which Scanner?

Location : Bristol Spotter Watch Member : no

Hi,

this is my first post on this excellent forum....... I am looking for some advice.

I currently have a Yupiteru 225 scanner that I have owned for about 10 years. I have had excellent service out of it. I think it is coming to the end of its life.... sometimes it scans very slowly, and it loses its memory frequently (a bit like me really).

I need a replacement!

Bearing in mind I am useless with complicated technology (i want something simple), I would like a reasonbly fast scan together with 100 or so memories, full VHF and UHF (military) airband coverage (mainly for airshows) what would you guys recommend?

Looking at some scanners they seam to be able to tell you which frequencies are in use when you arive at an airfield. Does this technology work?

thanks for any help.

Subject: Re: which Scanner? 2009-07-12, 13:36

Welcome

I too have a VT225 which i brought in the early 90's and it is still going strong, however i think the days of scanners that are as easy to use as the 225 are gone. I have just upgraded to the Icom IC-RX7 quite tricky to set up with frequency names and scan categories, however once set up very easy to use.
Close call is the ability of the scanner to tune itself to the nearest operational frequency, it does work and is only avaliable on the Uniden Bearcat range of scanners.

Subject: Re: which Scanner? 2009-07-12, 13:41

Have you ever changed the battery inside it,should be a half-length AA.
My 22 year-old Signal R535 has one inside it and I've only ever changed it twice,it looks after the memory.
Not sure if your's is the same,but it's worth a look.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Half_AA_battery.jpg

Admin Location : Bristol, UK

sgtchilco wrote:: Looking at some scanners they seam to be able to tell you which frequencies are in use when you arive at an airfield. Does this technology work?

The Close Call feature does work, but you need to be reasonably close to the transmitting radio for close call to detect it. So I wouldn't rely on being able to go to a airfield and the scanner work all the freqs out for you.

Mike

Subject: Re: which Scanner? 2009-07-13, 06:39

I agree with MIKEB. No substitute for pre-programming your frequencies as then you know what you're listening in to. I have found that Close Call constantly picks up the ATIS transmission so I end up turning it off.

Location : Swindon Spotter Watch Member : no

I am not qualified to advise on what is the best scanner; I guess this does depend on how much you want to spend.

However I have recently purchased a UBC3500XLT (£110.00 B-Grade from Maplin) and PC Cable (€32.00 from Unidenshop.com)
With the freely available BC-Tool PC software, I found this a breeze to set up and excellent to use.

There are several threads on here. Which are very helpful.

I and I expect other FC'ers will be happy to email you their memory files; if local enough to you; this you can load into the software, see how things are arranged and add and remove lines as you see fit, then up-load to the scanner.
I have the freqs for Lyneham, Brize, Benson, and Fairford plus Brilstol Int and Filton, also some of the Civil and Mil air Control zones loaded.

Location : various

sgtchilco wrote:: I currently have a Yupiteru 225 scanner that I have owned for about 10 years. I have had excellent service out of it. I think it is coming to the end of its life.... sometimes it scans very slowly, and it loses its memory frequently (a bit like me really).

I need a replacement!

Bearing in mind I am useless with complicated technology (i want something simple), I would like a reasonbly fast scan together with 100 or so memories, full VHF and UHF (military) airband coverage (mainly for airshows) what would you guys recommend?

Looking at some scanners they seam to be able to tell you which frequencies are in use when you arive at an airfield. Does this technology work?

You'll struggle to find a new scanner that will perform as well on airband as your VT225. If it's losing it's memory then you need to change the memory back up capacitor.

As others have said 'close call' (which is the uniden name....GRE and Alinco have also marketed similar functionality) is a useful feature but certainly shouldn't be a major factor when deciding what to buy. Close Call works better on FM signals than AM and needs a big difference in the 'wanted' signal and the noise floor at the time of transmission...on an airfield at an airshow this means you are likely to pick up the ATIS, car park attendants, cuddly toy stallholders radio mics, PMR446 etc rather than the airband comms you want.

Location : doncaster Spotter Watch Member : no

Hi,

I have the IC-RX7 and it is extremely sensitive on VHF and UHF air better than my old aor 8200, yupi 7300 and my old uniden 780

Programming i find easy especially pc software its excellent

Many THanks,

Jonny

Location : various

jwmachon wrote:: Hi,

I have the IC-RX7 and it is extremely sensitive on VHF and UHF air better than my old aor 8200, yupi 7300 and my old uniden 780

Programming i find easy especially pc software its excellent

Many THanks,

Jonny

Whilst I like the RX7 I haven't found it better on VHF or UHF than an AR8200 (all three versions), MVT7100, MVT9000....quite the opposite actually. It IS better at 1200MHz than the AR8200's and it's better than the 780 on UHF