Worst scanner ever made?

[Tugboats]

I vote Realistic Pro-2026. What a dog. Image rejection of 0. Intermod from pagers, 800 you name it. Absolute junk. Never took a radio back to the store so quick in my life.

 

[Voyager]

I vote Realistic Pro-2026. What a dog. Image rejection of 0. Intermod from pagers, 800 you name it. Absolute junk. Never took a radio back to the store so quick in my life.

I've had a lot that were much worse than the 2026 (and I have several 2026s - never a problem with images or intermod on any of them). The 2066 comes to mind as being much worse.

Of course, ANY cheap model will not perform like a high teir model.

Joe M.

 

[Joseph11]

I'd say the PRO-92 Version 1.00. The trunking on it is crap, it scans slow, and it takes 6 batteries.

 

[richster]

Here's an old thread that has some very good candidates on the worst scanner ever made.

http://www.radioreference.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=6455

Regards,
Richster.

 

[JGP]

I have to say the R/S PRO2052 (...still have it, don't use it).

Joel
Franklin, Wisconsin :lol:

 

[INDY72]

PRO-2052 was a great scanner for mil air....

Was not too shabby for trunking....
In fact if you hate that 2052 so much.... Send it to me.. I could use another Mil Air scanner!
Now the 2066 was a pita...

But the one I hated was the BC350-A as far as progging/chan arrangement/delay.... I can't remember the others I disliked....

 

[fmon]

In fact if you hate that 2052 so much.... Send it to me..

Only because you ask first...otherwise send it to me.

 

[INDY72]

LOL!

 

[KR4BD]

The Pro-2052 is a great scanner. I use it for military air and analog EDACS trunking. Works great.

I have owned more than a dozen scanners since 1971 and the worst one I had was a portable 4 channel Regency Crystal controlled VHF scanner from the mid-1970's. I don't remember the Model #. It had no sensitivity whatsoever, but maybe I just got a lemon. Another candidate was the Bearcat 10 channel programmable portable (BC-1???) from the 1980's. I could never get the batteries to make good contact no matter what I did. The space for the batteries was larger than the batteries and they keep jiggling around and losing contact. This was despite the fact I put metal wedges in to tighten up the battery connections. A real piece of junk.

 

[Dubbin]

Another vote for the BC350-A

 

[fineshot1]

Everyone is gonna give an answer that best describes there own individual scanner model experience. What we need on here is the opinion of someone who has reviewed the lion share of scanners past & present but that is probably gonna be impossible. So here is my two cents worth. My vote would go with the AOR 2700 with a close 2nd on the Regency HX-1200 scanners. For me the 2700 was most user hostile scanner ever made as far as programmability and there was always a hiss and pops always comming out of the speaker even with no signal being received. I will NEVER own another AOR. The 1200 had a great receiver but generated so much RF it was useless in search mode and would generate birdies into my other scanners as well and also depleted its peculiar one of a kind battery pack rapidly.

 

[loumaag]

Well since it has been mentioned before, I'll add my vote for the BC350A. It is a bear to program and while scanning it's IF output is so strong as to affect my other scanners (no common antenna line either).

The BC560XLT is no champ either, as far as programming goes, but thankfully it only has 16 channels to fight with. :lol:

As for the people voting against the Pro-2052, I hope you are all wrong, since I just ordered one two days ago. Just adding to the collection. :?

 

[K5MAR]

I'd say the PRO-92 Version 1.00. The trunking on it is crap, it scans slow, and it takes 6 batteries.

While I agree about the trunking part, having 6 batteries gives better audio volume. I wish all the handheld scanners had 6 cell packs. (BTW, I have 2 Pro-92s, a v1.0 in my gobag and a v2.8 sitting here next to my computer. The v2.8 does a better job of hearing the distant trunked system than my 780.)

My vote is for that old GE scanner that didn't use crystals, instead it had tuning pots for each channel. Now that was a real POS!

Mark S.

 

[fmon]

As for the people voting against the Pro-2052, I hope you are all wrong, since I just ordered one two days ago. Just adding to the collection. :?

I don't think you'll regret that decision Lou, obviously you won't be using ScanCat Plus , but I will recommend ScanControl and Users Group.

 

[JGP]

There are only two R/S scanners that I liked and still have:

1. PRO-2004--300 channel converted to 500 channels, faster scan speed, and wide open for searching.

2. PRO-2035 1000 channel scanner.

These scanners were great in the days when scanning was easy (no trunking).

Now I use my BC780XLT, a very good scanner. This will do until I get my BCD-396T when it comes out.

Joel
Frankin, Wisconsin :wink:

 

[INDY72]

As for 92's... I own a 92 B V3.something..... I love it except the slow scan speed.

 

[KR4BD]

The Pro-92 has lots of nice features (like alpha tagging), but from a strictly performance standpoint, its sensitivity at 800 mHz is terrible compared to many other portable scanners. I live about 5 air miles from our local EDACS system and my Pro-92A is useless. It misses about 80% of the calls while my Pro-94 misses nothing....and this is with the RS 800 mHz rubber duckie antenna on both of them. At my office, however, which is about a mile from the EDACS site, the Pro-92A works fine....so I only use it at my office. Another thing about the Pro-92 I don't like, as mentioned above, it does have one of the SLOWEST SCAN rates out there. This contributes to missing calls on a busy system.

 

[h8tdigitalradio]

Hello,

Please don't knock the BC350A. It was my first scanner. I still use it once in a while. The 2026 was my second scanner. They did by me fine. I am afraid I have not scanned enough time to determine a worst scanner.

73

Dave AKA The Tripzter :shock:

 

[Thunderbolt]

My vote goes to the Regency MX-4000, made by AOR. The front end on that scanner was garbage, tons of front-end overload from paging systems, and Intermod galore etc. Likewise, the MX-4200 wasn't much better.

73's

Ron

 

[northzone]

The Relm MS-200. What a piece of junk. Intermod city and useless on 800.