uhf/vhf hd television vs satellite

Hi
We are getting ready to full-time and are considering UHF/VHF HD ANTENNA as opposed to typical satellite set up.  Most channels on satellite are pretty bad, and you can't get local news (where you are parked being local).
Looking for feedback from people who use UHF/VHF HD antennae. 
How is coverage in general, nationwide?  Signals generally available?  Quality? 
We live on fixed and don't need to spend $$$$ on bad programming.

Thanks for the feedback.

BT

Well I have used both Sat (both major networks) and now use my Batwing (VHF/VHF/UHF antenna)

A lot depends on where you park ... For example.. A couple places I like to go (But can not just now) Over the air (As we call it, rather than V/U-HF) simple is not.  and cable may not be an option either... UHF is affected big time by trees.

Most of the places I park there is more TV than I can watch..Over the air.

Where I am at now by improving the basic Batwing I get a few stations (About six or 9 services) Fairly well.. but the park provides cable so no problem with the rest. One channel comes in BETTER over the air.

My DVR's are smart enough to choose the source.

Many cable companies though are forceign people to get a set-top box (one per TV) to watch their programming. (So they can charge by the TV instead of by the house)... Greedy (Term deleted by poster).

So the bottom line is the usefulness of the OTA (VHF/UHF) antenna depends on where you are parked.

how to improve batwing....

Added Wingman (Improves UHF range) added Sensar Pro (Improves range all bands plus other functions).

We travel to a number of places where OTA reception is iffy at best, so we opted to go to a satellite service for that plus other channels that are not available OTA. We installed a Dish system using a portable dish for aiming flexibility and the ability to easily change our service location as we move about to get the area local channels. Even when park cable is available now, we rarely use it.

John From Detroit said:

...

A lot depends on where you park ... For example.. A couple places I like to go (But can not just now) Over the air (As we call it, rather than V/U-HF) simple is not.  and cable may not be an option either... UHF is affected big time by trees...

Click to expand...

... the same goes for satellite, if you have surrounding trees, forget about your dish set up, unless you have a portable tripod complicated installation that you install far away from your coach and gets really hard to program !

We quit using satellite TV when most OTA stations went digital.  We have the Wingman on our antenna.  Depending on our location,  we almost always get a few stations,  sometimes dozens.  We have a TIVO DVR and usually have a backlog of recorded shows we can watch if we don't have any watchable channels.  It works for us, but we are not avid TV watchers.

Jeannine

OTA is free. Satellite costs $50 to $100 per month. No contest for me, I use an antenna.

A few general thoughts...

1. There is no "nationwide' for OTA tv. It is, by definition, local broadcast and both reception quality and content will vary widely as you move around.  If your campsite is far from a metro area (where the tv stations are), say 40+ miles, you probably get little or nothing. Even at 20-30 miles it may be spotty. And if there are hills in the way, all bets are off. Large geographic areas of the country have no OTA tv service at all.

2. You CAN get local channels via standard satellite service in most areas, but you have to change your satellite "service address" at each new place. However, if you use the satellite "Distant Network Service [DNS]" option for mobile accounts, you lose access to the locals.  [Note: a few DNS subscribers can still can get locals, but this is a not the norm and violates FCC policy].

3. If you simply MUST have tv reception every day, or depend on a DVR to record favorite shows, satellite is probably your only real option, but be aware you will have to forsake those lovely tree-covered campsites.

4. Because of #1, quite a few campgrounds offer cable tv at the site. It may be just a community antenna rather than a cable service like Cox or TimeWarner, but it will get you the stations in that area. Content varies widely.  Note: A "community antenna" is just a large central TV antenna or satellite receiver in the park which then redistributes the signal via coax cable to each site.

We have a couple of articles in the RVForum Library on how to get TV for an RV. Here are two, but there are more. Use Search while in Library to find them.
Satellite TV
http://www.rvforum.net/joomla/index.php?option=com_weblinks&view=weblink&id=26:tvonroad&catid=58:newcomersweblinks&Itemid=92

Here's a tip for changing the local channels with DirecTV as you move around.  When you call and get the voice response menu, don't ask to "Change my service address", say "Change my local channels" and you'll get directed directly to a customer service rep that can handle it.  It takes less than a minute in most cases and you don't end up down the rabbit hole of the voice response menus.  When we did this last month in Milwaukee, the CSR had the channels changed before I even told him where we were.  He saw our summer address from the previous year and changed them to the same location.

We've been in parks with everything from no trees to thick trees where we were told there was no way we could get a satellite signal. But, by using as much of the 200 feet of coax we carry as needed with our portable tripod mounted dish, and switching between the three Dish eastern arc or three western arc satellites as needed, we've yet to find a site that we couldn't get a signal from at least one satellite. With Dish, changing locals is a simple 5 minute process using their online chat service. I've changed our locals as often as 5 times in one week, and even twice in one day, and rarely had a problem requiring a second chat session.