I just bought an Icom IC-R20. great reciever, except that most of the
police radios around here use the trunking system. Anyone know how this
type of radio can be used to track trunking calls? is there any
software out there to make programming easier? I hope I won't have to
but two different scanners...

Assuming they are analog trunked systems, you can still listen--you just
won't have the ability to track the conversations by talk group. Since the
R20 has lots of memory banks, you can assign just the frequencies for a
particular system to one bank, then scan that bank or scan in bank-link mode
to scan multiple systems. You will have to mark the control channels using
the PSKIP function to avoid always stopping on them (and blasting you with
the horrible digital hash).

Scanners with trunk-tracking will allow you to set up and label talk groups,
then follow conversations by talk group so you can understand what's going
on better. They will also automatically find and skip the control channels.
The drawback with using a conventional scanner for listening to trunked
systems is that the control channel often skips around to different
channels, and as a result you have to manually mark them for skipping and
remember to clear the skip markers for the previously used channels so you
don't miss anything.

I assume you didn't find out about the use of trunked systems in your area
until after you bought the R20...that sucks. One of the often repeated
pieces of advice given in these scanner groups is to research the comms in
your area before deciding on a scanner to buy. I know that isn't helpful
for you now, but look at it this way: now you have a good reason to go out
and buy another scanner!

Regarding software for the R20: I suggest joining the Yahoo!Groups "IC-R20"
group. There you will find some software approaches for easier programming
using just a standard USB cable. Also look he

http://pages.videotron.com/scanman/R20Page/R20page.htm

- Doug


"zarro" wrote in message
oups.com...
I just bought an Icom IC-R20. great reciever, except that most of the
police radios around here use the trunking system. Anyone know how this
type of radio can be used to track trunking calls? is there any
software out there to make programming easier? I hope I won't have to
but two different scanners...

Thanks Doug.
So far, only one agency in this area use the digital trunked system, so
at this point I am dealing with analog. However,I suspect that more and
more agencies will use the digital system in the future. The R-20 will
be nice for rural scanning, and I'm not sorry I bought it--good for
shortwave also. I knew at some point I would have to buy a
digital,anyways.