Comments on: How to Get Free HDTV (in Canada)

By: bill

bill — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 19:42:45 +0000

What out for Free HD Canada small cish free local stations and access to
pay channels only if you want them On Air Auh 2011

By: FrugalTrader

FrugalTrader — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 18:58:34 +0000

Steve, it really depends on where you live as well. If you are within range of the HD towers, then yes, all you would need is a decent antenna.

By: Steve W

Steve W — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 15:06:49 +0000

Hi all, I have a Sony Bravia and completely technology illiterate. From what I understand, is all I need a UHF indoor antenna (I’m only interested in CBC for HD) and then I’m good to go?
thanks

By: Agaver

Agaver — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 02:33:55 +0000

Hi everyone, I was wondering if someone could provide some real feedback for the following antenna “Futura HDTV Outdoor Antenna GE TV24769″. I live in Montreal, and even though I’m on the 3rd floor I don’t get any clear signals from local networks (ctv, cbs,…). May be someone has had similar problems and have already tried this GE antenna. Any feedback is welcome. Thanks a lot!
PS: I’m not sure if I’m allowed to paste the link but here it goes.. hope the admin will tell me.
http://www.canadiantire.ca/AST/browse/7/Electronics/TVsAccessories/VideoRemotesAccessories/PRD~0452806P/Futura%2BHDTV%2BOutdoor%2BAntenna.jsp

By: Dave Smith

Dave Smith — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 04:16:10 +0000

Hi Mike,
I am close to you in Colborne and have an outdoor (Delhi) Antenna and rotor which came with my house. I hooked up a $60 (Tivax stb-t8) digiotal tv converter and get 26 channels including Citytv, CTV, and the buffalo stations. The picture is perfect and I cancelled Bell. Good luck! Dave

By: Chris

Chris — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 10:51:24 +0000

Try making your own antenna and see how that works before shelling out money to buy one. Do a youtube search for Coat Hanger HDTV antenna.

At the very least you’ll find an alternative use for those old metal coat hangers in your basement. Or you’ll be kicking yourself for tossing them all out last spring.

Good luck and happy HD surfing.

By: Mike

Mike — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 04:18:28 +0000

I live in Trenton Ontario I have a stand alone tv tower on the side of the house with a rotor which I have never used in the six years here. Going to buy a HD tv and wondering what I can expect in this area with a tower and rotor. I would love to kick bell expressview to the curb. Any comments would be helpfull.

Thanks Willow Gates

By: DIY

DIY — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 18:56:44 +0000

For those of you that are more interested in the ‘zero’ end of the investment scale than the ‘$500-$600′ end, have a look at http://www.hdtv4free.info. It shows you how to very quickly and easily make a neat little antenna. Mine has been in service for a couple of years and works just great here in Vancouver. Couldn’t be happier, and so glad I didn’t listen to all the TV salesmen who told me nothing was available over the air in HD!

By: FrugalTrader

FrugalTrader — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 11:43:00 +0000

Ultrastarr, I think ideally, you’d have an antenna along with an HDTV with ATSC tuner built in.

By: Ultrastarr

Ultrastarr — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 06:42:26 +0000

Hi there, i just stumbled upon this link by accident (was searching for wifi antenna boost), and it seems pretty interesting so far.

I currently have an old analog tv,
so to get me started, i’d have to get a digital tuner is that correct?
will any brand work?
I plan on building my own antenna

any info is greatly appreciated,
thanks

By: Tomasz

Tomasz — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 21:01:23 +0000

Thanks Roger for the clarification. Just for the record, I had stated “OTA channels are *almost* all on channels 14-69″. Most stations post-transition will actually be located on 14-51 (52-69 no longer being available), with fewer than 20% being on VHF-hi. You’re right though, I may have given the impression that DTV is *only* on UHF, which is not the case since there will be the occasional network on VHF-hi (or even more rarely, on VHF-low).

By: Roger

Roger — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 20:03:53 +0000

Interesting article, though there are a few factual errors. For example although UHF (channels 14-69) is predominantly being used currently for DTV, after the analog shutdown, many stations will be reverting to their VHF (2-13) channel number (especially VHF-HI (7-13)) so a combination antenna my be necessary in the long run.

With regards to 1080i vs 720p, don’t forget that the OTA broadcast is what the cable and satellite companies receive. If they are giving you 720p and the original broadcast is in 1080i, they are down converting it and may not be doing a very good job of it (especially Compress-View).

By: Mike

Mike — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 19:35:38 +0000

My tip – don’t buy a crappy antenna. My experience has been that people who find OTA problematic usually have dollar store rabbit ears.

Get a Channelmaster 4221 or 4228 for outdoor, or a Zenith Silver Sensor if you are indoors. You may even try building a Gray-Hoverman antenna (instructions on digital home) – they work very well.

By: Kasm

Kasm — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 17:22:08 +0000

I’ve ditched Cable and have been using OTA for about 2 years now. I’m in Mississauga and get about 22 digital channels. NBC (WGRZ) is the only one that drops off in the winter times. My install is a CM4221 antenna with a winegard AP4700 preamp mounted in my attic. The only station still not broadcasting in digital that I watch is TVO.

