There has to be a way to do this

[RichBrubaker]

This is not Dish related but I know there allot of smart people viewing here. Please help me if you can.

My dad is 90 and living in a retirement home. They have a cable distribution system distributed by a coaxial cable.

He recently purchased a new 32" Sony HDTV. It has two HDMI inputs and one component input. By connecting the coax cable to the tuner input he can receive the cable channels without a problem. He does not have a converter box so the TV tuner is decoding each channel. The input to the TV is set to cable.

What I need is to connect an HDTV antenna so he can get the local channels. Of course there is only one coax input on the TV. If I connect the antenna to the tuner input and switch the TV input to antenna he is able to get all of the local HD channels.

I've tried an AB switch but that required switching the TV input back and forth. Too much technical stuff for a 90 year old.

Is there a device that I can connect the local antenna to and then connect the output of the device to one of the HDMI or component inputs?

 

[navychop]

Well, there is the accursed TiVO. There's also the Channel Master 7400. Pricey. At least the CM 7400 doesn't have a monthly fee like TiVO.

 

[osu1991]

You need either a separate digital ATSC OTA tuner box or a separate cable box. Then you can use one box on the HDMI/Component input and the other on the tv tuners input.

 

[dwarren2]

I would ask why the locals aren't being carried on the in house cable system.
Does the hdtv have composite inputs (RWY) and do you have an old vcr laying around? If so hook up the cable to the vcr and out put it to the tv via composite and hook your ota antenna up to the coax input. Then all he would have to do is use the tv remote to switch inputs and ota channels and the vcr remote to switch cable channels

 

[upsss]

Rich, no matter what you would use, your dad will have to switch between 2 inputs on his TV and it is usually much more complicated than a single clicks on the remote.

I think your best option is to use a remote controlled A-B switch, Radio Shack makes one. Switching inputs between the OAT antenna the Cable channels would be a single click on the A-B remote. Just one question, are you sure the Cable company doesn't provide local channels to the retirement home?

 

[osu1991]

If the tv only has one coax input for the tuner, then an a/b switch is not that simple, as depending on the tv it may have to rescan.

My Mitsubishi has 2 tuners, my LG Plasma only has 1 coax input, but it remembers what it scanned between cable and ota, so an a/b switch would work. My older Olevia and newer Sony LCD's have to rescan.