Over-the-air coax to HDMI question

[cyinne]

I have DirecTV and am trying to cover my bases for the impending football season should DTV and the local stations 9 and 14 (Sioux City) not reach a resolution to their greedy ways. I am trying to find a somewhat cheap way to get these channels until the two stations come back.

Problem I have is that a couple years ago we remodeled and I only put a HDMI in the wall for the tv- that means that the OTA antenna we have hanging outside I cannot get the signal to the tv without having an ugly cord hanging out in the open. It would also be nice to have this installed for when storms blow through and the satellite goes out as a backup. Does anybody know of a converter that would convert a coaxial signal to an HDMI signal and then when I want to watch the ABC or CBS channels I can unplug the dish box and plug in the converter? Or if anybody has any other solutions (except cutting cable or switching to Dish Network- I have my reasons) please, I'm all ears.

TIA

 

[Cardinal and Gold]

I have DirecTV and am trying to cover my bases for the impending football season should DTV and the local stations 9 and 14 (Sioux City) not reach a resolution to their greedy ways. I am trying to find a somewhat cheap way to get these channels until the two stations come back.

Problem I have is that a couple years ago we remodeled and I only put a HDMI in the wall for the tv- that means that the OTA antenna we have hanging outside I cannot get the signal to the tv without having an ugly cord hanging out in the open. It would also be nice to have this installed for when storms blow through and the satellite goes out as a backup. Does anybody know of a converter that would convert a coaxial signal to an HDMI signal and then when I want to watch the ABC or CBS channels I can unplug the dish box and plug in the converter? Or if anybody has any other solutions (except cutting cable or switching to Dish Network- I have my reasons) please, I'm all ears.

TIA

Unhook the coax from your dish and hook it into your antenna. I even used the dish mount to fasten my antenna to. Then you will get ota anywhere that dish set up wall coax outlets to. Use the work that they already did for you and there is no cables showing. All this is after you cancel Dtv of course, unless you are still under contract. But since you are not wanting to cut cable, get a cheap individual antenna for your main tv, unless you need more range.

 

[ArgentCy]

I don't think that could be done. Well I did have an old tuner box, you might be able to find an exterior tuner and output with hdmi but you won't be able to control the channels. Yeah, the answer above is better. Use the coax cables for the signal.

 

[alarson]

I have DirecTV and am trying to cover my bases for the impending football season should DTV and the local stations 9 and 14 (Sioux City) not reach a resolution to their greedy ways. I am trying to find a somewhat cheap way to get these channels until the two stations come back.

Problem I have is that a couple years ago we remodeled and I only put a HDMI in the wall for the tv- that means that the OTA antenna we have hanging outside I cannot get the signal to the tv without having an ugly cord hanging out in the open. It would also be nice to have this installed for when storms blow through and the satellite goes out as a backup. Does anybody know of a converter that would convert a coaxial signal to an HDMI signal and then when I want to watch the ABC or CBS channels I can unplug the dish box and plug in the converter? Or if anybody has any other solutions (except cutting cable or switching to Dish Network- I have my reasons) please, I'm all ears.

TIA

Depending on how advanced you want to go with htis, you could probably get by with something as simple as a converter box or go advanced as a tivo OTA

 

[huntt26]

I have an older version of this that will do what you're looking for:

Amazon Homeworx converter box

It's not a super fancy device, but it gets the job done. I use this to hook up the OTA antenna to an HDMI projector for a super bowl party and it has worked great for that.

 

[ricochet]

Depending on how old your DirecTV receiver is you could add an over the air tuner to it and the channels will be integrated in with the satellite channels. I think the OTA tuner box was an AM21 and they stopped making them a while ago but you might be able to get one off eBay or something for cheap. I know the HR54 Genie and older receivers support it but I don't know about anything newer or if was ever supported on non-DVR receivers. If your receiver is really old it will have one built-in but that is going back a long ways - to like the early HR20s.

 

[3GenClone]

Where is the other end of your HDMI and what is it connected to? No need to run any more cables to the TV - a single HDMI should suffice as long as you have the other end of the HDMI connected to a receiver. If your only source is the cable box (no receiver) then you are hosed.

If it were me, I would use the existing HDMI as my pull-string and pull a new HDMI and RG6(coax) line down the wall to the other end. That keeps the wall clean at the TV. I’m betting the current HDMI is just dropped in the open drywall cavity so the pull should be easy.

 

[SDClone]

In my old house I had directv and also a roof antenna. I was able to find a double input splitter and split the coax cable from the antenna and the dish on my roof. All I had to do then was choose which input on my tv that I wanted to watch.

 

[cyinne]

Where is the other end of your HDMI and what is it connected to? No need to run any more cables to the TV - a single HDMI should suffice as long as you have the other end of the HDMI connected to a receiver. If your only source is the cable box (no receiver) then you are hosed.

If it were me, I would use the existing HDMI as my pull-string and pull a new HDMI and RG6(coax) line down the wall to the other end. That keeps the wall clean at the TV. I’m betting the current HDMI is just dropped in the open drywall cavity so the pull should be easy.

The OTA coax isn’t hooked up to anything and is in the crawl space below where the converter would be placed. I have coax coming in from dish to dish reciever. The hdmi cord that is in the wall to the tv can be plugged into either the dish reciever or a blue ray player.

I’d have to run the new cords from a counter top through a exterior wall cavity with insulation in it out to the top of a book case and then horizontally in behind a false front mantle. Not impossible to do but I know I will swear a lot....

 

[NickTheGreat]

You need a tuner with an HDMI output. You've can't just *put* coax onto HDMI. Something has to decode it.

I bought one years back (for a projector) that didn't work very well. But something like this looks promising

Assuming you physically have a place to put it near the hdmi

 

[ArgentCy]

You need a tuner with an HDMI output. You've can't just *put* coax onto HDMI. Something has to decode it.

I bought one years back (for a projector) that didn't work very well. But something like this looks promising

Assuming you physically have a place to put it near the hdmi

The problem becomes trying to control that box, which seems unlikely unless they are close. Probably don't want to run to the basement to change the channel.

 

[NickTheGreat]

The problem becomes trying to control that box, which seems unlikely unless they are close. Probably don't want to run to the basement to change the channel.

Fair point. It didn't dawn on me that he may be talking something like that.

If that were the case, I'd wonder how one of those thin amplified antennas would work? The OP is in Lincoln, which is a little ways from teh Omaha towers. But could work? Assuming the TV has a built in digital tuner, which most do.

 

[Jmarsh13]

I have my HD antenna hooked up to a Tablo. The Tablo then transmits to a streaming box (Roku) on each of the TV's in the house thru the wi-fi network. Hooked up a 2TB portable hard drive to it so we can DVR OTA shows.

It is pretty pricey if only using it as a back-up system for an occasional OTA show but has been extremely worth it since we cut the cord a couple of years ago...

 

[cyinne]

The problem becomes trying to control that box, which seems unlikely unless they are close. Probably don't want to run to the basement to change the channel.

The ota cable can go to where the dish reciever is.

 

[tzjung]

I have my HD antenna hooked up to a Tablo. The Tablo then transmits to a streaming box (Roku) on each of the TV's in the house thru the wi-fi network. Hooked up a 2TB portable hard drive to it so we can DVR OTA shows.

It is pretty pricey if only using it as a back-up system for an occasional OTA show but has been extremely worth it since we cut the cord a couple of years ago...

I did this as well! We have Roku and FireTV's and it works well. I've been tempted to try the Amazon Recast instead, but it looks like it's not ready for prime time.