Customer Reviews

Terk Technology AM/FM+ Radio Antenna

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(23)

 

 

I bought a wonderful Grundig s35 radio, which works wonderfully in my Los Angeles home, but which suffers in performance at work, a college, because of so much interference in the building. I bought the Terk antenna to see if I could get KPCC, a Pasadena station about thirty miles away. The Terk succeeded. Whereas without the Terk antenna I could barely get KPCC, about 10% clarity, with the antenna this often tough-to-get FM station now comes in with over 90% clarity. Also all the other stations, both FM and AM, are now much stronger and clearer. So I'm glad I bought the Terk. Finally, let me add that the hook up is easy. You just snap the attachment to the back of the radio. Finished.

This is a passive antenna that receives radio signals over a pretty broad range of directions simultaneously, so while it won't let you receive stations hundreds of miles away, it is a nice step up from the ugly wires and loops that come with most stereos today -- especially in the aesthetics department. Performance does seem a little better; I expect some of this is due to the fact that you can more reliably 'aim' something this size rather than those long wires that you normally get.

This antenna is much better looking than a wire antenna and does a very good job of being an antenna too. I get excellent reception with it. My only quibble is that there is small slot in the plastic where you can run the antenna wires through to route them out the back. This little slot is wide enough for the AM wire, but is not wide enough to accommodate the FM wire so you have to run it out the side and then back. Not a major problem, but you have to wonder how they could make such a mistake. If not for that this would definitely be a 5 star product as it is reasonably priced, looks good (better than in the picture here, which makes it appear huge - it isn't big at all) and works great!

This antenna did not offer good reception. In fact, unless "aimed" precisely, it seems to be no different than having no antenna. Additionally, it is large and awkward.

This pretty much sum up my experience. It is realy easy to set up but it is not helping me where I needed. The weak station remains weak. A powered antenna should help but my experience is that powered antenna also introduce much interference. Placing it close to windows should help - the location of my stereo is in the middle of my house.

I was trying to get in three FM stations that were local ~20 miles, but had very weak signals (public radio, college, etc). This did NOT help at all. In fact, 2 of my other corporate FM stations (which had "medium" signals) were actually made much worse with this thing! And for the very "strong" corporate signal FM stations, it added some sort of distortion that made my speakers crackle and pop like they were blown. It totally killed ALL of my AM stations. A useles piece of junk, in my opinion.

My Sangean WR2 table radio comes with a crappy wire antenna but evidently a pretty good tuner - with the crappy antenna connected, I was able to get better than average FM tuning in my NYC office, but non-existent AM tuning. After spending $20 on the Terk AM FM+ passive antenna, I discovered minor increases in FM tuning (2 stations came in stronger, but no new stations could be tuned) and zero increase in AM tuning.

The Terk needed to be moved around a bit to maximize signal strength, the same as the mfgr's out of the box wire, but the ugly bulky Terk and its voluminous wires was far less convenient to move around, took up more desk space, and was an obtrusive eyesore. All in all, slightly improved tuning on two stations was not worth the $20 and added inconvenience of using the Terk.

This is my second Terk disappointment; one of their powered TV antennas was even worse - costlier and with plastic junk knobs that fell off quickly. This seems like a pretty inferior company, and their prices are certainly much higher than the quality or effectiveness of their products would indicate.

I have an AIWA stereo system that was given to me as a gift almost ten years ago. With the system came two cheap antennas that were really just plastic coated wires with exposed ends. It was impossible to get ANY signal from them. Now, almost ten years later, I ordered the Terk AM/FM+ radio antenna from amazon, and I could not be happier. I had the thing hooked up within three minutes. The antenna can either be placed on a flat surface, or hung on the wall on a simple nail. If you are looking for a great antenna at an even greater price, then look no further.

I bought this antenna after reading about various different antennas. I wanted to run my home entertainment tuner. I live inside a small town of about 6500 people, and 32 miles from a very large city that offers many AM stations that I enjoy. I was very suprised to find that the AM doesn't work well enough to understand any stations, period. It is a static mess. However, I rate this 1 star instead of none because the FM works flawlessly. Very clear and pics up all the stations in the area as it should. If you are looking for an FM antenna, buy this. AM, don't waste your money, this thing is a peice of crap. How they can get away with calling this an AM antenna I don't know...

Even after reading many of the negative comments I decided to purchase this antenna for my HD radio tuner. While it was able to get some weaker analog signals in, the Terk Antenna did not pull in any HD radio stations, which was what it was advertised for. As my location could be a factor in the reception of these signals (26 miles away from the broadcast tower farm), it is surprising that the loop antenna provided by the manufacturer of the HD tuner was more effective in pulling in stations. My suggestion is to stay away from this antenna and opt instead for an amplified antenna.