necessarilly HDTV , some are acctually SD all the time , some boradcast in HD but the source material is upconverted since it was originally SD. In any case the picture and audio quality has improved although some people beleive digital sucks , I guess it all depends on your own personal experiences.