Antennas Direct's Clearstream2 Antenna Available for Pre-Order

Post by **Shane** » Mon Jun 16, 2008 11:12 am

St. Louis-based antennas maker Antennas Direct announced its new, ultra-efficient, compact, digital TV antenna, ClearStream2, will arrive June 30. Orders are being taken now.

ClearStream2 is Antennas Direct's latest model of digital TV antennas, which are optimized specifically for the 2009 digital conversion.

The first DTV antenna created with...

[url=http://www.hdtvmagazine.com/news/2008/06/antennas_directs_clearstream2_antenna_available_for_pre-order.php]Read Bulletin[/url]

akirby · Post by **akirby** » Mon Jun 16, 2008 12:17 pm

That's the most BS I've read in a single press release in quite some time.

Richard · Post by **Richard** » Mon Jun 16, 2008 4:41 pm

A single bow tie? 50 miles?

Post by **Shane** » Tue Jun 17, 2008 8:12 am

I thought this might stir up discussion.

We should expect to see more of this from Antenna manufacturers as we inch closer to the Feb cut-off, and beyond.

Perhaps we can put together an FAQ here in the forum and publish it as an article to clear up the FUD?

- Shane

rich644 · Post by **rich644** » Tue Jun 17, 2008 3:46 pm

Its not a bowtie antenna, its a dual tapered loop antenna. Nearly the same gain as a 4 bay bowtie, but with better VSWR.

The performance claims are not outrageous. There is still plenty of efficiency to be wrung out of antennas.

Richard · Post by **Richard** » Tue Jun 17, 2008 5:50 pm

Well thanks for the input... would love to hear from Ken on this one...

akirby · Post by **akirby** » Wed Jun 18, 2008 6:28 am

rich644 wrote: The performance claims are not outrageous.

Maybe not, but comments like

optimized specifically for the 2009 digital conversion.

are bogus. There is nothing magical happening to UHF/VHF broadcasts or reception next year. Any working UHF/VHF antenna will continue to work next year.

Richard · Post by **Richard** » Wed Jun 18, 2008 7:52 am

rich644 wrote:Its not a bowtie antenna, its a dual tapered loop antenna. Nearly the same gain as a 4 bay bowtie, but with better VSWR.

We would love to see some performance data rather than marketing hype.

http://www.hdtvprimer.com/ANTENNAS/types.html

kq6qv · Post by **kq6qv** » Wed Jun 18, 2008 2:02 pm

Bogus claim #1: That this antenna performs like antennas five times larger. (This claim is on the maker

rschneider · Post by **rschneider** » Wed Jun 18, 2008 11:49 pm

As I own the company, I may be able to provide some insight into the Clearstream series.

While the PR folks may have gotten carried away, there is technical merit to the new Clearstreams. We chose tapered circular loops for its potential to increase bandwidth performance over the uniform circular loop and fan dipoles. (bowties) This choice was motivated by a recent paper that analyzed the electromagnetic dual (tapered circular slot) of this geometry for application in ultra-wide band / short pulse applications. We have expanded upon this and adapted these theories to create new geometries targeting the core DTV frequencies. We are betting heavily on the new tapered loop elements, and will be releasing two more designs in the coming months based on this research: a single loop (Clearstream 1) and a quad loop (Clearstream 4).

Short version;
It