Uniden's New Product Called Home Patrol

[Dorpmuller]

My cynical opinion, yes, I'm a pessimist:

Nice concept-I like the color touchscreen, beautiful, but...

Looks too much like a toy and not a real radio. Ditch the silver and do it up in black.

How good is the audio? Tinny like most scanners or Motorola Saber-like-mellow and LOUD?

I can see the screen being digital noise and birdie city. How birdie-prone is this thing gonna be? Fragile SMA connector. Software bugs. Fragile screen? How about support when the first screen gets broken? More $$ for a new screen than a new unit? IOW, a throwaway radio with no parts availability?

No scanner compares to Motorola RF performance, period.

Free updates for now but will greed take over and all of a sudden updating will be a pay-site thing after the radio is on the market?

Will be too expensive-I'm on disability income.

Cops around here use cellphones or Nextels anyway for anything other than traffic stops. State police here on OpenScam anyway.

That's my experience after 30 years of scanners of every type and running back to my Sabers every time, at least for the railroad.

Rich

 

[grb]

Is the software compatible with Mac computers?

 

[Viper43]

While I enjoy programming the XT on the fly, customization, etc., this certainly may fill a gap. Certainly more needs to come out, but for me, the ability to "set up shop" in the field, quickly-could this be a better way to go? possibly.

BTW-would anyone know if the disply has a "night time" mode a la GPS models? Not a deal breaker, but curious.

I'm sure it has a brightness control, but doubt it has the auto dim or whatever the gps uses

 

[Viper43]

It's cool, but why you not asked your customers about what they need?

It looks like toy. And limits market to the North America only.

I am disappointed.

Ummm, they always read the forums and Uniden has plenty of websites and phone lines for customers to give their ideas, I'd say Uniden is at the forefront when it comes to listening to it's customers, especialy here at RR with Upman here alot chatting with users of their products.

I don't think it looks like a toy, looks more like a GPS than a scanner and I think thats what the whole plan was and I think it works.

Ummm, yeah, it IS Uniden North America releasing this unit so that would make sense it's only available in North America.... maybe after a while the other divisions will like it and they too will sell it...time will tell

V

 

[h8tdigitalradio]

I'm sure it has a brightness control, but doubt it has the auto dim or whatever the gps uses

Yes it has Auto Dim. There are some features not discussed yet, and more will be revealed. While I appreciate lively discussion, until the specs are released, some of these posts are pure speculation. Not picking at you Viper43, just correcting some misinformation.

73

Dave AKA The Tripzter

 

[trido]

this post answered my one question I think as you were in nashville why for on the fly programming cant we just enter nashville,tn I assume it must be a zip code??

I am now glad I got the iphone 4 I can now tell wife I must have it when on vacation cause new scanner ONLY programs via zip code and not city and state name(so iphone will search for zip codes for me).

Thanks cant wait till fall.

Jeff

Actually we did come out with the pay updates. We just decided not to charge anything for them.

Video is still "cooking" in Pinnacle. So, looks like I'll have to post it Sunday.

Ability to create your own stuff will roll out in the PC software once we get the initial release taken care of. Ability to enter stuff "on the fly" is further out. I want to make sure we get the feature set for the advanced user nailed...and reading these posts + the ones that come out after release will certainly feed into that process.

This has been the culmination of about 4 years of effort...a couple of the patent-pending features were filed years ago. A couple of the patented features we licensed over a decade ago. We are working very hard to make sure that we've correctly identified the audience, the feature set, and the implementation...and we are ready to adjust to reality from Day 1 if we missed anything at all.

I know and appreciate that this is not going to be a product for many of you. And don't take it that this scanner is for "stupid people" or that it is a dumbed down product. That absolutely isn't the point. A friend of mine's son is an astrophysicist. Definitely not stupid. But, he has tried and failed at programming today's scanners because he just doesn't have the time to become a radio engineer. He really likes listening (he uses 911scanner on his iPhone), though. He is ready to buy HomePatrol today (if only we were ready to sell it today).

But, even you scanner guys are going to find things to like about it right off the bat. I was in Nashville last week and had the opportunity to have Greg Voros work on my guitar. He said that the most common request from beginner/intermediate guitarists is that they want their guitar to be easier to play. Actually, he said, everyone wants their guitar to be easier to play, even the guitar impressarios. It isn't cheating to be easier.

On that trip, 5 minutes after I hit the hotel room I was listening to the Nashville area PD, FD, and EMS. What took about 3 minutes was finding something in the hotel room that had the local zip code . As a casual visitor, I would have been immediately blown away by what I was listening to with so little knowledge of the local systems. I had not researched Nashville at all before the trip, so didn't even realize that they had digital channels. It wasn't necessary for me to know anything about the technicalities of the systems...I was hearing a Motorola Type 2 system with some P25 channels, many conventional channels, and I think some Motorola (maybe EDACS) systems with no digital, too. It really wasn't necessary for me to know any of that...and your dad (or brother-in-law, or mom, or cousin, or next-door-neighbor) will not need to know that either. But, they'll still hear police, fire, ambulance (and more, if they turn on those other channel types), just by knowing their zip code.

I'm way to "inside" this project to give an unbiased view. I'll let the guys who saw it today give their likes/dislikes. But, while this is really targeted at your brother-in-law, we aren't forgetting about you. If you don't want it today, I totally understand, and we aren't abandoning products like the BCD396XT and BCD996XT. But, I'm making a list (actually started it last year) of things I want to do for you to bring you up to this platform, too. Can't make any promises...so don't buy it until you see something you like. I'm just betting that even the way it will be on day 1 will be irresistable to a good chunk of die-hard radio technologists in addition to the guys who "just want to hear the cops."

