Winegard SharpShooterTM Backgrounder
When the problem is Off-Air indoor DTV/HDTV reception for metropolitan/suburban consumers, where line-of-sight to the local transmit sources are blocked, the best solution is Winegard¡¯s new SharpShooterTM Antenna Platform.
Getting the best DTV/HDTV reception is all about the right antenna. And the best antennas are now necessities, not accessories.
73 million TV sets in the US don¡¯t get their signals from cable or satellite, 45 million of which are in homes that rely exclusively on local, 'over-the-air' stations as their sole source of television. And let¡¯s not forget that Free HD is here, now, for those that can ¡°Get It¡±. The CEA has projected that 8 million Digital TV products will be sold in 2005 and 10.5 million in 2006. 84.69% of the U.S. TV households are in markets with five or more DTV stations now. 1491 stations in 211 markets have made the transition to broadcasting a digital signal and are now delivering Digital signals serving 99.99% of the current US 4 million HDTV households, which are up from 1.6 million in March 2004.
For consumers who can¡¯t or don¡¯t want an outside antenna, set-top antennas offer consumers the best way to receive local broadcaster's Digital TV signal over-the-air. As many people have found out, they can't just bring home an HDTV set and use their old antenna system; they need to install a separate antenna for HDTV reception. The only current way to receive true HDTV resolution (1080i) is with an Off-Air antenna or satellite broadcast signals and HDTV satellite is not free. Satellite and even cable customers want the opportunity to receive free Off-Air DTV/HDTV signals.
By far, the majority of the new antenna market today is directed at metropolitan/suburban consumers. And the fastest growing sector of the market is in the Off-Air reception of HDTV broadcasts. With the number of digital stations rising, the amount of HDTV program doubling since last year and HDTV set sales soaring, Digital TV is fast becoming a necessity for high tech home theaters. The vast majority of these HDTV unit sales will be to these markets.
The single largest contributing factor to successful indoor digital antenna installation and DTV/HDTV reception today is the ability of these metropolitan/suburban consumers to buy the right antenna to specifically deal with multi-path or reflected signal. This is especially true where line-of-sight to the transmit source is usually blocked and the only signal they can receive is a bounced signal, such as off a wall or building. This is critical for downtown urban lapartment/condominium dwellers living on the wrong side of a high-rise with respect to the transmit tower. This bouncing is known in RF terms as multipath. This is a huge issue and significant challenge for digital antenna manufacturers.
This was also a major issue and significant challenge for the 45 million potential Off-Air DTV/HDTV customers, until the SharpShooter was introduced in November of last year. Winegard¡¯s SharpShooter SS-3000 indoor All-Band DTV/HDTV Digital/Analog Directional/Bi-directional Antenna Platforms addresses this issue by allowing the customer to aim the antenna properly to choose the cleanest reflected digital signal off a wall in the room or a building across the street. This is made possible by the SharpShooter¡¯s ability to selectively look at each bounced multi-path signal, one at a time for channels 2 through 69 and by design, reject all unwanted multi-path signals to find the best signal possible.
Multipath is the result of several different broadcast signals reaching the antenna out-of-phase with each other or at differing time intervals. This creates a digital multipath condition that delivers several sets of digital data 1¡¯s and 0¡¯s to the ATSC chipset out-of-phase and can confuse proper decoding. The ATSC chipset is not sure which set of digital data is the correct data bits to decode. If the amount of multi-path is too high, the ATSC chipset will not decode any data at all. Unlike analog television, the interference caused by reflected signals can prevent a receiver from getting enough digital information from the primary signal, causing a cliff effect and total loss of the picture also.
The metropolitan/urban market is the biggest segment of the HDTV market. It was not being served well by existing digital antennas until the release of Winegard¡¯s GETDTV/HDTv TM Series, starting with the outdoor SquareShooter last year, which is now Winegard¡¯s best selling Off-Air antenna.
It is imperative that any new digital antenna platform design specifically deals with this multi-path issue. The SharpShooterTM does this by selectively looking at each multi-path signal one at a time and by design tends to reject all other multi-paths, allowing the customer or installer to properly select the cleanest digital signal possible and best digital data sources for the ATSC chip set to decode. It then delivers them in a format that the chip set in the receiver prefers and can resonate and process effectively, delivering the best DTV/HDTV picture possible, while rejecting other multi-path signals so critical for downtown urban locations.
Why do we say the new SharpShooter is the best indoor DTV/HDTV antenna? Because it solves indoor DTV/HDTV problems no other indoor antenna can solve. The SharpShooter incorporates, for the first time together, both an ¡°E-Field¡± Ultra-Low Noise Amplifier and the same ¡±Scatter Plane¡± technology found in Winegard¡¯s SquareShooter Series, to deal with these multi-path issues.
