Now that the 996 came out I finally got a BCD396T. I had a 296 for a while but I sold it and got a Pro-96 because the Pro-96 had a lot better performance on the Phoenix CQPSK trunked system. The problem with the 296 is that it was subject to adjacent channel interference and so when another transmitter on a nearby frequency was keyed up it would basically be unable to decode CQPSK digital on the selected frequency. The Pro-96 had much better selectivity so it wasn't bothered as much by strong adjacent signals. With the way the 9600 baud systems have their frequencies spaced so close together you really need to be able to hear only that one channel and not everything else on the adjacent channels.
The BCD396T has a lot of nice features and a lot of extra bells and whistles. The display and the features are much better than the Pro-96, which you would expect because Uniden has always been ahead of Radio Shack when it comes to features and usability. Unfortunately the digital performance is still not up to par on the BCD396T. The decoding is very good when there are no strong adjacent signals, but as soon as another transmitter keys up on a nearby frequency, you can forget about hearing any digital transmissions. I can even hear the adjacent-channel interference on some conventional 800 MHz channels; it's about as bad as it was on the 296. When holding on a conventional 800 MHz channel, I can hear the digital sounds from a transmitter on an adjacent frequency, and of course that means I can't pick up anything on that frequency when the other transmitter is transmitting. And that is with it set on narrow NFM.
You can probably tell that I'm disappointed with this $549.95 scanner. I had hoped that it would be designed to stand up to the rigors of an urban radio environment, which is where most digital systems are. But it really seems to work best in an area where there is not very much radio traffic adjacent to the frequencies that you want to hear. The attenuator takes the signal down from 5 bars to 1 bar or 0 bars, so it's useless for solving the problem.
If you live in a suburban area where there aren't a lot of transmitting towers, the BCD396T is the best handheld scanner ever made. But if you want to listen to CQPSK digital in the middle of the city, stick with the Pro-96 for its better selectivity.
The BCD396T has a lot of nice features and a lot of extra bells and whistles. The display and the features are much better than the Pro-96, which you would expect because Uniden has always been ahead of Radio Shack when it comes to features and usability. Unfortunately the digital performance is still not up to par on the BCD396T. The decoding is very good when there are no strong adjacent signals, but as soon as another transmitter keys up on a nearby frequency, you can forget about hearing any digital transmissions. I can even hear the adjacent-channel interference on some conventional 800 MHz channels; it's about as bad as it was on the 296. When holding on a conventional 800 MHz channel, I can hear the digital sounds from a transmitter on an adjacent frequency, and of course that means I can't pick up anything on that frequency when the other transmitter is transmitting. And that is with it set on narrow NFM.
You can probably tell that I'm disappointed with this $549.95 scanner. I had hoped that it would be designed to stand up to the rigors of an urban radio environment, which is where most digital systems are. But it really seems to work best in an area where there is not very much radio traffic adjacent to the frequencies that you want to hear. The attenuator takes the signal down from 5 bars to 1 bar or 0 bars, so it's useless for solving the problem.
If you live in a suburban area where there aren't a lot of transmitting towers, the BCD396T is the best handheld scanner ever made. But if you want to listen to CQPSK digital in the middle of the city, stick with the Pro-96 for its better selectivity.
