I am sad to say that today I boxed up my recently delivered SDS-200 and I am sending it back to Amazon.
I will just put it out there that I am disappointed. I am no stranger to scanners and I probably owned 15 different models over 45 years. I primarily listen to P25 systems these days. My last attempt at scanning was about 4 - 5 years ago with the BCD996XT. This did not go well. It is no fault of Uniden, but the multi-path issues ruined this experience. During the various attempts to get the BCD996XT working at the time, and before I really understood multi-path, I spent considerable effort and expense to install a high gain yagi on my roof along with 75' run of LMR-400 to the radio in an attempt to lock in on a specific tower to improve results. I gave up but learned a ton about multi-path. The antenna went unused until this past week as a resorted to Broadcastify for my P25 needs.
Recently, however, I purchased a Unication G5 after seeing someone else that had one of these radios. My eyes widened the moment I saw it and, more importantly, heard it. This is, by far, the greatest radio I ever owned. It is only going to get better when Unication releases the firmware currently in beta that will allow users to scan and hold on a talk group (final FW release is expected in May), and ultimately scan different P25 systems in a confirmed future firmware update (second beta release expected in May). This radio is basically a dream come true for P25 fans. It is small, rugged, and the reception is second to none.
I am not a Unication salesman, and it is only 1 tool for the job. So anyway it has been many years since I was on the forums, but I returned to learn how to program and tweak the G5. So many years, in fact, that I did not even know the SDS-100 and SDS-200 existed until one month ago. When I found out about the new Unidens, I was excited to see that the multi-path issues were apparently addressed. I got caught up in the excitement of learning this fact and, coupled with the boredom of the lock down, I purchased a unit.
Long story short... yes it fixed the multi-path. This is great. However, I am greatly disappointed with the reception of the SDS-200 and, no, I do not believe this to be a "cold solder joint". It is amazing to me that I can sit here with a palm sized G5 and not only listen to my own county P25 system, but I can also receive every neighboring county 5 X 5 crystal clear with no dropouts or garbles with a 1 inch stub antenna. The SDS-200 can receive a few neighboring counties with my rooftop yagi, but frustratingly it loses the ability to decode the control channel on the other counties further away, despite me rotating the yagi in 5 degree increments for the entire 360 degrees. I have spent an entire week playing with attenuation, filters, aiming the yagi, etc. Nothing helps. In fact, I get the same exact reception with the telescoping antenna as I get with the yagi !! Yet, as I try and 'tune' the SDS-200 and antenna and filters to try and get this to work, the G5 comes in 5 X 5 without a single problem. I gave up in utter frustration.
I have resigned myself to this fact: The SDS-200 is a great scanner for the right purpose and it has an incredible amount of features. I am upset that I am returning it as I wanted to love it. I even had ProScan setup, everything ready to go. But it is a consumer device and as such it is tuned to a wide range of frequencies, whereas the G5 is a professional radio at the same price point tuned to a specific band plan. Simple physics - there is no match. Reminds me of the days decades ago that I wished my scanners worked as well as my minitors. Inasmuch as I only listen to P25, the G5 is for me. If I was into P25, air, railroad, whatever, the SDS-200 would be the better choice.
But there is one more aspect to the final decision that is noted. Broadcastify recently introduced custom 'dashboards' and the ability to listen to 6 feeds simultaneously. This too is a game changer and it kind of sealed the decision to return the SDS-200. I found the SDS-200 to be slow to scan, even after assuring that the filters were not set to 'auto' and that I was only scanning control channels for the nearest site. I was trying to scan 6 P25 systems. I would frequently miss calls as the SDS-200 struggled to lock on the control channels for each system as it did the scan. With Broadcastify's dashboards, I can listen to 6 P25 systems simultaneously with ZERO reception problems and, more so, I can listen to the counties beyond those that neighbor my house. It is great.
So anyway I felt like sharing the above. I have nothing negative to say about Uniden or its products as they supported my 45 year hobby. It is great to have choices, and this is simply my story as I head to the UPS dropoff box. I hope to be back one day to try it again.
