If you’ve been reading our series, you probably learned a lot about cables. You’ve learned how a well-built cable with a firm connector can keep your signal nice and strong while a poorly built cable can…
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I said I wasn’t going to give you equations for calculating gain, loss, and Noise Figure/margin but I will explain how I estimate the Noise margin (NM) of the antenna system. I’ve worked in a…
It’s just a fact of life… signal loss happens. Of course, the image above would result in complete, 100% signal loss. However, there is a lot more to the idea of loss than just broken cables….
When you think about it, a cable isn’t just the wire. The ends are important too. They’re the point of contact between the wire and everything else, and if that connection isn’t very good, then you’ll…
There’s a lot to learn about cables. Before we go too far, we need to look at the parts of a cable and why they’re important. Center Conductor The center conductor, marked “D” in the…
Are you using the best cable for the job? You may have heard terms like RG59, RG6, RG11, and Slim RG59 but you didn’t know what they meant. There is actually a real difference between these…
If you’re looking for the ultimate resource for frequencies in use by different broadcasters, you’ve come to the right place. Our PDF showing common frequencies used by radio, television, satellite, and government has been fully updated!…
You’ve probably seen the above image… an episode of The Simpsons predicted this move about 20 years ago. Of course that show has been producing about 20 hours of television a year for about 30 years so they’re…
This weird looking monstrosity is the SureCall SC306 UHF/VHF antenna. Believe it or not it hooks up to a cellular signal booster. Wait, what now? That’s right, the SureCall Fusion7 and Force7 cellular signal boosters also boost Wi-Fi and HDTV signals within…
Thanks to a $10,000 spectrum analyzer from our friends at Televes USA, we’re able to measure antennas even more accurately than ever before! This video shows how to read the charts you’ll start to find with…
Because no one wants to end up with this old thing. Some would say there is an art to knowing when it’s time to get the next big thing, whether it’s a cell phone, a…
We’re always improving our test procedures at Solid Signal and starting with the latest crop of antennas, we’re giving you even more tools to try to choose the best antenna for you. As much as I’d…
Has it already begun? According to Cord Cutters News, Phoenix, Arizona will be the first city in the US to start pilot broadcasts using the ATSC 3.0 next-generation broadcast standard. Ten stations in that market will begin simulcasts using the…
Here come the commenters. In a decision released yesterday, the FCC decided to allow ATSC 3.0 broadcasts so long as the content is exactly the same as regular broadcast content. This is a move designed to…
Well here we are folks, it’s almost 2018 and for those people who got themselves worked up about 4K over-the-air TV, it’s been a hard six months. Despite a flurry of news hitting the internet in…