Televes Smartkom review: Maximum over-the-air TV reception

Best Prices Today: Televes Smartkom (model 531983)

For many of us, cutting the cord and switching to free, over-the-air TV is easy—simply install an antenna. But if you live somewhere that makes it difficult to pull in your local channels because the broadcast towers are in opposite directions, you might need something like an antenna rotator. This motorized device will reorient your rooftop antenna depending on the channel you want to watch, so it can pull in signals from towers in disparate locations.

But an antenna rotator comes with its own set of limitations. It requires an extra cable coming into your house, an extra box near your TV, and if you’re feeding the signal to more than one TV, both sets will be restricted to whatever channels are available from the direction the antenna is facing. That’s where the Televes Smartkom comes in.

Rather than set up a single antenna on a rotator, you can install up to three antennas, with each one pointing to a different transmitter. The Smartkom combines the feeds from each antenna, figures out what each is receiving, and selectively amplifies only those channels. This not only means the resulting combined feed coming to your TV tuner includes only the signals your antennas are bringing in, it also means you can send all of those signals to multiple tuners, and each one can receive all the channels available in your area, no matter which direction the broadcast towers might be.

Installation and setup

Televes

Installing the Smartkom is pretty straightforward. The unit comes in a weatherproof box that you’ll zip tie to your antenna mast. It has three ports for connections to up to three antennas, and a fourth port for the coax cable that will go into your house. Inside the house, the coax connects to a 12-volt power supply that feeds the Smartkom over the coax cable. Finally, there’s an output connector that you’ll run to one or more televisions.

When everything is connected up, the Smartkom needs to scan for channels to discover what’s available and how it should switch between antennas. If you’re up on the roof, there’s a button on the rear of the unit to do this, but if you’re back in the house, there’s a button on the power supply unit. You can also use the Televes Asuite app for this task.

Televes

The app, which is available for Android and iOS, connects to the Smartkom via a Bluetooth radio in the power supply unit, but it also serves other functions. After scanning, it presents you with information as to what it’s decided. You’ll see which channels it has assigned to each antenna, but you can click on each antenna to override the Smartkom’s decisions, should you wish. The app also allows you to fine tune the amplifier and add a little extra or less amplification to each channel.

Day-to-day use

Martyn Williams/Foundry

So, how did it fare? In the location where PCWorld tests TV antennas, we’re lucky to receive stations from two broadcast TV markets in almost the same direction, so a single antenna is usually sufficient. But there’s a pesky VHF station off to one side that doesn’t normally come in.

The Smartkom will work with any brand of TV antenna, not just Televes models, but TechHive’s current top TV antenna pick is the Televes Dat Boss Mix LR, and I happen to be also working on a review of the new Televes Dinova Boss, so I connected the Smartkom to them both, using the latter for reception of that secondary TV station.

Martyn Williams/Foundry

After installation and scanning, the Asuite app correctly assigned the Dinova Boss to reception of the off-angle VHF station and, surprisingly, a couple of the other stations I normally receive with the Dat Boss Mix. I compared signals by manually switching between the two antennas, and while both delivered an excellent signal, the antenna the app chose was slightly better.

Another advantage of installing the amplified on the roof is that it minimizes the length of your coax run, reducing signal loss before the signal gets amplified. This resulted in slightly better signal levels across most channels compared to my previous installation where the amplifier was indoors.

Further reading: This review is part of TechHive’s in-depth coverage of the best TV antennas.

Should you buy the Televes Smartkom?

The Smartkom is a neat and clever piece of kit, of a quality not typically found in the North American consumer TV market.

If you have TV signals coming from more than one direction and want to maximize the number of channels you receive, it would be an excellent addition to your TV reception system alongside two or three good-quality outdoor TV antennas.

Note: Amazon also sells an older version of this device (Televes model number 531981) that we have not evaluated.