Antennas Direct - ClearStream Television Antenna

I live in metro Los Angeles, on a bottom story apartment with big buildings and tall trees all around, and with my Panasonic Plasma TV I have had trouble getting HD reception. The previous best was the $9 RCA rabbit ears, with which NBC came in wonderfully 98% of the time (but did require rotating the antennas every once in a while), but that was about it. NO CBS or ABC or any other local digital channels. PBS and some analog channels came in, but not well... This ClearStream came with the best reviews here on BestBuy.com, and though it was an expensive option, and not really geared toward being indoors, I decided to give it a try. Well, it works. I now get 6 HD channels, including CBS and NBC (ABC still won't work), and the digital reception quality is GREAT and reliable. This antenna is a also not fussy at all once you find the right rotation/position (unlike rabbit ears). I have it on top of a tall shelving unit, a foot from the ceiling, pointed west (which is opposite direction of where the transmitting towers are!), and all of the channels are very reliable. It looks a bit strange in the living room, but not too bad, and the reception is so superior to any of the other antennas I have tried (basic RCA rabbit ears, amplified rabbit ears, Trek, and flat panels), it's worth it. Not cheap at near $120 by the time you buy a cable, but it does work WELL, even if you only mount it indoors. If you're looking for at least the network channels in HD, and reception is a problem in your location, this antenna really does work and I recommend looking into it if you're trying to get some basic channels and avoid satellite and cable... Interesting to note that I did try mounting this antenna outdoors, with a 50' cable, aimed directly at the sky (in various directions), and the reception was no better than mounted on my shelving unit indoors. The only difference was that the the hard to get ABC HD was more like 70% reliable, rather than more like 50% indoors, but it was still un-watchable with the frequent digital pixalation and audio cut-offs; we tried for two days, and could never get ABC anywhere near reliable enough for watching.

Bought this antenna to supliment my Direct tv service as the satellite doesn't carry local HD channels. My local stations are all between 35 and 45 miles away and with very little initial adjustment of the antenna I am receiving 12 channels, crystal clear. Three of these channels are SD copies of the HD channels I was after, but some are channels I hadn't heard of before. Thinking about dropping the satellite service. I'm very happy with this antenna!

It took me a little while to install it since none of my local stores had a mount for a chimney, I think all of the stores gave up on antennas since cable/satellite are so popular. I finally found a bracket that I modified (bent) to work and everything else went fine. I live 32 miles from the antenna farm and my reception is GREAT! I get 100% signal strength on a majority of the channels. It even picks up some non-digital that didn't switch yet, but I don't pay any attention to these. It's so small, my neighbors didn't notice it! It was not packaged well and got banged around in the box, just cosmetic scratches. It should include at least a bracket for chimney mounting. I would recommend this antenna!

Some people posting here says it absolutely does not work, while others swear that it is the greatest thing since sliced bread. That is because for those who have great reception with this antenna, their stations are UHF. For those who have no reception, those stations are VHF. Go to antennaweb.org to find out which band your stations are broadcasting on. If you are UHF, you're golden, get this antenna. If you are VHF, this antenna won't work. In my area, CBS and PBS are UHF. NBC and FOX are VHF. This antenna won't work for me. Four stars since it is the best UHF antenna I have seen. I take one away because they do not advertise that it does not do VHF.