The OTA FAQ on digital home forums is the best place to start looking.

By: Steve

Steve — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 22:39:14 +0000

I setup my OTA HD setup last fall, I live just northwest of Hamilton up on the escarpment.

I love OTA TV, it’s much higher quality video then the crap I pay for with Cogeco.

HOWEVER, the canadian networks ARE NOT interested in boosting OTA. Many of them have been continuously badgering the CRTC for entensions on their deadline to convert to digital transmission.

The bottom line is, very few people view broadcast networks OTA. Most of there viewers (i’ve heard about 95%) use cable or satellite. Those digital transmission towers are very expensive to operate. This means spending a lot of money to reach very few customers (remember ad revenue is all they get).

As a result, most networks are doing the bare minium in terms of transmission power.

American networks often broad cast 200-300 kW all the way up to 1000 kW.

CBC is 30 kW (government funded).
CTV is 15 kw (I think).
CityTV is 1.5 kW.
Global is 1.0 kW.

in the GTA, but outside of Toronto, it’s easier to get american stations from 100 km away then to pick up canadian stations 20 km away.

Unless the popularity of OTA picks up really fast, the networks are not going to be interested in providing strong, reliable signals.

By: CanadianFinance

CanadianFinance — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 16:23:36 +0000

Thanks for the info Thomaz, if it’s coming in spring I think I’ll look into this… I currently use a windows media center with regular cable, the firewire on Shaw’s HD box is apparently disabled so I wouldn’t be able to record if I went that route. I’ll just get the atsc card and plug that in!

By: Tomasz

Tomasz — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 14:57:49 +0000

Philip in North York,

OTA HD broadcasts are carried in either 720p or 1080i, depending on the channel. True, 1080i always has the disadvantage of being dependant on deinterlacing methods to ensure smooth images in fast motion. It comes down to how good your deinteracer is. Some are very simple BOB-style deinterlacing, whereas more advanced deinterlacers use motion-adaptive technologies to smooth out the image. If you have a larger tv though, 1080i is still sharper than 720p, which is what cable/satellite is transmitted at. And the compression is much lower on OTA than cable/satellite. Funny thing I read (not sure if this is true or not) is that Bell Expressvu doesn’t compress their “HD Preview” channel – to make sure you get hooked on the image quality – but then all their subscription channels are overly compressed. I can’t see this getting any better because they keep cramming more HD channels onto their existing satellites. Perhaps when they switch to MPEG4 compression, they’ll get a bit better – but chances are they’ll just use that to cram even more channels into their packages (and of course, charge more $$$).. But I’m getting off-topic..

By: rob

rob — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 14:49:24 +0000

my tv (a samsung lcd) has a built in receiver. we get a hand full of stations and i believe CBC and Global in HD. i can’t remember what stations, but those sound right. i still never watch it, though.

By: Philip in North York

Philip in North York — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 02:45:49 +0000

I have never watch cable or satellite tv in my home, but it is interesting to hear that OTA gives better image qualities than others.
As far as I know OTA use interlaced format(1080i), so the picture quality may not good as you wish with fast moving actions such as sports.

I can pick up CBC and CTV easily, and CityTV and CW when the weather is good. More is merrier, but 4 is good enough with an indoor antenna.

Englishman in Canada, buy a TV tuner card for PC with ATSC support(make sure it does) like this one

http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=26873&vpn=1181&manufacture=HAUPPAUGE

and plug it to the HTPC and to any UHF antenna. After installing the bundled software, you will be good to watch.
As a side note, my family has never paid a cent for cable or satellite TV and this is my first comment in this blog.

By: Tomasz

Tomasz — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 02:32:00 +0000

There are definitely some interesting dynamics at work in the OTA industry. Some people believe that Global and CTV have over-extended themselves with their secondary networks like E! (Global) and A-channel (CTV). I don’t think that the ‘core’ networks like CBC, CTV, and Global are in as dire straits as the offshoot channels. For now, OTA is still strong for these core networks. In fact, the act of simsubbing (putting Canadian ads into American channels on satellite/cable) is only allowed if (as per Wikipedia) “simsubs can only be applied by cable companies in areas where the local station is available terrestrially”. This means that if CTV is airing the same show as NBC at the same time on cable/satellite, they can only insert Canadian ads onto the NBC channel if CTV is available OTA in that area. OTA therefore helps the network by ensuring that their cable/satellite ad revenue is not jeopardized by people tuning into the American network airing the same show with U.S. ads, and in turn we as consumers benefit because we can pick up CTV for free via OTA. Ironically, we can still see the American ads by picking up the terrestrial OTA versions of U.S. networks that leak across the border :)

So all in all, Canadian networks have a vested interest in keeping OTA to maintain their ad share on subscription-based cable/satellite services. I do not think this story by the Globe took that into account when they made the premature blanket statement about OTA dying.

For more information, I invite you to visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simsub where there is a much better explanation of simsubbing than I can scribble out!