Uniden BC296D

[cohenner5377]

Question: While scanning the digital channels, 9 times out of 10 I will lose the conversation in middle. It will just go away. It will continue to monitor that talkgroup for the 2 seconds and then go onto the next channel. It is rather frustrating. Anyone have an answer? The squelch is in the right position...

Secondly, I was wondering... anyone else dislike the scanner a smuch as I do? It is auto tuned, and the sound is still sucky. I find it hard to operate. The only thing I like about it is the track wheel, so I can switch between talkgroups quickly. I am considering selling it and buyikng a rat shack Pro 96 (I am sure much to the delight of mlevin).... Anyone esle with a similar opinion?

David
MAR018

 

[doctordave]

Where, precisely, are you and which service are you monitoring? I have similar troubles in the Northern Balt Co area - primarily due to the heinous RF interference from commerical transmissions - overloads the unit and kills reception.

Otherwise, I actually love my 296 & 796. I do hear that dig sound is superior on the 96.

Dave

 

[dynamitedjs]

have you both made sure you have all the correct frequencies for the jurisdiction you are listening to and in order if need be? I have never had that problem. I don't live in the areas you do but when I did go to the redskins game recently I programmed prince georges county md and had no problems listening to them. Also believe it or not a good rat shack 800 mghz. antenna is definitely the answer. I am old school so I programmed my scanner manually as I always have and I did miss a freq. in one bank which I was losing part of the conv. and figured it out. I suggest you double and triple check your freqs. and modes to see. I love my 296. It may be a little difficult for some people but it is a much more precise scanner and not as basic as the 96.

 

[mlevin]

I am considering selling it and buyikng a rat shack Pro 96 (I am sure much to the delight of mlevin)

:lol: :lol: Is it that obvious how biased I am? :lol:

BTW, I never experienced this problem with my 250D when I had it. And from your location, the Baltimore City system always comes in 100%

PS: Dave he lives near me, not near any cell towers. Unless his home seriously antennuates radio signals , there should be no reason why this is happening.

 

[Dougie]

Well, there could be a glitch in this scanner!!! my 296 is allways a litte late on catching the conversation trunking wise if you havent noticed it cuts out the very very begining of a transmission. The radio shack doent do this. It also heats up which ive had very strange problems with it allready. I am so unhappy with this scanner i got it for the name not knowing that the gre has the digital volume filter or balanceing feature or whatever they call it. I do like it cause ive bought uniden for the last 5 years now and they are easy to use for me also and were always good in sensitivity. But thats the past.The 296 doesnt pick up any better (that ive seen and heard)than the radio shack. If i could do it again i would go radio shack 150 percent. Not to say the uniden is junk, i think they rushed these radios out to soon than thay should have !!! as for your problem, i doubt it is intereference neither though i get it when i listen to balti. county but it just will get stuck on the control channel or i cant explain it. get a pro-96 !!!

 

[dynamitedjs]

Unfortunately Dougie, you are having this problem. I have never had that problem. Maybe you should try to get someone in your area to help you in programming or cloning what they have. It's possible your programming has a mistake in it.

 

[TinEar]

I have a similar problem with a couple of specific frequencies with my Uniden 785D. It will not hold on Baltimore County 46.46 voice nor on Baltimore City 154.415 tones and sometimes voice. It will stop on them when they transmit and then just leave and resume scanning. Yes, they are programmed correctly, the delay is set for 2 seconds and I even have the PL tone set to 156.7 on 154.415. However, 46.46 is CSQ and so does not operate with a PL tone. And the squelch control is set to its most sensitive position so it isn't a case of not being strong enough to break squelch. Both frequencies produce a six bar signal level on the psuedo strength meter. Those are the only two frequencies it happens on. It has grated on my nerves ever since I got this scanner and nothing I do helps it. I've never had a problem with a trunked talkgroup though such as you're having.

 

[cohenner5377]

Problem

TinEar, it sounds like you could have data skip on? Not sure, though...

Yes, I am having the same exact problem as dynamitedjs. I have tried everything, but I cannot figure out what the problem is. Next time E-Bay has a 1 cent listing, I think mine is going on the auction block....

