Cable installers, or just smart people???

[tumbler]

I'm wanting to mount a vhf/uhf antenna in my attic and my house already has cable outlets in all 3 bedrooms and the living room. I'd like to be able to add the antenna into the same cables that are already run through the house, without compromising the integrity of being able to add a cable television service at a future date. I went up into the attic today and it seems that the one RG6 coax from outside is all the way under my attic floor as shown below

[Broken External Image]

It appears to go into a hole where I'm assuming it's run into a 4-way splitter as the 4 RG6 coax cables are coming out of that same hole and running to their respective areas of the house.

[Broken External Image]

I have absolutely NO idea what I'm doing. I have zero experience with anything electrical. Is it possible to hook the antenna into the main cable that runs to the splitter so the antenna provides reception to every outlet in the house? Will that have any effect on starting cable service in the future?

*on a side note... should I be worried about the cut blue wire showing in the second picture? I'm the first owner of this house and I sure as hell didn't cut it.

 

[gfercaks33]

The cut wire is cat5 it's used for networking, they could have used it as a pull wire but I see abandoned wire like that daily at work.

 

[SoonerP226]

Yeah, the cut wire appears to be Cat5 or Cat6 data/telecom wire; it's no big deal (other than possibly leaving you with a data/phone outlet that won't work).

It's likely that the coax all goes into one (or more) splitters, but you never can tell what some cable pullers will do (phone guys and electricians can do odd things to cables--they work fine for their normal cabling types, but are no-gos for data or A/V cabling).

Go ahead and hook up an antenna; worst case when it comes time for cable is that you disconnect the antenna. I would suggest adding terminators on any unused antenna jacks, though; you can pick them up cheap at Radio Shack or Best Buy.

 

[BReeves]

Is there a removable panel or some way to access wherever the cables go to under the hole? That is where the splitter should be and where I would start to see what's going on with the cut cable. The cut cable is a CAT-5 network cable and it would drive me crazy till I found out where the other end is.

Also, every time you split a TV signal you half the signal level (reduce it by 3db). It is always best to only use splitters with the number of outlets you are actually using. For example, you do not want to use a 4 way splitter when you only have two TVs hooked up. Another reason to access wherever those cables are going.

 

[tyromeo55]

Ill try to have these rumblings make sense but it is kinda early....


Personally, As long as everything works I would not worry about the cut cable. It is not a hazard.

BReeves is right on the use of splitters. The only thing I can add there is to try and never put a splitter on a splitter ( there are some that are specifically made to do this though they are uncommon)

If you want to have an antenna and CATV at the same time you will need to run additional cables to each TV or get a switch.

The signal that is picked up from the antenna is so weak that your really not going to have much luck splitting it. Also, TV top antennas do ok because they are so close to the TV. An antenna in the attic is going to have a lot more cable length between it and the TV resulting is tons of signal loss.

Whatever antenna you install really should have a Pre-amp on it as close to the antenna as possible ( Like within the first 18" cable ). A pre-amp will provide enough signal to be able to overcome all the length of wire and splitter in the home

as far as hookup, If it were me Id see if I could run a brand new cable from the new antenna to wherever the splitter is located and put a new splitter on it. Then move the existing TV cables that I want on the antenna from the old splitter to the new one ( you could also add a switch there if you like).

 

[71buickfreak]

The signal is digital, it won't be that big of a deal with the proper equipment. Yes, the signal is analog, but the actual information is transmitted in a digital format that the TV decodes. If there is enough signal to generate an image, it will be perfect, if there is not enough signal, you won't get anything. An HD analog antenna signal is capable of being split 4 times before running into any issues at all, and then they can be fixed with a pre-amp and the guy above mentioned. And that is 4 separate splitters in the chain, not a single 1 into 4 cable splitter. Each split gets you about a 3 dB loss in strength, but that is not that big of a deal with Digital transmissions.

If you are running more than 200 feet of cable, you also will want a pre-amp.

As for sending the cable signal and an antenna signal down the same pipe, that it is possible with a series of diplexors and separators. It is complicated in theory, but it is not that tough to actually install.