I discovered this forum a day after I ordered Voom. After reading the Installation thread and comming across some of the horror stories of bad installs and inept installers I must admit that I was a bit apprehensive. My install date was April the 20th in the morning time slot. To my great relief the installer that came knew about everything to know about Voom and was an active reader of horror stories that were posted (if not here than somewhere else that has a Voom forum).
George the intaller had been in the television business for quite a while. I live in Lawrenceville, a suburb of Atlanta, Georgia and George had worked for Wometco Cable which became MediaOne which then became ATT. He apparently left before the Comcast takeover and became a contractor for Installs Inc. This guy was great and addressed all of my concerns.
When I questioned him about the whole diplexer/no diplexer issue he assured me that they do not really degrade the signals as much as was reported online (again I do not know if it was this forum or another) and assured me that the OTA does not take a huge signal hit. I also asked him about the power for the amp in the Stealth antenna (wether the power comes from the STB or if the power inserter wasn necessary) and he confirmed that if the diplexer was used the power does indeed come from the STB.
After the dish was up and the cable was run the STB was installed and began downloading. The first image that I saw was a short clip of a wind surfer in a short promo on HDN. I was blown away by the PQ having come from analog cable that was comming in very fuzzy. I switched down to a local but got nothing but pixelation and freezing. Apparently my OTA antenna had to be pointed directly into a thick area of trees to point towards the towers.
George told me that the trees cause the signal to reflect and degrades the total signal strength. He suggested that I give it 24 hours and if it did not improve to give Voom a call and tell them the problem.
The next day after work I called Voom and described the problem. The CSR was very helpful and scheduled me for an upgraded antenna - for no charge. This was excellent news, I was very happy that the larger antenna was being installed free of charge.
Needless to say I was hoping that George would be the insaller to put up the new antenna. After a weeks wait who shows up? George! He brought a Weingard antenna. According to the box the Weingard (I dont remember the model) was supposed to reduce the reflection problems. The antenna also comes with a preamp which also takes its power from the STB. After the install was complete I had my locals; no more pixelation, no more freezing.
I have fallen in love with Voom in the few days that I have had it. The PQ is simply amazing on my Samsung and comming from analog cable the Program Guide makes finding things so much easier.
I did not mean for this post to become so long winded but I really wanted to commend George for his excellent job and to say that I intend to be a long time Voomer.
I dont know if you can request installers but if you are in the Atlanta area George is your man!
George the intaller had been in the television business for quite a while. I live in Lawrenceville, a suburb of Atlanta, Georgia and George had worked for Wometco Cable which became MediaOne which then became ATT. He apparently left before the Comcast takeover and became a contractor for Installs Inc. This guy was great and addressed all of my concerns.
When I questioned him about the whole diplexer/no diplexer issue he assured me that they do not really degrade the signals as much as was reported online (again I do not know if it was this forum or another) and assured me that the OTA does not take a huge signal hit. I also asked him about the power for the amp in the Stealth antenna (wether the power comes from the STB or if the power inserter wasn necessary) and he confirmed that if the diplexer was used the power does indeed come from the STB.
After the dish was up and the cable was run the STB was installed and began downloading. The first image that I saw was a short clip of a wind surfer in a short promo on HDN. I was blown away by the PQ having come from analog cable that was comming in very fuzzy. I switched down to a local but got nothing but pixelation and freezing. Apparently my OTA antenna had to be pointed directly into a thick area of trees to point towards the towers.
George told me that the trees cause the signal to reflect and degrades the total signal strength. He suggested that I give it 24 hours and if it did not improve to give Voom a call and tell them the problem.
The next day after work I called Voom and described the problem. The CSR was very helpful and scheduled me for an upgraded antenna - for no charge. This was excellent news, I was very happy that the larger antenna was being installed free of charge.
Needless to say I was hoping that George would be the insaller to put up the new antenna. After a weeks wait who shows up? George! He brought a Weingard antenna. According to the box the Weingard (I dont remember the model) was supposed to reduce the reflection problems. The antenna also comes with a preamp which also takes its power from the STB. After the install was complete I had my locals; no more pixelation, no more freezing.
I have fallen in love with Voom in the few days that I have had it. The PQ is simply amazing on my Samsung and comming from analog cable the Program Guide makes finding things so much easier.
I did not mean for this post to become so long winded but I really wanted to commend George for his excellent job and to say that I intend to be a long time Voomer.
I dont know if you can request installers but if you are in the Atlanta area George is your man!
