Scanner - Closest Site

[danielau89]

Hi All,

Looking for recommendation for scanner, monitoring a statewide system and would like to have everything programmed without the need to change zones etc.

This used to be possible on the older 396XT scanner by just adding all sites and it would lock onto the strongest signal, the new SDS series jump around unless manually holding on sites, which means needing to interact with the scanner to set the nearest site or using gps which also is unreliable as closest doesn't mean you would have signal.
Also need to auto power on when power is applied to the input (USB/barrel/whatever) like the old 396.

Any ideas?

 

[jtwalker]

A Unication G series pager will lock on to a strong (not necessarily strongest) site and look for another when that signal degrades.

Or get a gps for one of the Uniden scanners.

I don’t know that any current models do what you want, but maybe there is …

 

[phask]

The 396xt did not lock onto the strongest site. That is actually a Whistler feature - patented. At least so I have been told.

 

[Whiskey3JMC]

Welcome to the RR forums:

the new SDS series jump around unless manually holding on sites, which means needing to interact with the scanner to set the nearest site or using gps which also is unreliable as closest doesn't mean you would have signal.

Sounds to me like you're using the zip code feature? You should only program the site(s) within range to you & the talkgroups you're interested in into a favorites list and you won't have to worry about scanning sites out of range to you. Sure Sentinel can be used for this but Proscan is my goto app for favorites list customizations. Way easier to check boxes for systems/sites/departments of your choosing

 

[Ubbe]

What type of system is it? P25II trunked? It has to be a portable? All scanners that has a On/Off function in the volume control will start up when power are applied. All scanners that have a button for On/Off will need that button to be pushed as that are the only thing that the CPU are monitoring when power are applied. AFAIK.

Uniden scanners jump to other sites if there's no conversations on the current one as it tries to help the user to scan active conversations. When a conversation ends on a site it will not scan other sites and leaves the system to scan other ones. When it returns to the system it starts to monitor the last active site it stored in memory in the previous scan cycle.

If a trunked site are out of range it scans thru the channels in that site at a 50-100ch/s speed so it shouldn't be any noticeable extra delay when a site are out of range. Set the squelch a bit higher to not get stuck on sites that barely can be received as if the squelch detects a signal it will stay on that site for the time that are set for the hold time. For conventional sites and systems it will always stay for the duration of the hold time regardless of the squelch information.

/Ubbe