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Comment by chaosmachine | Hacker News Reader

After not being able to find a suitable online stream of this event (I don't have cable), I gave up and built a rudimentary antenna for my TV. Basically, I just wound a bunch of copper wire around a piece of cardboard and stuck it in the window. The other end of the wire went into the cable port on the back of my TV. Surprisingly, I was able to pick up the game in crystal clear, digital 1080p!

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There's something fitting about fashioning your own antenna to watch AI compete on Jeopardy. True hacker.

It may have been crystal clear, but it wasn't in 1080p. It was either 1080i or 720p. 1080p over-the-air broadcasts still do not exist.

You're right, my mistake, it was 1080i.

That's pretty impressive, mind sharing a photo with us? I just want to understand what this level of awesome looks like.

Thanks, I just wrote it up and took some pictures:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2222827

Antennas made of a straight bit of wire of about 1/4 the wavelength usually work well. Think FM radios: freq about 100 MHz -> lambda = c/freq = 300 cm -> antenna of 75 cm (30 in).

The non-realtime/non-hacking way: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLdkJpAtt1I (part1, part2 link on screen)

I grabbed it out of youtube not long after it played on the East coast.

youtube search: jeopardy watson

search options: upload today

edit: I think I may have included the date in the search

For anyone searching for it, including today's show:

http://www.youtube.com/user/Rashad8821

Before I signed up for cable, I built this and had pretty great reception. Just a couple of parts from Home Depot/Radio Shack and you're good to go:

http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2009/01/maker-workshop-dtv-...

For the sake of clarity, could you explain the set up? How many channels could your copper wire pick up?

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