There is a very good chance that if you only use it in the basement for emrgency situations, you have a small set of bunny-ears. If you are at far from the signal source, the traditional indoor atennas are worthless. I live 40+ miles from most of our major broadcasters and cannot pick up any signals with an indoor antenna. Even my outdoor antenna has limited signal strength. If you live fairly close to the source of the signal, you might want to pick up a new indoor antenna that can pick up UHF signals. This may help.