jetblack3791 said:
I have been trying to figure out what type of scanner I will need to listen to ems/police/fire/and military in Corpus Christi Texas. I am in Nuecess county and plan to buy my first scanner soon, but I dont know if I need digital, or if the scanners I am looking at will survive rebanding. If someone who knows the area will give me a few ideas about which scanners would fit my needs, I would greatly appreciate it. Also what other cool things there are to listen to that I did not list above.
THANKS.
The Provoice talkgroups on the Corpus Christi
TRS are not monitorable with any scanner available. There are a number of talkgroup ID's tagged with an "A" (analog), which you could monitor. There is a large number that are not specified as to "D" (digital), or "A". From what I see at this time, your main decision would be whether to buy a digital scanner. TX
DPS in that area shows to be APCO-25 (digital). If you can live without them, you might skip a digital for now. However, if your area follows the pattern that seems to be in place elsewhere, the use of digital transmissions will only increase as other systems make the switch. How soon (or if) that happens in the Nueces County area is something I can't tell you. Just food for thought. Also, while there are none in your area listed in the database at present, many of the military bases are switching to trunked systems in the 380mhz frequency range. Some of those are digital. The Radio Shack scanners, from what I've read, do not trunk track in the 380 range. The Uniden digitals such as the BCD396T & BCD996T will.
If you go analog, I'd consider the Uniden BR330T. The 330, besides being an analog trunk tracker, also receives military air band frequencies. The BC246T, while a good analog scanner, does not receive mil-air. Both of these handhelds are listed as being supported for
rebanding. Of these two, the 330 seems more sensitive. The BCT-15 is a base/mobile alternative that also receives mil-air.
As for the
Pro-97 from Radio Shack, it is a good analog scanner, with mil-air capability. However, Radio Shack has indicated they will not support it for rebanding. While that does not matter on an EDACS system, it would for any Motorola TRS system that you might want to track.
The Pro-528 (handheld) and Pro-433 (base/mobile) are also analog scanners from Radio Shack. Both show to be supported for rebanding; only the Pro-433 has mil-air coverage. Neither of these scanners has text tags on the display, and neither will accept PL tones or DCS codes. (The Pro-97, and Uniden's 330, 246, & BCT-15 all have text tags on the displays; all can utilize the PL tones/DCS codes.)
How soon will rebanding occur in your area? It's way behind, as numerous other threads have pointed out. A wild guess says at least a couple of years at the earliest. More likely, it will be longer than that in your area.
