Burley, Idaho SD/HD project!

[CharredPC]

After enjoying a slew of SD and HD content available OTA where I live in Provo, UT, me and my wife went to visit her mother up on the edge of Burley ID (83318). We had planned to buy her a new television for her birthday (hers being small and 15+ years old), when it occurred to me that the addition of one of my spare Hisense DB2010 SD/HD receivers could get her some better quality tv with an EPG. She currently has an existing roof aerial and gets half a dozen or more analogue signals pretty well.

Because I plan every little thing, I tried to use the various online guides to see how many stations she would get, if she would still have to use analogue for any stations, and if I would need to reorient her antenna. Antennaweb claims she will get one digital station (UHF KMVT-DT, Channel 16.1 CBS from Twin Falls, 35 miles away). 2150.com lists three stations- KISU-DT (POCATELLO), KAID-DT (BOISE), and KIPT-DT (Twin Falls)... all PBS stations. This webpage appears to tout an HD ABC signal on VHF channel 9. So whom do I believe? If it helps, I use the same receiver I'd be giving her, and off a set of rabbit ears at ground level I get all my local stations adequately from 37.6 - 41.6 miles away (pretty good sensitivity ). If the broadcast power is somewhat comparable, the roof antenna should do the same or better. There are no large trees or any nearby buildings to get in the way. I'm hoping someone in the area ( or 'in the know') can report what's currently available digitally in the southern Idaho area.

Thanks in advance!

 

[texasbrit]

It's obviously a bad reception area, there are several analog repeater stations in Burley and twin falls and these are probably the ones she is receiving. (These are the ones with strange-looking callsigns, or -LP stations)
Antennaweb is notoriously conservative when it comes to digital stations - if I put in a height of 300ft, a few more digitals show up - KBGH, KIPT and KXTF (Fox) in Twin Falls. But I don't see any of the other national networks, the analog ones are 70-90 miles away, except for the repeater/low power stations , so it looks pretty bleak. The channel 9 station you mention is 90 miles away so it's extremely unlikely....

You could try putting up a CM4228 or an Antennas Direct 91XG, and pointing it on a heading of 284, maybe you would get CBS, PBS and Fox, maybe not. With a rotor you might get other stations also. A preamp might not be useful because it could get overloaded by the close-in VHF repeater signals. But it will definitely be an experiment.