Urgent -Need FM band on a scanner, any suggestions?

[davidc1]

Hello all,

Newbie here....

We'll be going to Circuit of the America's in Austin, TX next week for the Formula 1 race. We'll be getting scanners this weekend to primarily be able to hopefully listen to the TV commentators feeds of the race (BBC and SkyTV) to make it more enjoyable.

Just found out also though that Fox/Speed will probably be broadcasting their TV feed over regular FM as well.

So, I notice that not all scanners receive the standard FM band. Can anyone give us some suggestions on any scanners that do receive FM? We've got to buy them by tomorrow.

Thanks all for any suggestions!

 

[captclint]

Just found out also though that Fox/Speed will probably be broadcasting their TV feed over regular FM as well.
So, I notice that not all scanners receive the standard FM band. Can anyone give us some suggestions on any scanners that do receive FM? We've got to buy them by tomorrow.!

Welcome to RR. BC346XT - The RadioReference Wiki is a good choice. It covers FM and nearly everything else except digital, Of course, a $12 http://smile.amazon.com/Sony-ICF-S1...=UTF8&qid=1414244105&sr=1-1&keywords=fm+radio pocket FM radio would be a lot cheaper, and then you cold get a less expensive scanner such as
BC75XLT - The RadioReference Wiki
or
BC125AT - The RadioReference Wiki
Using a scanner for FM sort of defeats the purpose: SCANNING. None of them will scan while listening to FM. I guess you could use the priority feature to catch other things, but the $12 option is still better. If you want a scanner for anything else but FM, you need to tell us your county and state, and what sorts of things you want to monitor. The less expensive models may not get what else you want.

 

[KG4NEL]

Can you not use your smartphone to receive a local station's online feed?

Of all the things to buy a scanner for, FM seems like the worst use of it...

 

[iMONITOR]

Although not a portable, Uniden's analog BCT15X receives the FM broadcast band.

 

[jonwienke]

As does the x36 line.

 

[davidc1]

Thanks all for the reply's We've decided to get the Uniden BC125AT to be able to listen to the teams radio transmissions as well as the TV feeds from the BBC and SkyTV broadcasts. These British broadcasts are far superior to the American broadcasts by Fox. While we like the FoxTV commentators themselves, the content of the British counterparts is far better.

However, just in case we can't receive these transmissions on our scanners, we're purchased some inexpensive FM radios to listen to the Fox broadcast, which is the first time it will be done.

We've also purchased the official F1 app for our smartphones, as well as the SiriusXM app. However, we don't know yet if the cell phone networks will be sufficiently robust. The track was built pretty much in the middle of nowhere two years ago. The first year we could obtain cell signals in only a few areas of the track, but the network was so congested to be unusable. Last year, we were able to obtain strong signals around most of the track, but the networks were so congested we could rarely even get a text out, let alone any data signals.

This year, the cell phone companies say we shouldn't have any problems, but we don't really trust anything they say.