Scanner_Rider
Member
In my area until this year all the main frequencies I monitor are the same that they were in the 1970s when I bought crystals to plug into my 8 channel Realistic base scanner which I still use in my living room although I acquired a Radio Shack Pro-82 about 10 years ago and use it as a bedside and vehicle scanner.
This year however, a few of the nearby municipal PDs and some of the EMS have opted out of the county dispatch and operational frequencies in favor of 800 Mhz .
In looking at the few handhelds I found online, some say they are analog, some digital, some trunking, others dual trunking and some triple trunking . The most expensive is only about $500 which I could handle out of my savings.
What I am trying to figure out is which handheld would be most feasible to be able to receive the 150 Mhz county sheriff and local PD, 153 state, 450 VFD and the 800mhz maybe digital maybe not that the other agencies are switching to.
I would also like your opinions of which model would be the best choice for bnc antenna swap out from house base antenna to rubber antenna when in use in the vehicle and gets at least six hours of battery time off of the house charger as we use them in mobile mode as part of our rural community watch.
I did go to the nearest RS store and when I asked the floor sales rep and she tried to sell me one they had that was only a model number or so above my ancient Pro-82 they had on clearance sale for $90 but did not cover above 512 MHz range, so I figured she knew even less than I did about this analog/digital and trunking .
So is there a handheld that could cover the 29 to 800 or so bands old school analog/ possible digital and trunking, be as easy to program manually as my old pro 82 and be easy to move from the base antenna to the vehicle ?
Is trunking like a radio transmission version of multiplexing signals to multiple phone extensions or phone and computer at different frequencies over one phone line?
My apologies at all the questions but I am almost 15 years retired out of the electronics manufacturing sector and still can use a crystal controlled base scanner to listen to about half of the agencies in my area so I haven't studied the advancements that much in the last couple decades.
This year however, a few of the nearby municipal PDs and some of the EMS have opted out of the county dispatch and operational frequencies in favor of 800 Mhz .
In looking at the few handhelds I found online, some say they are analog, some digital, some trunking, others dual trunking and some triple trunking . The most expensive is only about $500 which I could handle out of my savings.
What I am trying to figure out is which handheld would be most feasible to be able to receive the 150 Mhz county sheriff and local PD, 153 state, 450 VFD and the 800mhz maybe digital maybe not that the other agencies are switching to.
I would also like your opinions of which model would be the best choice for bnc antenna swap out from house base antenna to rubber antenna when in use in the vehicle and gets at least six hours of battery time off of the house charger as we use them in mobile mode as part of our rural community watch.
I did go to the nearest RS store and when I asked the floor sales rep and she tried to sell me one they had that was only a model number or so above my ancient Pro-82 they had on clearance sale for $90 but did not cover above 512 MHz range, so I figured she knew even less than I did about this analog/digital and trunking .
So is there a handheld that could cover the 29 to 800 or so bands old school analog/ possible digital and trunking, be as easy to program manually as my old pro 82 and be easy to move from the base antenna to the vehicle ?
Is trunking like a radio transmission version of multiplexing signals to multiple phone extensions or phone and computer at different frequencies over one phone line?
My apologies at all the questions but I am almost 15 years retired out of the electronics manufacturing sector and still can use a crystal controlled base scanner to listen to about half of the agencies in my area so I haven't studied the advancements that much in the last couple decades.