81greer

I have the radio shack pro 651 hand held scanner.
Is it necessary for me to update the channels? If, so how do I do that or who can do that now?
The person that had originally programmed my scanner has passed away.

Well, it depends on when your scanner was last programmed. A lot has changed in the South Carolina radio world in the last year. Assuming you live and listen in Greer, as your username would indicate, Greer PD is using a digital talkgroup on the Palmetto 800 system now, they just switched a few weeks ago. It would be necessary to update the programming in your scanner if that's what you're interested in listening to.

Are you interested in learning to program the scanner yourself? If so, are you willing to invest $$ in programming software and a programming cable, assuming you don't have those items already? Given that you have programming in your scanner now, it would be easier to modify that information than it would be starting from scratch. So you have an advantage in learning how to program the scanner yourself.

You can also forego the cost of software and cable and learn to program the radio from the front panel. Most people find this more difficult, and with lots of different frequencies and talkgroups, it can be a tedious, time consuming task.

You may also find someone who's willing to help you remotely. If you have (or obtained) the Win500 software and a programming cable, I would be happy to update your configuration for you via email correspondence.

Brian

Thanks Brian.
I knew there was a software program to do this but just not sure how "user friendly" it is.

There are actually 3 programming applications to choose from that will work with the PRO-651. The RadioReference Wiki is a reference site that has tons of information, instructions and hints about all things scanning. Here's an article that will get you started that has links to lots and lots of other articles. There's a section at the bottom of this page that links to the different programming software applications.

Getting Started with your GRE/RS Object Oriented Scanner - The RadioReference Wiki

The PRO-651 is in the same family as a whole series of radios from RadioShack, GRE and now Whistler. It's a very popular family, so there is a lot of information published about them. This family of scanners uses what GRE coined "object oriented scanning" based on scan-able objects (frequencies and talkgroups) and scanlists.

So, if you're feeling like you want to learn to do this on your own, and are willing to invest some money and (more than) some time figuring it out, there are plenty of resources to help you.

I have several radios in this same radio family, and I use a program called Win500. You may or may not find it to be user friendly. That depends on your comfort with computers and software and knowledge of scanners. To beginners, it can be very daunting at first. But many other people in the ~10 years since this radio family was first introduced have figured it out.

Best of luck in deciding how to proceed. And please post any other questions you may have. The purpose of these forums is to help and share.

I forgot to mention that all three software packages that are compatible with your scanner have 30-day fully functional trials. So you can download and install all three and try them out and decide which one, if any, you like best. So you don't have to invest in the software before trying it.

Note also that, even though the three software applications support programming the same family of scanners, the file types for the three programs are not compatible with each other. So if I use Win500, and you choose to use one of the other 2 applications, we can't easily share configuration files with each other.