I finally upgraded my TV about a month a go (had a 9 year old tube and just got a new plasma). We have not had cable for years because we don't watch a ton of TV and couldn't stomach the $50-80 a month. I figured that this antenna was pretty low risk considering that it is only $100 and I could always take it back if it didn't work. I mean who can pass up free TV? I considered putting it in the attic, because it is plastic. It feels really durable, but there is something about plastic that makes me feel like it might break down due to the elements. However, the instructions said that I could loose 40% of the signal strength by putting it there. (Since I had to run the cable anyway might as well do it right.) So, I put it on the roof and ran the coax. A buddy of mine told me that I had to go online to www.antennaweb.org to find which position to point the antenna. They tell you what channels you can expect to get based on your address as well as the direction the antenna goes. Being a typical guy, I just eyeballed the direction and put it on the pole I attached to the chimney. After I was done, I plunged the coax into the back of the TV and ran the channel scanner. I kept my expectations really low, not really believing that this could actually work for me. After a couple minutes, the scan finished. It said that I picked up 59 digital channels!!! 59!?!?! Anyway, I went through them all and deleted half of them since I only speak English and the rest were in languages that I don't understand. But 30 free (English speaking) channels and a couple were as far out as San Diego (about 90 miles away) is good enough for me! I can't believe the picture and the sound. I get all the major networks (CBS, NBC, ABC, FOX, CW, etc.) in HD. I even get 5.1 surround sound on the ones that broadcast that way--receiver light comes on. Over the last couple weeks, I noticed that channel 9 (KTLA I think) and channel 11 (Fox) were not coming in that well. They were getting delayed, pixelated (if that's a word), and would kinda skip/hang up. I looked up that website again and checked my antenna position. I grabbed my compass and got on the roof. My antenna was at about 5 degrees and was supposed to be 327 degrees. OK, I know I sound like a total bonehead. Anyway I moved it over to around 327 and went back down--no more problems now! This thing works so well that I was off about 40 degrees and it still worked (almost perfectly). I know that I sound like a total fanboy, but this thing works great and anyone in Orange County should get one. For $22/mo I get almost every thing I want entertainment wise ($11 for Netflix w/ Blu-ray and $11 for Tivo). That beats the $50-80 that the cable company's charge! Now if only there were a way to get ESPN a la cart.

I found myself only watching the basic channels about 60% of the time, the other 40% was spent watching espn and usa network. Both of which can be watched online (including live sports games). This antenna works great here are the key points. -mounting hardware is nice (i mounted it with some minor adjustments to an old satellite mount that was already mounted into my roof) -range is great even with surrounding trees and taller homes in my area (as the antenna is mounted on the lower part of my roof not the tallest) -works great with standard coax splitters to feed multiple tvs even over long range of cabling (antenna is on roof and wire is ran through the attic down to three rooms) -price is great, previously i had an indoor RCA or some other brand amplified antenna that cost me about $40 and every time i changed the channel the antenna or the gain had to be adjusted, the antenna also did not perform well with two tvs. This antenna needs no adjustment once you find the "sweet spot" (angle at which you get the most channels with the best reception , i am able to pick up all the channels in my area) SIDE NOTE: I was receiving poor signal on 1-2 channels in my living room which is coincidentally the furthest tv from the antenna, i assumed it had to be the antenna so i adjusted it as i needed to watch a particular channel (not all the time but more frequent than desired)...it turns out that my internet router (which is 4inches from my tv was causing interference, instead of having the router right side up i turned it to the side and the interference was gone and I was able to watch the playoff game on cbs with 0 interruptions. signals have been perfect on all channels since then.

If you've been going insane trying to get reception out of one of the cheaper wall or table mount antennas, do yourself a favor and pick one of these up. Mine is connected to a 50" 720p plasma, and the HD programming is better than I got with cable or dish. The total number of available channels went from 12 with the table top RCA antenna, to 30 with this one (although, a few are spanish language and bible networks that I'll probably never watch) Signal strength is great across the board, with no adjustment necessary when I change from UHF to VHF, or between any channels. I do live in the city, so I'm not sure how it would to in rural areas, mountains, etc... but in South Charlotte, it works perfectly! I live in an apartment, and as such, can't mount external antennas to the outside of the building. I mounted this one inside my storage closet on my patio, angled slightly up, and it's working brilliantly. The cost is a little steep, but it let me get rid of my $90 a month cable bill, so it's basically paying for itself after the first month.

I got tired of paying for cable because I only watched 6 or 7 channels that are not available over the air and all the other channels I watch are. I have tried many antennas and the only one that comes anything close to this was an RCA ANT1251, but the rabbit ears always had to be adjusted for some channels. I looked at many TERK antennas and they have many more negative reviews than the Clearstream 2 & 4. I live in a basement apartment, so some channels never had solid reception-until now.. I put this Clearstream 2 on the indoor stand in a corner window on top of two crates and picked up ALL the local channels I watch. No more fussing with it, adjusting rabbit ears, no amplifier to deal with, just a very well designed antenna. The Clearstream 2 blows away my RCA and 4 Terks I tried. Assembly & set-up only took me about 15 minutes. This antenna gives me a far clearer picture than RCN or Comcast ever provided. Also, it rained cats & dogs the other day and the reception never faltered! I am using the 2 crates so that the Clearstream 2 is at the top of the window, enabling it to pick up signals much better than at the bottom.