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DTVuser2009

I think Magnavox released an updated boxes. the ones i remember that first came out were grey, not black and had power buttons on the side (mains power, not power to the box as in turning it on in the remote).

They just got these in. there were about 50 of em.

The Zenith is a great box, but not at all forgiving of any signal fluctuations or signals below a very unrealistic threshold. any signal below 65% you might as well forget it.

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RCA Sucks

I bought the RCA converter box from Walmart just before the transition date to DTV and it is slowly failing to function properly one channel at a time. I live in the Dallas area and I get many high strength broadcast signals. When I first lost channel 52, I just thought it was the broadcast station. Days later that channel was just a terribly scrambled signal, totally unwatchable. Now channel 13 is acting up. When I switch to that channel, the converter box works for about 10 seconds then fails to translate the signal.

HTNut

Sorry to hear that. Just a suggestion, have you done a rescan lately? Some of the stations have been hopping around different frequencies. Might help.

RCA Sucks

I've tried it frequently but it doesn't help. And I forgot to mention: A friend also bought the same model at Walmart, the RCA DTA 800B1, and she is also starting to experience the same problems.

So what is a good reliable brand of converter box that will pick up signals well and has a good picture quality? That's what I want.

JakesDTVBlog

The very earliest Magnavox boxes were the TB100MW9, which were black and had the main power switch on the side, plus no analog passthrough. The TB110MW9 appears to be the latest, and it too is black but there's no power switch and it does have passthrough. Also, the remote is different.

The gray Magnavoxes were not great. I had one of those and it died.

However, as good as the new Magnavox is, my fave is still the Venturer that Target sold last summer. It has been by far the easiest to use and neither of the two I bought have given me any trouble. One is now in the RV.

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RCA Sucks

Venturer is made by RCA and I will never buy crap from the RCA crap company again. I've read elsewhere that Magnavox also has a huge failure rate. The fact it it is sold by Walmart is not a plus.

DTVuser2009

The only 'good' RCA-anything i got which still works is the 13" Color XL-100 TV in the bedroom. granted it was made in USA then and it's manufacture date is 1979.

I don't have experience with Venturer and i'm sold on Magnavox since they appear to work great and i don't like buying a box i may or may not like and then end up trashing it. i hate throwing things out into the garbage.

The only other box i got that works excellent is the Samsung HD Tuner. but those are expensive new and i was lucky to find one in a flea market for $5. they didn't know what it was lol.

it all depends on how far away you are from the towers too. some boxes are fine if you live within ~20 miles of them (such as the Zenith or DTVPal) but some people live more than 30 miles away and are are on areas with hills or trees or buildings. those will cause all sorts of problems with boxes which are not tolerant of signal fluctuations within a certain range. also i do NOT recommend using the cables packaged with the boxes. they're inferior and will cause more problems than the antenna or box could ever do. a lot of times replacing the cheesy quick-connect RG-5 in favor of high-quality RG-6 Satellite-grade cable works wonders.

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Who is General Failure, and why is he reading my hard disk?!

Eureka

RCA,
See your other threads for suggestions.