Scanner Portable or Not that has the best range?

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By range I mean largest ability to pick a wide variety of frequencies. From Ham, to Police, CB'. 1-1000mhz. Basically don't want to have to get 3 different scanners to pick up different things.

Of coarse cell phone spectrum being illegal.
 

teufler

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AOR 8000, and its not analog cell blocked. 0-1000 mhz, out to 4 decimal places, lsb, usb, cw, fm, am but not trunking. This is an older unit but still available sometimes. AOR makes specialty scanners or receivers . They are pricey so get ready for a shocker. Uniden and GRE/Radio Shack/Whisler make good scanners though they are not a receiver like the AOR scanners are.
 

krokus

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What is your goal? Which systems or services do you want to listen to?

There is no "all in one" solution for everything, as there are significant differences in the physics of the signals.

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What is your goal? Which systems or services do you want to listen to?

There is no "all in one" solution for everything, as there are significant differences in the physics of the signals.

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Okay, well was really interested in picking up HAM signals around my area. Also police. Have an old police scanner but I feel HAM is out of range on it and it's incapable of picking it up. Doing some research overnight, the most diverse Scanner or if you wanna be picket a communications receiver I've come across is the ICOM IC-R20-06. Has a frequency range of 100 kHz - 3.3ghz! Not sure how good this is as they say jack of all trades master of none. Although what I've realized with scanners it's not so much the actual device, more the antenna you use for your needs. Their is no all purpose antenna for everything. I've seen people get multiple antennas for this device one good for police, one for ham, one for military ect. This scanner doesn't come cheap though. They also make a couple of table top scanners but way out of my price range. Anybody have any experience with this receiver?
 

teufler

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EHAM has some good reviews. ICOM R20 Product Reviews
Not sure where you live, as the ic-r20 is not a trunking receiver. Like the AOR receivers, its more of a portable general coverage receiver. Most of those commenting were using a discone antenna. Front end overload seemed to be a problem with a long wire antenna. All complained about the 100mw speaker that was just too weak, best with an earphone of amplified speakers.
 

krokus

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Okay, well was really interested in picking up HAM signals around my area. ...

Hams use many different bands. A general coverage receiver would be ok for picking those signals up, as no special processing is required. (Except if you want to listen digital voice modes.)

For listening to any public safety, I would suggest a recent model scanner.

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Would I need a trunking receiver to pick up police talk on a digital signal? As many law enforcement are switching out of analogue to digital.
 

teufler

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not really, there are frequencies/channels, that are digital that are not trunked. I don't know of any scanner that picks up digital that is not a trunking scanner though. So if you plan on hearing digital, plan on picking a new scanmner up.
 
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not really, there are frequencies/channels, that are digital that are not trunked. I don't know of any scanner that picks up digital that is not a trunking scanner though. So if you plan on hearing digital, plan on picking a new scanmner up.

Any Recievers like ICOM IC-R20 that also picks up digital trunked signals? Reason why I wanted a receiver and not a scanner is the gapless frequency coverage. If theirs ever anything in between on a scanner, you'll miss it.
 
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