Stay safe everyone.
I will just put it out there that I am disappointed. I am no stranger to scanners and I probably owned 15 different models over 45 years. I primarily listen to P25 systems these days. My last attempt at scanning was about 4 - 5 years ago with the BCD996XT. This did not go well. It is no fault of Uniden, but the multi-path issues ruined this experience. During the various attempts to get the BCD996XT working at the time, and before I really understood multi-path, I spent considerable effort and expense to install a high gain yagi on my roof along with 75' run of LMR-400 to the radio in an attempt to lock in on a specific tower to improve results. I gave up but learned a ton about multi-path. The antenna went unused until this past week as a resorted to Broadcastify for my P25 needs.
Recently, however, I purchased a Unication G5 after seeing someone else that had one of these radios. My eyes widened the moment I saw it and, more importantly, heard it. This is, by far, the greatest radio I ever owned. It is only going to get better when Unication releases the firmware currently in beta that will allow users to scan and hold on a talk group (final FW release is expected in May), and ultimately scan different P25 systems in a confirmed future firmware update (second beta release expected in May). This radio is basically a dream come true for P25 fans. It is small, rugged, and the reception is second to none.
I am not a Unication salesman, and it is only 1 tool for the job. So anyway it has been many years since I was on the forums, but I returned to learn how to program and tweak the G5. So many years, in fact, that I did not even know the SDS-100 and SDS-200 existed until one month ago. When I found out about the new Unidens, I was excited to see that the multi-path issues were apparently addressed. I got caught up in the excitement of learning this fact and, coupled with the boredom of the lock down, I purchased a unit.
Long story short... yes it fixed the multi-path. This is great. However, I am greatly disappointed with the reception of the SDS-200 and, no, I do not believe this to be a "cold solder joint". It is amazing to me that I can sit here with a palm sized G5 and not only listen to my own county P25 system, but I can also receive every neighboring county 5 X 5 crystal clear with no dropouts or garbles with a 1 inch stub antenna. The SDS-200 can receive a few neighboring counties with my rooftop yagi, but frustratingly it loses the ability to decode the control channel on the other counties further away, despite me rotating the yagi in 5 degree increments for the entire 360 degrees. I have spent an entire week playing with attenuation, filters, aiming the yagi, etc. Nothing helps. In fact, I get the same exact reception with the telescoping antenna as I get with the yagi !! Yet, as I try and 'tune' the SDS-200 and antenna and filters to try and get this to work, the G5 comes in 5 X 5 without a single problem. I gave up in utter frustration.
I have resigned myself to this fact: The SDS-200 is a great scanner for the right purpose and it has an incredible amount of features. I am upset that I am returning it as I wanted to love it. I even had ProScan setup, everything ready to go. But it is a consumer device and as such it is tuned to a wide range of frequencies, whereas the G5 is a professional radio at the same price point tuned to a specific band plan. Simple physics - there is no match. Reminds me of the days decades ago that I wished my scanners worked as well as my minitors. Inasmuch as I only listen to P25, the G5 is for me. If I was into P25, air, railroad, whatever, the SDS-200 would be the better choice.
But there is one more aspect to the final decision that is noted. Broadcastify recently introduced custom 'dashboards' and the ability to listen to 6 feeds simultaneously. This too is a game changer and it kind of sealed the decision to return the SDS-200. I found the SDS-200 to be slow to scan, even after assuring that the filters were not set to 'auto' and that I was only scanning control channels for the nearest site. I was trying to scan 6 P25 systems. I would frequently miss calls as the SDS-200 struggled to lock on the control channels for each system as it did the scan. With Broadcastify's dashboards, I can listen to 6 P25 systems simultaneously with ZERO reception problems and, more so, I can listen to the counties beyond those that neighbor my house. It is great.
So anyway I felt like sharing the above. I have nothing negative to say about Uniden or its products as they supported my 45 year hobby. It is great to have choices, and this is simply my story as I head to the UPS dropoff box. I hope to be back one day to try it again.
Stay safe everyone.