Any Experience with Minitor IV or V use?

[jeremytrent]

I was wondering if anyone new much about these pagers, as far as would they work here in A/TX? I only ask because in my internet surfing I saw several ads and links to purchase these. I thought they would be a cool thing to have, to here and monitor fire or ems dispatch. I also noticed they came in different freq ranges and came with available software to program them with. So my question is if I got one, what freq range would I get and slo has anyone used them enough to give me some advice to if it was worth it, as I already have a996t. I love the idea of having a mobile device such as this and because I'm primarily interested in Fire....any way.

Let me know. I know there are several fire guys here on the board so chime in. On that note - I'm so proud of what you guys do. I would be right in your midst if it weren't for sever medical problems, cancer included, that excluded me from pursuing this as a career. My hat is off to you guys!!!

Any answers thoughts would be great.

 

[rattlerbb01]

I have a Minitor V. It will work great in the Austin area on the conventional fire repeaters. I believe you have 153.950 and 154.175 as the main two fire dispatch channels. You can program those frequencies both into a dual-frequency VHF pager, and you can get one that either stores pages, or doesn't store pages. If you want it to set off for a particular agencies tones, then you must do some digging on your own and find out what the tone combinations are for that particular agency. You can do that by recording a dispatch, then use a frequency counter. Or you can just ask the other guys around you if they know the tones. Otherwise, you can enjoy monitoring one or both channels and catching every single dispatch for every single agency.

 

[jeremytrent]

So does it come ready to roll right out of the box? If I get one specified for that frequency range? Does yours work here in Austin or are you in Austin? Do you love it enough to dell it?? hint hint. Thanks for your post!

 

[rattlerbb01]

So does it come ready to roll right out of the box? If I get one specified for that frequency range? Does yours work here in Austin or are you in Austin? Do you love it enough to dell it?? hint hint. Thanks for your post!

Mine is issued by the VFD here. You would have to get a minitor from somewhere that will program the frequencies for you if you want it to work out of the box. They don't scan the entire band like a scanner would. They will only take one or two frequencies. In your case, unless you can find out what the tone sequence is for a particular department you want the pager to "selective call" monitor (only alert when that agency is getting a call), you would just get 153.950 (Travis Co Firenet) or 154.175 (Metro Fire) programmed, or both if you get a dual frequency minitor. Good luck.