RadioBanter - View Single Post

August 25th 05, 07:39 PM

I'm about 40 miles south of Chicago.

wrote:

On Wed, 24 Aug 2005 22:22:50 GMT, Ted Griffin wrote:

My old Uniden (BC855XLT) finally died last week. It did me just fine
for many years and now, trying to replace it gets more confusing every
day. One guy says I need trunking, another says triple trunking, yet
another says they'll be coming out with quad-trunking soon. I'm
considering the BC898T at around $200 but wanted to run it by here
first. Good choice?

First, what area?

Second, and possibly most important.. Does your area currently or possibly in
the future have Motorola Trunking systems in use? If so then YOU ONLY WANT to
consider the following radios:

Radio Shack: Pro-96, 2096, 2055
Uniden/BearCat: BCT8, 246T 396T, 796, 296, 898

Why? In the future the 800MHz area will be rebanded and this will cause the
functions of the 800MHz Motorola trunking firmware in many scanners to quit
working. This applies only to Motorola systems, and only to 3600 baud Analog or
Digital voice using the 3600 Baud CAI, does NOT APPLY to Motorola systems using
the APCO P25 CAI or 9600 baud control channels.

See: http://www.tampascanner.info/rebanding/800mhzreband.htm for more info on
this.

IF and ONLY if Motorola trunking is not a factor then you can consider other
units.