 

[TinEar]

Good suggestion but, no, the data skip feature is not the problem. I've had it set both ways and it makes no difference. Those are the only two freqs that give me a headache. I've even tried switching positions within the bank and then moving those two freqs to a different bank. SSDD no matter what I do. Here's the kicker I didn't mention...I have two 785Ds and the problem presents itself on both scanners. There is just something going on with those two freqs that the 785 doesn't respond to. Anyway, I've almost learned to live with the fact that when those two freqs become active, I've got to quickly reach for the HOLD button. I was going to switch to the new Radio Shack receiver but don't like the fact that they cannot be PC controlled and that the 225-400 mHz band is missing according to the FCC specs.

 

[mlevin]

Alan,

225-400 comes in just fine if you use Win96 to program...

 

[TinEar]

Mo, are you talking about the current model or the one coming out in January? That's the one I looked at the specs on.

 

[mlevin]

Both models will operate 225-400 MHz Mil-Air if opened via Win96 software. My Pro 96 does that range just fine.

 

[TinEar]

That's encouraging. Thank you.

 

[Llwellyn]

Hey TinEar, do you have digital cards in both of them? I have a 785D without the digital card and I don't have any problems on those frequencies. If you haven't tried it, try pulling the card on one of them and see if it changes anything. Could be a software glitch.

 

[TinEar]

Yup, have the cards in both. I'll give it a try but, somehow, I can't make the connection between the problem and anything that makes sense.

 

[Llwellyn]

I just suggested it since the only difference between yourself and I is the card, and location. Since you can pick up a ton more stuff than I can, I don't think the location is necessarily the issue, so we'll see if it's the equipment.

I'm only a little bit closer to the sources than you are. An experiment that could be conducted could be to bring one of your cards to my scanner (or vice versa) or bring my scanner to your location (or vice versa) and see if the problem continues, assuming that removing the card doesn't fix it... in that case, just contact Uniden and they may be able to come up with some sort of fix.

 

[ka3jjz]

I believe the new Unidens use a programmable delay that you set for so many seconds; if you are listening on a conventional freq and find you are losing the conversation in the middle, you might be running into this. Most software I have here that supports the digitals have a pull down that allows you to set this delay (Scancat Lite Plus, Scan Control for example).

73s Mike

 

[TinEar]

LLwellyn, I appreciate the offer and may take you up on it once I get to play with it a bit later today. I'm going to try several things with the ARC250PRO software along with your suggestion to remove the digital cards. Hopefully, something will start to make sense with this problem.

Mike, yes, I've thought of that feature. It's a limiting feature within the delay setup that allows you to set the delay to automatically move along after listening to a freq for a specified number of seconds. That was the first thing I checked. I both checked the program to make sure I had the delay set to my normal two seconds and then that the radio was actually set for that delay period.

However, first comes some yard work. The ring of oak trees around my house are dispensing their leaves at alarming rates. And it's a great day outside anyway. Thanks to you both for the help and suggestions.

 

[TinEar]

It wasn't the digital card.
It wasn't the software.
It wasn't something I forgot to do.

I've come to the conclusion that I've got a desensing problem. I just have too much signal load. In the recent past I've mentioned how AA County Fire throws spikes all over my receiver. I also have a couple of local cab companies (151.745 and 159.495) that blast away and spike all over the place. I think my location that's in a "hot spot" is to blame.

I removed the radio whip antenna and used a simple foot long piece of wire just laying on the desk for an antenna and the problem went away. Bingo! I then used a length of coax between the radio and the whip and tossed the radio whip under the desk on its side. Again, I didn't have the problem with dropping those two freqs and still managed to hear them which is the strange part. Yes, indeed, that sounds like a desensing problem caused by overload to me.

So now, the decision is to accept those two freqs dropping out or desensitizing my antenna input which will also cut out those other local signals blasting away that cause the spikes and the problem. That will also cause my listening range to be reduced dramatically. Notch filters? Something tells me I'll just leave it the way it is. I think satisfaction comes just from learning what was causing the problem even if I can't solve it and have the best of both worlds. I prefer being able to hear long range signals more than the aggravation caused by those couple of problem freqs. By the way, someone mentioned desensing on one of the threads that led me to think of that as the problem. It might have been you Mike. If so, thank you.

 

[Llwellyn]

There's a built-in attenuator you can activate on a per-frequency basis through the menus. I'd put your regular antenna on and adjust it as normal, and activate the function for those two channels and see if it helps.

Menu: 2: 5 when sitting in a channel should get you there. Attached is the excerpt from the online manual.

No offense re: the huge image size, but apparently either I'm incapable of making the stupid Acrobat Reader work correctly or Uniden has their files copy/paste locked. :lol: I had to just screen-shot it.