It is needed for recording (time stamps).
Bah. I was afraid of that. OK, let me amend my suggestion.
1. Add an option to prompt or not for the time upon startup
2. If you opt out of the prompt on startup, you must enter the correct time prior to recording anything.
The reason I suggest this is because many "power users" such as myself are probably not going to have the scanner connected to USB any longer than it might take to update the database or upload a new favorites file from Sentinel. We'll be using an external charger with multiple sets of batteries that we will "hot swap" into the radio as needed and put the old ones back in rotation to be charged. I was planning on having 3 sets myself. It's not a big deal to have to tell the scanner what time it is each time I use it, but since I don't plan on using the recording feature much, it'd be nice to simply opt out of having to put that in each time. Again, just a suggestion, and (hint hint) another reason why I'd be good to have on a beta team.
I think the clock feature is a great feature. I know there has been several times where I can't seem to see the clock and always glance over at my radio looking for the time and its not there.
Love the clock feature.
I'm not saying get rid of it altogether - simply allow me as the user to opt out of setting that if I don't want to (and don't plan on recording any audio beyond the rolling 30 second "what the heck did they just say?" feature). Let it work like any microwave or VCR (hey remember those - there's a good one for "throwback Thursday") that will just think it's midnight until you set the clock to tell it otherwise.
The beauty of these radios being firmware driven is that such enhancements and features can be added any time after the radio itself has been purchased. Such a change to how it works is just a download away.
-AZ