Thank you everyone for all the replies! Sorry I wasn't back here sooner, but a migraine took over my life the past few days.
Ok, I'll try to answer everyone's questions.
:welcome: MaineGreenGirl!
I have a similar problem when my cell phone periodically 'hunts' or 'locates itself', has an incoming call or if I make an outgoing call and it wipes out my converter box. However, it never bothers our main TV set which is a Sony Bravia.
Most converter boxes have plastic cases that offer zero shielding to 'spurious' signals and I suspect your laptop is radiating signals that are being detected by your converter box and those signals are confusing it.
My only suggestion is to find a Channel Master 7000 converter box which has a steel case that can be grounded ... there is no guarantee it would be an improvement, but if the cabinet is grounded it may block those spurious signals. Those boxes are out of production but they can be found on EvilBay and Craigslist.
Jim
Thanks for the welcome, Jim!
First thing is that what you say makes perfect sense... the problem is that that is way over anything I can afford to buy at the time. I appreciate the time and effort of you posting it, though!
Question:
Where is your antenna located?
The only place it will bring in a signal is right in front of my laptop (of course). I'm somewhat disabled, so I use the laptop on a desk-type thing on a bed in the livingroom, which is small to begin with. The antenna is placed in the only area of the room where it will bring in the signal.
Snap-Together Toroid Choke Core-2-Pack - RadioShack.com
Like many things with RF, there is no way to accurately predict in advance what will cure the interference. I would suggest buying this at the local "Shady Rack" and trying BOTH toroid chokes on the power cable. You could try it on the coaxial feedline (RG-6 hopefully), but you would have to be VERY careful not to break the wire inside the cable. As always, keep the Radio Scrap receipt just in case this does not help. I used this with a 10 meter amateur radio years ago and they worked. The problem I had with that is when I transmitted and released the Push To Talk button the transmitter kept transmitting! (Trust me, that was NOT a good thing!) I added the chokes in the feedline and life was good again.
How to Stop Radio Frequency Interference with Ferrite Chokes - Yahoo! Voices - voices.yahoo.com
Well, this I
could afford! I have some friends over at our local RadioShack, so I'll check with them as to how to install/use it. I know that if it doesn't work out for me, they'll let me return it. The next thing is getting someone to go pick one up for me... sigh!
Does the interference go away when the laptop WIFI is turned off, or when you run it on batteries only? Does it blank out all channels, or just some of them? If the converter is picking up RF through the computer power supply and the AC power lines, you may try a UPS (Uninterpretable Power Supply) as a filtering device on either the laptop, or possibly run the converter box off of it, and you still may need to try some of the above suggestions too.. I am having a problem with my RF readable power meter supplied by the power company interfering with my AM Radios, and stray RF is sometimes hard to identify and prevent. I found my problem by using an AM Radio, and turning off my main breaker to make sure it was not something in my house causing the problem. I still had a detectable AC hum on my AM Radios.
Another possibility to try would be to take the converter box apart, and spray the inside of the plastic case with some type of metallic spray paint such as aluminum based paint as an RF shield. this trick proved useful in some early Radar detectors in states like mine who utilize Radar detector detectors. This would require some additional vent holes be put into the converters upper case, since the Magnavox converter runs unusually hot anyway due to lack of adequate venting, which is what I did to mine in the picture below. I took some metallic window screen and melted it into the plastic with a soldering iron to hold it in place. This brought the converters temperature down to an acceptable level.
I've tried it with the computer only on it's battery, as well as plugged in - it happens either way, although not as bad when it's on battery power. As far as the WI/Fi, I'm not sure what you mean... we have two boxes over there for our internet, one is a modem and I forget the other name, but one is from the phone company and one I had to buy at RadioShack to get internet with my laptop, can't remember which is which but I'm sure you guys know what they are, lol. Thanks so much for the long reply. This sounds like it would help, too! I'll have to ask hubby about doing this (painting with metallic paint). I did notice that the box is unusually warm too - my cat loves to get up there and sleep on it (and yes, she interferes with reception, too!) because of it's warmth. I've never tried unplugging the box to see if it happens when it's not internet-connected, if that's what you're asking.
I surely hope something will fix this, it's so infuriating! I know the more technologically advanced we get, the more things will interfere with each other... but I don't have to like it, ha ha!
I hope this post is ok, since I don't see a "preview" button... yikes!
