DVB on the Mac — Forums

[manuvcube]

http://www.vdr-wiki.de/wiki/index.php/DVB-T_Antennen
(german)
http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.vdr-wiki.de%2Fwiki%2Findex.php%2FDVB-T_Antennen&langpair=de%7Cen&hl=de&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&prev=%2Flanguage_tools
(google translation)

This thingie works better than most of the high priced amplified ones.
hth in case of reception problems.
manuvcube
[edit: fixed the link]
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[giandrea]

This sounds very very interesting! But unfortunately none of the online translation services that I tried does a good job at translating from German, so I don't understand a world of it

Can any german reader of this forum do us a little favor and translate this article in English? I then will translate it into Italian. :)

[bootsy]

hi manuvcube
wow this simple antenna works perfect!!!
I first had a passive commercial room-antenna which didn't work properly, after that I had a real big ugly one with an amplifier which worked only in some positions in my room, where I didn't want to see it allday long...
but this simple one is the best! cheap, small and good!

[bootsy]

Hi giandrea
this little tutorial just says:

take a coax cable
cut the isolation 12,5 cm behind the end
take the mass-net und move it over the cable (so you have 12,5 cm without mass-net and extra 12,5 cm with mass-net)
now cut the dielectricum from the upper part away that there just the Cu-cable remains.
now you have a dipole which works fine as antenna...
you can isolate the cable with tesa or an shrinking hose again...

I hope my explanation is understandable, but the pictures from the link should tell the rest...

[simonB]

Hi,

Small addition:

"Shrinking hose" is officially called "shrink tubing" and Americans would know tesa better as scotch tape.
But i would not recommend using tape because it is not very durable when used outdoor.

Greets,

Simon

[RadioDog]

Sorry, I think I'm a bit slow today (and my high school German is a bit more than rusty). But what is the mass-net, Cu-cable and dielectricum?

I'd love to get this rig happening!

Rob

[simonB]

We don't learn such things in high school either!

I'll try to explain:

The "mass-net" is the grounded wire netting between the outer plastic wrapping and the opaque plastic insolation (dielectricum) that covers the inner wire.

So, to draw a conclusion:

Carefully take off the outer plastic wrapping for 12,5 cm (the closer you get to the exact length the better your reception will indeed be). Do not destroy the wire netting beneath.

Now (in my opinion the hardest task) carefully evert (do you say this, i mean "pulling over") the 12,5 cm of freed wire netting to the still coated cable side.

After doing that, you should see the opaque plastic dielectricum where the wire netting was. It contains the inner wire. Just take off this opaque plastic to free the inner wire.
Use something to fasten the netting (scotch tape or insulating tape or shrink tubing or whatever) and attach a plug to the other end of the cable. Put this into your TV-card and everything should be fine.

Hope that helps.

Simon

[ipod_man]

is this actually a DVB-T antenna and how long do you think is a good length for operation :)

[manuvcube]

It's a UHF/VHF Antenna and DVB-T is send with those frequencies.
Actual length shouldn't matter (as long as it is not 50m or so)
important length is only the deisolated/wrapped part at the top, which should be 12,5cm.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dipole_antenna

HTH
manuvcube
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[simonB]

Hi,

It is actually a dvb-t antenna (as long as you build a plug on one end). The length is not too important (the longer the cable is the worse it gets) but you have to use exactly 12,5 cm when building the antenna as mentioned above.

Regards

Simon