We’ve elected not to bother with cable service just yet in the apartment – neither of us are avid television watchers and most things we’d like to see are coming out on DVD eventually, so why pay to get tv shows you have to rush home to watch, only to have to sit through commercials and half the time end up watching episodes out of order?
We do like watching the news though, so I strung a cable off the back of my TV’s antenna input and tried to pick up CBC. No dice – that is until I hooked up our HIGH DEFINITION Wire Hanger.
As soon as our magical metallic friend hit the cable we started picking up 9 channels in full HD! Who knew Ottawa was broadcasting HD over the air? Fantastic! This is civilization! 
A High Def Wire Hanger
Editor’s Note: If you’re interested in picking up HD for cheap, you can read more about my RCA Antenna comparison, and my homebrew coathanger dipole antenna.
2 responses so far ↓
1 Kert Gartner // Nov 24, 2008 at 6:42 pm
Are you serious? I have to try this. I tried the cable trick too, and no dice. how are you attaching the cable input to the wire hanger? Tape?
2 jcobill // Nov 24, 2008 at 9:29 pm
The setup is even more lo-fi than you’re imagining.
I have the cable reaching out front from behind the TV, and then the hanger pushed against the cable core using a highly engineered pillow, plant pot and windowsill configuration.
I tried tape, but I’m all thumbs with sticky stuff and it kept coming loose. This way I can adjust the angle of the pillow, and if I’m standing in the right spot in the room, I get really clear reception.
The irony of all of this is that I actually bought a high-gain antenna from “The Source” and couldn’t get a signal at all – it was a piece of garbage.
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