As many may know, I work for one of the companies that sells scanners and offers programming services to customers should they choose to go that route.
When I am discussing their purchase of a scanner and programming options, I always explain to them that regardless of whether they do it, or we do it, it is incumbent upon them to learn - at a minimum - the basics of their scanner in order to achieve the best results. After all, any programming is going to age and become inaccurate. To help them along with that I enlighten them to the availability of Radio Reference, other scanner websites like SNE, and a lot of other resources that will help them along the way. It would possibly amaze you to know how few people actually seem to know about this website. The ones that do a lot of the time make mention of it before I get a chance to. For the Uniden models that use Sentinel I always try to provide them with the link to the latest download and give them a basic idea of the need to learn it, of course that being database updates, firmware upgrades, and the ability to create their own favorites lists as they learn. I at least attempt to make it clear to them that even if we do programming for them, that programming is going to age as well and as such become inaccurate over time. I feel like in a lot of cases I'm successful in getting them on board with at least attempting to learn said basics.
Sometimes we talk about my company doing programming so they can use that as a tool to learn, see the file structuring, and branch off from there and create their own. There are also people out there that don't want to learn, just want to take it out of the box, turn it on, and have it work, don't have access to a PC, etc.. We regularly replace SD cards for them, or take their mail-ins for updated programming and return to them. There are options for everyone.
Ultimately, it goes without saying, regardless of what the subject matter is, learning about it - at least the basics - are going to result in a much better overall use and experience. All of the comments in this thread (and hopefully mine as well) are well said. The OP has made it to RR prior to purchase and as such is further along the path to success than others might be.
