Is there any use for a Pro-94 anymore?

[N9DUC]

I have a Radio Shack Pro-94, I bought new 10years or more ago. Since then the agencies around me have went digital. So I was wondering what does one do with one of these other than listen to Noaa.
Any suggestions?

 

[nanZor]

The 94 doesn't do vhf aircraft so that's out. About all that's left is amateur (obviously), marine, gmrs/frs, murs etc.

Maybe use it as a dedicated vhf-low band skip monitor? 6-meter ssb dx-window opening monitor? (even though it will be unintelligable, the noise might be an alert)

 

[wtp]

seems it does do air

Frequency Coverage: ........................ 29-54 MHz -- (in 5 kHz steps)
108-136.975 MHz (in 12.5 kHz steps)
137-174 MHz -- (in 5 kHz steps)
216-224.995 MHz -- (in 5 kHz steps)
406-512 MHz (in 12.5 kHz steps)
806.0000-823.9375 MHz (in 12.5 kHz steps)
851.0000-868.9875 MHz (in 12.5 kHz steps)
896.1125-956.0000 MHz (in 12.5 kHz steps)
1240.0000-1300.0000 MHz (in 12.5 kHz steps)

 

[wtp]

other uses

i still have a pro 2001
i use it for forestry and space station.
could the towns or counties around still be analog?

 

[n5ims]

Scanning is way more than just your local PD and FD calls. Spend a bit of time with the scanner just scanning the bands to see what's still around. Do this at various times and days of the week to see what you may have around that's fun to listen to. You may be surprised what you find. Sure, it probably won't be a major SWAT operation (you'll find that on the news anyway), but it may simply be a taxi or limo company where the folks talk about their fares (think taxicab confessions or the like). You just might laugh so hard that you pee yourself a little!

 

[shadcall]

wtp is correct as to the frequency coverage so you can receive not only civilian air but also military air. You can also receive railroads if you have a interest in that. There is also federal although some will probably be encrypted. There are your sports teams which may be low powered. There are also businesses and media. There is a lot you can listen to on your scanner. As N5ims suggests, do a lot of searching the bands.

 

[wtp]

sorry

that would be no to military air 225-380

 

[KR4BD]

I Still used my Pro-94 for our local Analog EDACS trunked system, railroads, hams, etc. In its day, it was one of the easiest trunking scanners to manually program.

 

[KR4BD]

I Still use my Pro-94 for our local Analog EDACS trunked system, railroads, hams, etc. In its day, it was one of the easiest trunking scanners to manually program.

 

[KC4RAF]

Still using my 94

for various activities in the area. There's lot's of stuff out there to listen to. All the LEOs are digital in my area, but I listen to other transmission.

 

[nanZor]

Hah! I looked up a Pro-49 by mistake .

Wow, you might want to develop a taste for civil and military airband monitoring. Putting Indianapolis, IN into airnav . com/airports reveals about 27 airports.

Start off with KIND tower on 120.900
Some general aviation at KMQJ on 122.7 ctaf.

There is so much more in your area, civilian, military, FBO's, commercial - wow. Airband monitoring heaven. Your 94 will thank you.

 

[NWI_Scanner_Guy]

Plug in a few school bus company frequencies. There's more drama on those channels (at least in the south Chicagoland area) than on a dozen soap operas.

As someone else mentioned, you can never go wrong with taxi transmissions. The things I hear, especially on a weekend night, are quite astounding sometimes.

If it's your cup of tea, go sit outside of a large hotel complex and listen to the various departments chit-chat or act like fools over the air. One of the things I like to do it try to figure out which hotel/motel the transmissions are coming from.

As was said, scanning is so much more than just listening to your local PD and FD.

 

[N9DUC]

Interesting, thanks for the ideas and all your replies. I may spend a little more time scaning before I decide rather sale or trade. thanks again all!

 

[KD4YGG]

It'll cover Hamilton County's EDACS system to the north...

 

[N1BHH]

There are still conventional users to listen to, and plenty of them.

 

[WyoWabbit]

What I did with mine, was to add a discriminator tap and use it to monitor Fire/EMS POCSAG dispatch 24/7. - Tom

 

[Darth_vader]

Is that actually possible on the PRO-94? From my observations (having had it apart quite a few times) the rather cramped handheld chassis doesn't seem like it'd lend itself well to installation of the required hookup jack/s. (Your results may vary, of course.)

The PRO-2004's a different story, of course...

 

[ilmfng]

Hi, I'm pretty new to scanners. My dad has had them for years and came across his 94 he replaced a little while ago and gave it to me. We both have been in FD's and love to listen to everything and anything. I've got a bunch of local freq's from amateur stuff. But what I'm wondering is if it will work with my local pd and fd. They are 453 and 155. But they also use viper, will it still pick it up? And can someone give me a quick walkthrough on programming it? Thanks.

 

[Darth_vader]

The PRO-94 is an analogue-only (AM/wide FM) receiver with Motorola/EDACS multitrunking and does not decode audio from any data radio transmission, including Project-25. If your police and fire departments are on a data radio system, this receiver will not work with it. It is also not rebanding-compliant, so if your target frequency has been narrowbanded (and it probably has been by now), the 94 may not work reliably with it.

"And can someone give me a quick walkthrough on programming it?"

1. Turn on unit and adjust volume.
2. Press "MAN".
3. Select bank by pressing and holding HOLD for a couple seconds.
4. Select empty memory slot (or programmed memory slot with frequency you don't want to keep.)
5. Press PROG.
6. Type frequency, including decimal point.
7. Press "E".
8. Activate lockout (L-OUT/SS) or delay (DELAY) as desired.
9. Press MAN to idle on that frequency or SCAN to enter scanning mode.

See also:
http://support.radioshack.com/support_electronics/68857.htm
http://support.radioshack.com/support_electronics/doc67/67350.htm

The 1 000-channel memory is divided into two 500-channel banks ("A" and "B") which are further divided into ten sub-banks (1 through 0 on the keyboard).

Tip: I personally have found it most practical to dedicate one bank (A) to non-trunked frequencies and the other (B) exclusively to trunking systems, since I live in a major metro area where at least three or four municipal 800 MHz trunking systems (Clark/Vancouver, Multnomah/Portland, Clackamas County, Washington County) are receiveable at any given time, in addition to a bevy of non-trunked signals. Each individual system is assigned its own numbered sub-bank. Frankly, this method is highly wasteful from a memory perspective (especially since neither the Vancouver nor Clackamas systems, individually, are anywhere near 50 channels long!) but is a necessary evil since it keeps things orderly and easy to manage.

 

[Darth_vader]

Numbered sub-banks:

1 = 1-50
2 = 51-100
3 = 101-150
4 = 150-200
5 = 201-250
6 = 251-300
7 = 301-350
8 = 351-400
9 = 401-450
0 = 451-500

To exclude a sub-bank from scanning, you push SCAN (if you are in manual or programming mode--the rig always boots up in scan mode regardless) then the number. For example, if you have the VHF marine band channels under 1 and 2 and only want to scan them, you'd push SCAN then 3 through 0. The corresponding numbers will disappear from the very top row of the screen when excluded from scanning and appear when re-activated. You can also exclude individual channels out from scanning by pushing L-OUT for whichever channel you are currently on. (The L/O symbol will appear on the bottom of the screen.)