thanks oldsoldier, the radio i'm using is on the other side of the room from the window but i'm up pretty high(5th floor res hall) but there's 3 other towers blocking signal. would proximity to tall solid buildings reduce reception too? i'm in a small concrete walled, ceilinged, floored, room (college dorm)Basically when you are touching the antenna on a reciever, such as SW and AM radios you get a stronger signal because you are acting as a larger antenna. Most SW and AM signals are broadcast on a "weaker" frequency or power than say FM channels. Therefore needing a better antenna to pick up distant stations. Try moving the radio closer to a window or somwthing or as someone else sugested try running a "string" ( piece of wire) antenna from the radio antenna along the wall or around a window to increase the area to "catch" the signal. I have done this myself and had greater reception not only in "found" channels but helped find other channels as well.
fm radio is pretty good, i'm about 2 miles north of morgantown, wv so mountains are plentiful. cell is great for me because the res tower to the NE of me has what cell phone towers have on the roof. i would do the wire thing, i've got a roll of 16 guage i used for auto lighting but i don't think my roommate would take kindly to me running wires through his stuff. i'll try the window trick tomorrow because it's been storming pretty bad tonight and i don't feel like trying for a signal now. if i were to do the dangle wire out the window, would i just extend the antenna on my radio or would i have a loop going out the window from the antenna and back to the antenna?I'd say yes as the towers are likely concrete and steel they will absorbe or deflect the signal to and extent. Try this and see what happens move the radio directly in front of the window and check your reception, if it improves then try using some type of wire, speaker wire works pretty good and run a loop around the inside of the window if you can't open the window. If you can open it dangle 4-5' out the window and connect the ends to the radios antenna, making a crude loop antenna. That should help your reception quite a bit. If not you may just be in a signal dead zone. Do you have good signal on other things like cellular phone, fm/am radio and such?
