A couple of lite questions

Mobile battery charging

1- The size of the charging brick for iPad is different from the one for an iPhone.  Can these be used interchangably?  Does it affect charge times?  Charge unit life?  Battery life?

2- I know that I can use iPad while it's charging; in fact doing so now.  I assume this doesn't affect battery liofe very much... Does it?  Some years ago an EE said this would shorten battery life.  Is this still true?

OTA HD TV

3- I've seen very different comments re: stations we can receive via OTA antenna?  What is your actual experience?  # of HD channels?  Severity of service disruption during storms?  Accurate list of channels we would be able to get?  Several basic discussions of OTAs mention how important it is to aim the antenna properly for each channel.  What's tthe truth?

4- Same vein is there a way to record HD OTA programs?  What's needed?

Thanks

1. Your iPhone will charge faster with the more powerful iPad charger. It will not damage the iPhone or affect battery life. Your iPhone will only pull the amount of current it can manage for charging.

2. I'm not an EE, but as far as I know battery life is affected by the number of charge/discharge cycles it experiences. Keeping the iPad plugged in while you use it should reduce the number of cycles the battery experiences, I'd imagine.

Back in the old days, there was something called the "memory effect" which reduced a battery's capacity if you charged it before it discharged fully. As far as I know, it is no longer a problem with today's batteries (otherwise you'd be hearing a lot more about it)

Right, the lithium batteries don't have much of a memory effect. In fact, it's almost the opposite. Whereas you were supposed to discharge and charge fully previous type of batteries, the new type can be charged and topped off as often as you like. Three factors affect the battery life of the new types: how often you discharge it below 10% or 20%, how often you let it get hot, and age. Try not to let the battery go down often. There's not much you can do about age. They last two or three years, and then they just don't work well any more, even if you treat them carefully.

You might heat up an iphone battery with an ipad charger. If you do, you'll do small long term damage, so do it if it's convenient, but don't make a habit of it. Charging an ipad with an iphone battery could take a day or two, as the iphone charger doesn't provide enough current for an ipad. In fact, it may never work.

According to this article* the use of an iPad charger will not damage your iPhone's battery, but the heat may lead to discoloration if you have a white phone...

--

* http://www.forbes.com/sites/eliseackerman/2014/12/19/will-rapid-charging-damage-your-iphone-6-or-6-plus/#42b5af51270c it

To record OTA you can use this https://www.tablotv.com/

We are using it and it's working very well.

If I am at work and need to charge my iPad, I use an iPhone charger. Takes about five-six hours to fully charge, but it works.

I keep, charge and use my iPad on different floor all day, so I'm lookiing for new ways to do things that will work for me.  Good to know that phone charger will work.  That way I can charge in either place.

Earlster, that was a discussion last year.  I guess you love tablo.  Since it's for OTA there's not even a need for a video card.  How is your channel line  up compared to what you had while living in NJ?

I switched to OTA only after having lived in CO for a while, so I can't comment on the channel lineups for NJ. Here in CO I get the big broadcast channels, NBC, ABC, CBS, Fox, PBS, bunch of Spanish language channels like Univision. It's not a ton, but covers the basics and especially the big live events, like Olympics, Superbowl, Oscars, that sort of stuff. That's also what we sometimes record, as well as Fallon and Colbert.

Most of the regular shows that we watch, we watch through Hulu or Netflix when we want to watch them. Overall we are not a big live TV family, the kids have their shows that they get streaming and the adults are not watching a lot of TV.

At the bottom of this page https://www.tablotv.com/ you can enter your zip code and it will give you a pretty good idea of what channels you can receive OTA. For me this was pretty accurate.

For guest purposes, we ended up getting a cheap TV for guest room #2 in the attic (we spent so long living in the city that the only thing we know to do with extra rooms is make them guest rooms) and while the original plan was to just connect to our Plex TV for programs for the kids that were visiting we also got a cheap $15 antenna and figured we'd connect that as an option for my mother-in-law who prefers that room and also watches network TV.

I was suprised as to how many channels came in. It was probably around 30-40 in total. Many of them not in English. The network channels often look better OTA than through cable. The reception didn't seem too finicky. Admittedly I set it all up and have barely been up there since, but my m-i-l has visited a few times and I know she watches the TV there.