Police / Emergency Scanners
 

The Bitch is quite nosey, so I thought I'd get her one of those police/emergency scanners for Xmas.

Anyone have one? Any recomendations?

Do they just search for the local police bands or do you have to get a list & input them by hand?

Any help would be greatly appreciated :)

I have one that I don't use anymore
I had to buy a book that had all the numbers for US police, fire...etc. But who knows, you might be able to find them on the web someplace.

The book is always really close to the scanner in the store.

OK when it comes to scanners Radio Shack is a good place to get them here are two models that work well

http://www.radioshack.com/product.as...ct%5Fid=20-432

http://www.radioshack.com/product.as...ct%5Fid=20-524

They also program them at the store and sell the book you need with all the local towns Frequencies :)

WOW those babies are so cool. I wish I could get one that worked over here, but it's probably not possible in this shitty country.

Scanners are OK but they get old quick
This from a guy that hears a fire truck and has to run out to find the fire :)

Damn MML - I might have to get both of those - one for the Pool House & one for traveling & finding the cops after the Bills games :D

I have a RS base unit, and a Uniden/Bearcat handheld. Neither of them are trunking units to little by little they will become more useless but don't forget to take a peak at uniden (bearcat.com) will give ya all the models. The RS Stuff is nice, the "flow" of operating the Uniden imho just feels better.


The days of the "crystals" (preset channels) are over, you will want the "Bible" sold at Radio Shack or use online sources for the frequencies. Usually there are 100+ channels, setup into banks. So you can set 1-10 for police, 21-29 for fire, 31-39 etc. Sometimes the 1's are priority channels 1,11,21 etc. meaning they get scanned 2x or 3x as much as the rest. If you layout your more important local channels on the priority ones they will usually override something small on a lesser channel. Example, you have the local trainyard on channels 34,35,36....and an ambulance call comes up (prog'd on channel 11) the priority kicks in and it will jump to the ambulance call over the lesser trainyard. They pretty much do whatever you want.

You definately need something that supports trunking these days as many state and even local police are using this type of system.

My 2 cents.

Yup my wife is into the scanner thing..or was when she had more time. It`s still here on a desk somewhere. There are a bunch of sites online for local codes etc. In fact were in the same area I could probably scrounge up some codes for you..been awhile. But keep in mind the older they are the moer the will pick up outside of traditioal police frequencies and stuff...such as your neighbors but I did`nt say that! hehe Models after the mid or ealy nineties starting cutting down on th ehigher freq`s that are used for cellphoes etc. But the radio scraps trunking scanners do a fine job!

I had a Radio Shack model way back that with a key stroke combo would allow one to listen to cell conversations and cordless phones.

I want to say Pro 51, but don't remember.

Heard some interesting shit. :D

It gets old quick though.

I know absolutely zero about scanners, but the coolest thing I every heard on one was the Nasa techno dudes talking back and forth during a shuttle launch. I don't have a clue how my friend was able to pick it up, as we're a long way from the Cape, but he did.

Being an ex-fireman/paramedic (long time ago now:) ) i have one next to my desk. It's great to hear what is going on since we have the all-in-one warning system here. That is the big whistle the blows for everything and the same sound is for fires, tornado warnings etc, so we keep it on just to hear what is happening at the time.


The thing to keep in mind with scanners is who/what you want to listen to. You don't just go out and buy a scanner and expect to pick up everything. Certain police organizations are now using trunked frequencies which means you need to have a trunked scanner to pick them up. You need to figure out what you want to listen to, then research what frequencies the police / fire / ambulance units are using around your area and then get the scanner that fits. It's not always as easy and just picking one up.

You can get scanners from different places. BearCat makes some ok scanners, I have a radio shack one but they are usually a rip-off. You can find tons of them online depending on your budget of what you want to spend. You can even get some of the good ones used on E-Bay.

Hope that helps.

Andy

I neglected to mention before, and others can comment as well. The other issue with scanner listening is reception. If you can't get the signal you won't hear anything either :)

I had my best success with a recommendation I got on the web. Using a discone antenna (easily found at RS) and some RG-8 cable (the thick less flexible stuff) probably increased my distance and clarity by 2-300%. If you get a base model you might also think about signal availability in the area and the potential issue of having an outside antenna. I was in a semi-rural area at the time so the need was greater.

You might not need anything like that, just wanted to point it out for consideration.