How can I connect an HDTV Converter Box to the Attic / Roof Antenna?

Question

My mom has about 5 TVs in her house, and one antenna in the attic. I know that she needs one converter box per TV. But how do we connect the converter boxes up to the attic antenna?

(for the TV in my apartment, I simply connected the rabbit ears antenna into the converter box, and the converter box into the TV).

I'm not a very "handy" person, so if the language could be kept simple and a step-by-step answer provided, I would be very grateful!

Answer 1

Is the attic antenna already connected to the TVs?

If they are, you just disconnect the wire from the tv, connect the wire to the converter box, and connect the converter box to the TV.

BTW, the converter boxes are SDTV, not HDTV.

If the antenna is not connected, you'll need to run wiring from the antenna to the TVs.  If it's an old antenna, you might need some kind of converter to match the TVs' RF in.  If both the TVs and the antenna have 75-ohm coax cable (the thick round ones), all you'll need is some lengths of cable, and a signal splitter.  If both the TVs and the antenna have 300-ohm antenna wire (the flat two-wire kind), all you'll need is some wire and a signal splitter.  If the TVs have 300 ohm and the antenna is 75-ohm, or vice versa, you'll need some converters.

The variations are too numerous.  You can pick up a Dummies book that shows how to wire your house for antennas that comes with some coax cable, some F-connectors and a coax stripping tool. It's called Cable and Satellite Wiring for Dummies, but it will work with an antenna.