It's been a while since I received my PCR100 and had the time to post my thoughts on it. I received the radio wrapped in bubble wrap in a small plain brown box. The radio looked brand new and unused. It didn't come with any instructions, software or an AC adaptor but it was sold as radio only and I knew this. The radio has a 9 pin serial port but you can use a serial to USB adaptor if you don't own a computer with a serial port.
I picked up an adaptor with 12 volts, 1 amp for $10, downloaded the manual from Icom and the Icom software from another website. It only took me a few minutes to install and set up because I already owned the similar PCR1000. The first thing I noticed when connected to my discone antenna, was the radio was really sensitive and brought in some VHF/UHF stations clearly that my other scanner only received very weak. It was even more sensitive than my PCR1000 in most VHF & UHF bands.
The HF band below 30Mhz was about the same as the PCR1000 except from about 21 to 28 MHz where is was a little less sensitive. It did receive shortwave about the same as a good quality portable shortwave but it only receives AM with no CW/SSB. If this was my only radio, I might see that as a problem but since I already own a radio that receives CW/SSB, it wasn't a big deal.
The radio has some really nice features like the 4 MHz band scope that can find active signals with in a 4 MHz window in seconds. Prefect for finding shortwave broadcast stations for example between 6 - 10 MHz, 11 to 15 MHz or HAM stations in the 144 - 148 MHz band, etc.
It only has 1 useful AM filter 6 Khz but you can switch from a normal 15KHz to a narrow 6KHz filter in FM to help receive those weak signals. It would have been nice to have maybe a 4 KHz filter on AM for those weak stations but I found using an audio DSP software filter really helped on shortwave.
The radio does have a slow scanning speed (about 16 to 20 channels per second) with the original software but I found using other software help get that speed up. The original software has 1000 channels but you can only scan one 50 channel bank at a time. Other software will allow you to scan all 1000 channels and at a faster speed (speed will depend on what software you use). I've been told the PROBE1K is one of the fastest programs. I've also heard of people getting 50 channels per second.
Over all this radio does impress and makes a nice addition to any radio collection. It's best compared to the PCR1000 missing the CW/SSB but with a wider band scope and better sensitive on the above 30 MHz bands. For the $39 I bought it for on Amazon, it was a real steal. I already have it set up for scanning some local conventional frequencies now including the 144 & 440 MHz ham bands but have plans to do the simple discriminator mod and buy the TrunkPCR software or use unitrunker and digital audio decoder software to follow the more modern stuff.
This ones a keeper, even better than I expected. I think Amazon still has 1 or 2 of these radios left for sale. If you get a chance to buy one, you'll have a lot of fun with a 100% computer controlled wide-band radio.
As a side note, I once read that the US air force used the Icom PCR1000 & PCR100 in their drones as Icom build quality receivers and they can be completely controlled and reprogrammed in flight. These receivers are also used in some marine & remote location applications as well.