 

[FoeHammer]

Well Agencies here are encrypted , So its gotta be loaded with features & flexibility to make scanning other things easier , Im waiting for a review from the hardcore military air monitors & marine monitors to see how useful it is to them ,..Oh and if this unit can be desktop ,..moblie,,,,& handheld ,....Then you guys better make sure it has one SOLID antenna connection to the board ,...It cant be a hair thin wire with a microdot of solder ,...with all the moving around & constant antenna reconnecting that connection is gonna flex & break
It NEEDS to be beefy !

 

[Viper43]

Yes it has Auto Dim. There are some features not discussed yet, and more will be revealed. While I appreciate lively discussion, until the specs are released, some of these posts are pure speculation. Not picking at you Viper43, just correcting some misinformation.

73

Dave AKA The Tripzter

I wasn't talking about THAT auto dim, I'm meaning, and believe the OP meant one that dims like GPS at sundown.... two different things.

V

 

[38ffems]

I think a very useful feature and something I would definitely buy into would be a combination of being able to listen to live scanner frequencies and also be able to stream web based feeds as well, I could see this being very useful.

 

[Viper43]

this post answered my one question I think as you were in nashville why for on the fly programming cant we just enter nashville,tn I assume it must be a zip code??

I am now glad I got the iphone 4 I can now tell wife I must have it when on vacation cause new scanner ONLY programs via zip code and not city and state name(so iphone will search for zip codes for me).

Thanks cant wait till fall.

Jeff

Jeff, they said you can use city name too, so there goes the phone excuse...lol but I won't tell her

V

 

[FoeHammer]

I think a very useful feature and something I would definitely buy into would be a combination of being able to listen to live scanner frequencies and also be able to stream web based feeds as well, I could see this being very useful.

Does it have Wi -FI ability or perhaps a Wi-fi usb adapter?

(More irresponsible speculation)
To what depth is it submersible , & how many megapixels is the camera ?

 

[trido]

thanks i will try not to ask anymore and wait for the FAQ.

thanks

Jeff, they said you can use city name too, so there goes the phone excuse...lol but I won't tell her

V

 

[trido]

that is the exact feature i thought Paul and Lindsay would have done that way we could have heard all of Radio Ref live feeds.Paul maybe next version?

Does it have Wi -FI ability or perhaps a Wi-fi usb adapter?

 

[madox01]

how much 300 -400 for this dose it do mototrbo nxdn wont buy it if not

 

[Drafin]

LOL at the people saying it looks like a toy and not a real radio.

I suppose the iPhone, most mp3 players and all gps units look like toys.

As for looking like a real radio, a lot of people would say that the smaller hand held units that came out in the 90s looked like toys compared to the old Bendix Kings and other old brick radios. I wonder what a "real radio" looks like?

I understand the people not wanting one because it doesn't have the features they want or that they want total control or even price (assuming it's expensive) but I don't get the above arguments. If it receives what I want to hear I don't care if it is purple with pink polka dots and has Fisher Price stamped across the top. But that's just me.

Draf

 

[markbart]

What's a real radio?

LOL at the people saying it looks like a toy and not a real radio.

I suppose the iPhone, most mp3 players and all gps units look like toys.

As for looking like a real radio, a lot of people would say that the smaller hand held units that came out in the 90s looked like toys compared to the old Bendix Kings and other old brick radios. I wonder what a "real radio" looks like?

I understand the people not wanting one because it doesn't have the features they want or that they want total control or even price (assuming it's expensive) but I don't get the above arguments. If it receives what I want to hear I don't care if it is purple with pink polka dots and has Fisher Price stamped across the top. But that's just me.

Draf

Amen to that.

 

[eorange]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPod; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_0 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8A293 Safari/6531.22.7)

Lots of people had issues with NASCAR stamped on the front of the BR330T, and that scanner had a short Uniden lifespan despite nearly universal acceptance as a great scanner.

 

[Jay911]

My two cents..

Looks like a nice radio for a market I'm not so convinced is as prevalent as people say it is. That having been said, providing it isn't locked down and prevents you from doing your own programming, it's a really impressive looking device.

I like the fact that the concept of a color LCD has finally come to the scanning world, a decade or so after it hit phones. Hopefully it becomes the new standard.

Loading data from the RRDB? Works in many cases, but people who know me know there's a number of reasons why I want to be able to input more than that. Besides what's already been discussed before, one of the big issues is that between admins' personal preferences and the short 12-character limit on alpha tags, things like "Smithville FD R1" become "SmithvlFSP". Besides that, configuring new frequencies not yet in the DB or not likely to be put in the DB is very necessary for some of us.

One of my thoughts reading this thread was that it should have CC dump, but I guess that's not really necessary, since the 396XT does that just fine. I would want it to have computer control, though, so it could be used in a Unitrunker type setup.

Unless the device has everything I am looking for in my statements above, the odds are good that I won't be lining up when it first goes on sale. I will, however, probably look forward to the (hopefully) inevitable 396XT replacement that uses the technology rolled out in this device, such as a full-color touch-screen (and elimination of the keypad), etc.

 

[Thayne]

Just what we needed, a sophisticated scanner that is so simple a gangbanger can use it.

Argghh--another nail in the Goose

How can we all entertain ourselves when there is nothing to listen to anymore and our kids will be so dumbed down by then that even they cannot figure out how to crack Direct TV or DES anymore?

PS
This could be a sick joke or not--

 

[lachacz]

The less time I am programming my 3 scanners, the more time I am listening....

The new scanner is basically program free! Just enter a zip code and listen. It scans digital and analog with a color screen. Pictures to come later!