Philips MANT940 UHF Digital and Analog Indoor/Outdoor Antenna
January 26, 2010 | Posted by admin 
- UHF amplification 18 dB
- Channels 14-69
- Plug and play
- Ideal for urban or suburban areas
- Includes 20′ Coaxial cable and mounting kit
Product Description
The Philips MANT940 Indoor/Outdoor Antenna is scientifically designed to improve analog and digital UHF reception. This antenna is very versatile and can be used both outdoors and indoors. It can be mounted to walls, railings or any sturdy base. This antenna is compatible with UHF and HDTV, and is ideal for those who live in urban or suburban areas. It comes with a mounting kit and 20 feet of coaxial cable…. More >>
Categories: Outdoor Antenna | 
Tags: Analog, Antenna, Digital, Indoor/Outdoor, MANT940, Philips | 
5 Comments »
I purchased this antenna from Target last week for over $50 and set it up both indoors and outdoors. Let me first say this is cheaply made, plastic and weighs about an ounce of crap. After installation on both indoor and outdoors, I received one (1) channel, and that channel was fuzzy. I live in the Denver area and had no obstructions on the roof and could only get ONE channel. This was returned immediately and I can not believe anyone would sell such crap.
Save your money!
Rating: 1 / 5
When I opened the box, I was concerned. The cable provided is 25 foot of unshielded RG59 with the cheapest crimp on connectors that can be had. I tested the cable on a Pentascanner from work. It passed all to 1Ghz, but the power loss per meter was 2.04db!! (So for those not familiar with the log scale of signals, if you lose 3dbm of signal, you have 1/2 of what you stated with. So a signal loss of 2.04dbm starting with a +4dbm injected on one side, resulted in a -10.48dbm. Well we know why you need the powered amp now as -10dbm is nearly no signal left. (They recommend if you are going to need longer than 20′ replace it with higher quality RG6 or RG6 quad shielded low loss cable). I strongly agree. Throw their cable away and pick up a pre-made RG-6 quad shielded cable. It has broader range (up to 3Ghz, and normally tests at less than 0.5db loss per connector, 0.2 loss per meter.
Anyway after replacing the cable and that helped, but a new problem started to occur. Signal level would drop to 0 periodically. I checked the signal power after the amp injector in-line and I suspect there may be an issue with the $0.59 6V power adapter they included as I lose all signal when inserted between the power AMP and my Hauppauge Encoder/Decoder card with built in Mpeg2 chipset periodically. Sits at a solid 97-100% on their power meter, -4.6db on my meter. THeir signal drops to 0, my meter reads -20db (which is no signal), then it jumps back to 100% again. (as if the power cut out and kicked in). I didn’t waste any more of my time on this thing.
UPDATE:
I did put more time in to this thing…
The cable on the injector was bad. Replacing the connectors on the injector made a significant difference, but as mentioned it did not resolve the problem of intermittent drops to 0dbm completely. It still happened periodically enough to be annoying. This is a pretty simple antenna in that it is just a sheet of copper. What is important however is that this directional antenna can not only pick up from the specific direction, but it also has the ability to pick up bounced signals that come from surfaces around the sides and rear of the antenna. I moved the antenna from indoors to outdoors to take advantage of the same line of sight, only about a foot higher on first floor, but where it clearly would pick up more signal from surrounding surfaces. Doing this eliminated all signal “drops” completely. So lesson learned here is despite a line of sight to the “empire State Building”, and it’s directional nature, the additional bounce signal picked up does add signal strength stability. Wish I could change the one star to 3. I wouldn’t give it a five because of the issues, and they really could provide better connectors. I highly recommend press on water tight connectors. They are about a $1 a connector, but I have not had one go bad yet! (These press on and crimp down in line with the connector and are water tight, unlike the crimp type that crimp perpendicular to the wire such as the ones on the wire that comes with the unit and injector.
Rating: 1 / 5
Similar to many reviewers, I was tired of paying so much for cable. I got this based on the many positive reviews and the fact that it is a convenient sort of all in one with everything from the antenna, cable, mounting bracket, etc. included. I have it mounted on a top of a 6ft fence serving an entire house with three TVs. It works fine most of the time. However, after several months using this thing I am pretty disappointed since it seems to intermittently lose signal on overcast, rainy, or windy days. Maybe something to do with the electromagnetism in the air or shaking from the wind. Whatever! I think I know why there are so many positive reviews. Many people indicated they are using this antenna on a single TV. Since I am using it as a whole house antenna it is pretty far away from any one TV and I think the signal strength may be dropping over longer distances. The instructions talk about upgrading cable wire if distance to TV is over 20 feet. But, this is advertised as a whole house antenna made to be mounted outdoors. When is that gonna be less than 20ft especially when they talk about ideal locations being on roofs (which I did try it only to get a poorer signal likely because of the wind). Plus it gets connected to the existing coax already running throughout the house. I’m not going to replace all that wire!
I’m gonna try and hold out until the whole digital conversion thing in June since I heard there may be an overall boost in signal once that fully occurs (may be just a rumor). Frankly, this has made me skeptical about antennas in general being able to support my whole house. Plus, I miss ESPN, CNBC, CNN, etc.
Rating: 2 / 5
This antenna wouldn’t pick up any channels, mounted inside and outside the house. Even the 10 year old $15 UHF indoor antenna I have can pick up a couple.
Rating: 1 / 5
I hooked it up and sent it back. I have a small portable antenna that came with my hauppage usb tuner that workes better than this.
Rating: 2 / 5