On Jun 11, 3:55 pm, "Dave Ferguson" wrote:
wrote in message

oups.com...





Hi,

Bought a bcd396t last weekend and was really excited about scanning.
Never owned one or new anything about it. I turned it on and cleared
all memory first, since my area didn't seem to be pre-programmed. I
live in Bay Point CA, 94565. Sat outside my house to see what was
going on on a Saturday night. I did an automatic search for police
activity and had one or two frequencies that gave me some messages
every once in a while. Was hard to understand too by the way

Is this all there is to it, or should it be more exciting? I expected
more action on a Saturday night, especially in my area, but all I got
was a message every once in a while. Or should I not use the automatic
search, because it doesn't work properly?

Is the automatic search able to find all different frequencies, like
trunking, conventional, etc...?

I guess I'm confused because it didn't give me the action I was hoping
for.

I returned the unit on sunday...very disappointed, but maybe someone
could tell me I'm wrong and I need to do certain things to get this
unit to work.

thanks

You had a very powerful scanner in your hands. I blame the person you
bought it from for not showing you how to use it or at least program local
agencies in it.

Scanning is a great hobby but it's not a turn it on and listen kind of
thing. You have to do some research of your area. A great place to start
iswww.radioreference.com . They have the most extensive database for
police/fire/rescue . I looked up Bay Point, CA and see it's in Contra Costa
County. Here's a listing for that county:http://www.radioreference.com/module...me=RR&ctid=189.

As you were scanning you were probably picking up bits and pieces of a
"trunked" system. You can listen to it but it's hard to follow if you don't
have your scanner set properly to listen to a trunked system. Here are
the basics of a "trunked" system.http://wiki.radioreference.com/index.php/Trunking

Hope you reconsider.
Dave- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

I bought it at Fry's, but nobody there who knew anything about it.
When bought it, I had already looked at the website you mentioned,
and entered the frequencies for police for my city. Every once in a
while I could here someone talking for 1 or two seconds, but it seems
that I should have heard much more than just a dispatcher going back
and force only a few times an hour. Also, I found only 2 channels when
I did the automatic search . I would expect to find much more. This
was around 11 PM. I would still expect airplaines, Fire department,
etc...I'm in the middle between two cities here(less than 2 miles), so
there should be lots of stuff going on.

How would one be able to program a trunking system then if the search
is only for Convetional? also, I'm not sure if my PD uses digital or
not. Is the search able to auto-detect digital as well?

The user's manual that came with it is probably the worst manual I've
ever read. Only today I found out about squelch. The manual said to
set the squelch, but it didn't explain what squelch was and what to
set it to. So, I put it in the middle when I tried the scanner and
left it there.

I would love to give it another try, but I am very sceptical now
unless I can see somebody show it to me in my area...