The simple electric field (E-field) sensing structure coupled to an electronic Ultra-Low Noise Amplifier is patented technology and digital architecture from Dotcast, a privately held broadband communications technology developer headquartered in Kent, Washington. Dotcast¡¯s Active Antenna Technology allowed Winegard, under an exclusive license agreement covering North America, to design and manufacture this new SharpShooter antenna incorporating Dotcast¡¯s technology. This addition provides reception that is as much as 225 times more powerful than traditional rabbit ears; in an antenna package design smaller than 1/3 the size of a typical indoor TV antenna. This resulted in Off-Air Digital TV reception that radically improves reception in neighborhoods and buildings where digital reception was not feasible.
Winegard¡¯s Scatter Plane technology neutralizes reflected, out-of-phase signals arriving at the back of the antenna element. SharpShooter antenna purchasers have the option of attaching the scatter plane to the back of the SharpShooter making it directional for pointing at local transmitter sources where the desired broadcast antennas are closely grouped. Or they can leave it off, to make the SharpShooter bi-directional to receive and resonate broadcast signals coming from several directions. This will depend specifically on were the consumer lives, were they are located relative to the local broadcast towers they want to receive and what may be blocking their line-of-site.
This antenna was specifically designed to reject multi-path and receive and resonate VHF/UHF
transmissions from reflected broadcast signals, by allowing the antenna to be pointed at
another reflective source, such as a building or wall, to capture the reflected signals and still be able to resonate quality DTV/HDTV signals. Sometimes reflected or balanced signals may be stronger than direct signals.
Other manufacturer¡¯s pre-amplifiers today typically deliver a noise figure of 4.0 dB or more. In contrast, the new technology found in the SharpShooter uses a truly unique non-traditional electromagnetic design for superior performance. This allowed Winegard to totally integrate the patent-pending Dotcast Ultra-Low Noise Amplifier design into Winegard¡¯s SharpShooter antenna platform.
With a demonstrably low noise figure of less than 1dB, the SharpShooter¡¯s Ultra-Low Noise Amplifier design significantly improves the carrier-to-noise ratio. This new technology, together with Winegard¡¯s ¡°Scatter-Plane¡± design, delivers an average beam-width of 55 degrees and a front-to-back digital multipath rejection ratio, its gain in a specific direction, of 6.5dB, providing the SharpShooter its muscle to reject multi-path signals and to deliver a low-noise digital signal as no other antenna can, in today¡¯s market.
The resonate characteristics of this ¡°E-Field¡± antenna design breakthrough also provides for a much smaller antenna that resonates throughout the entire VHF/UHF band-pass channels 2 through 69 in a platform that is 26.75¡± inches or less in size. The unique reception characteristics of this very small SharpShooter antenna allow it to receive and resonate indoor analog and outstanding DTV signals up to 30 miles from the transmit source. This fact is unheard of in an antenna package that is 5 inches high, 4.25 inches deep and weighs only 1.6 lbs, making it a true engineering marvel.
And there is a huge need in this market for an indoor antenna that successfully addresses these issues. Outperforming all, all-band indoor digital antenna systems, there is no other indoor digital antenna platform that can do what the SharpShooter can do. This is why Winegard feels that Off-Air antennas should no longer be thought of, by the trade media, as an accessory.
Antennas were originally put in this accessory category, although Winegard is vigorously attempting to make the point that they are no longer accessories. The FCC, in their press conference last October launching their ¡°DTV Get It¡± educational initiative, did touch on the need for the right DTV/HDTV antenna. Winegard will continue to help the FCC educate consumers by supplying information to them about Off-Air antennas, the does and don'ts of selection and installation and the right antenna¡¯s very important role in getting free local HD reception.
The point is that the right DTV/HDTV antenna, considering the role reflected signal plays, is not an option, it is now a requirement. Most of the DTV/HDTV antennas returned to retailers are either the wrong antenna for the location or are in perfect working order and returned because of faulty installation techniques. This means there is a huge need to educate consumers and retailers alike about receiving free Off-Air Digital and HDTV signals.
The SharpShooter¡¯s technical performance, low profile compact design which makes it esthetically pleasing for indoor use and installation, absolutely make this new antenna more unique and better suited for the metropolitan/urban segment than any other indoor antenna platform on the market today. And it will be available just in time to meet the proliferation of the HDTV industry and subsequent exploding HDTV consumer market.
The SharpShooter is built in the USA at Winegard¡¯s facilities in Burlington Iowa. As a true testament to the acceptance of this unique and innovative new antenna platform design, this is only the second time in Winegard¡¯s 51-year history that a product has been pre-sold before it was available, the SquareShooter being the first. |
