Basic Indoor TV Antennas

For good signal-strength areas, a rabbit ear/loop antenna will do

If you don't live very far from the TV transmitters, you can get by with very basic TV antenna. In the days of analog TV, rabbit ears (for VHF) and a loop antenna (for UHF) were ubiquitous. Believe it or not, that design remains a good choice for locations where signal strength is strong. How can you know if you're close enough to your area's TV transmitters to get a good signal? AntennaWeb.org is an excellent place to start. You only need to plug in your zip code and physical address to get an idea of how strong an antenna you'll need. (Note that AntennaWeb.org will ask you for a bunch of other data, like your name and email address, but you actually only need to input your address information.) This site will also give you a good idea of what stations you're likely to receive, and whether they are UHF or VHF.

If AntennaWeb tells you that you're in a good signal-strength location, you can get by with a basic antenna. We saw a good recommendations for the RadioShack Budget TV Antenna (*Est. $13) in EV's Indoor Antenna Round-Up, hosted at AVSForum.com. Anonymous reviewer "EscapeVelocity" calls it his "new favorite unamplifed RE&Loop" antenna.

At first glance, the RadioShack Budget TV Antenna (catalog number 15-1874) looks exactly like the familiar rabbit ears and loop antennas that found their way to the tops of millions of TV sets before the age of digital TV. However, as noted in the review, the RadioShack 15-1874 Budget TV Antenna has a wider-diameter loop that optimizes gain in the UHF band so that if falls into the heart of what's now used for digital broadcasts. While not every user weighing in at RadioShack.com is completely happy, the overwhelming majority -- especially those with realistic expectations -- seem satisfied. This and similar television antennas are bidirectional, meaning reception is strongest from the front and back, but weaker for signals received from the sides.

While pleasing aesthetics and good TV reception are tough to achieve in one package, a few TV antennas manage to do a decent job while looking good -- or better still, disappearing altogether. The Antennas Direct PF7 (*Est. $35) falls into the latter category. This television antenna marries a flat-panel TV antenna with a cherry wood picture frame that can be hung on a wall or placed on a table just like any other picture frame (albeit one with a coaxial cable coming out of the back).

User and expert reviews are decent, especially from those that respect this TV antenna's limitations, though we did see some complaints of flimsy construction. The PF7's flat receiving element is UHF only, so it's not a good choice if you need to receive VHF signals. It's also only suitable in areas that get very good reception; Antennas Direct specifies a maximum range of only 15 miles. The PF7 is highly directional, so careful placement is needed for best results.

An indoor television antenna for city dwellers

Log-periodic has long been a popular TV antenna design, especially for outdoor use. These V-shaped antennas, with short receiving elements in the front and successively wider ones toward the rear, can be found on millions of homes. Though highly directional, these television antennas do a great job of pulling in distant signals.

Log-periodic TV antennas have now become popular as indoor HDTV antennas. Most are paired with amplifiers; however, the Terk HDTVi (*Est. $30) is an unamplified log-periodic television antenna that could be a good choice for some city dwellers. That's because reception in areas with lots of tall buildings can be compromised by multipath interference -- weaker reflections of the main signal coming in from multiple directions at once (as a result of bouncing off of those aforementioned tall buildings or other obstacles). With analog signals, multipath interference typically shows up as image ghosts, but it can render digital signals completely unusable. The highly directional nature of log-periodic TV antennas can greatly minimize multipath problems.

Indoor log-periodic television antennas are typically UHF only (VHF log-periodic antennas are too large to be practical for indoor use). However, the Terk HDTVi adds a pair of rabbit ears for VHF reception. "EscapeVelocity," writing in EV's Indoor Antenna Round-Up at AVSForum.com, says if multipath problems aren't a concern, most users able to use an unamplified antenna would be better off sticking with a basic rabbit ears and loop model, such as the RadioShack Budget TV Antenna. User reviews seem to agree, though the antenna does have its proponents.