Hello all.

Recently I was helping out at my office clearing out a storage room,
and I came across an old PRO-2021 scanner. It had about an inch of
dust on it and I figure it had been stashed there for quite some time.

I took it home and cleaned it up. The thing reeks bad of cirgarette
smoke, and I cleared-off years of nicotine and dirt. Apparently. that
scanner was an integral part of the company back in the day and it was
in the same room with heavy smokers for quite a while.

Looking inside, it appears to have a discriminator tap mod, and the
cellular band was restored.

I plugged it in and it works, but the display is DIM (no suprise).

But I noticed that it just doesn't seem to pick up much of anything
well at all. Sure, it picks-up that NOAA weather radio frequency no
problem -- nice and clearly..

But I haven't gotten it to pick up a single frequency anywhere near
the 800 - 900 Mhz range. Maybe the occasional freq. in the 400Mhz
range, etc.. but it just seems 'weak', if ya know what I mean.

This old stashed scanner didn't have the stock whip antenna, so I
bought a Motorola-to-BNC adapter and tried a couple fo different
rubber-duckie antennas and whatever else I have, and it just doesn't
seem to really pick up much at all.

Is this some kind of known problem? An aged piece of electronics, way
beyond its time, etc.? Is something else wrong, maybe something
relatively easy to fix?

I'd really like to get it working again, even though it's pretty dated
as far as functionality goes..

Thanks in advance for any input.

Kevin

A Pro-2021 will NOT receive 800 MHz freqs, at all, period! I own myself,
I've performed the "mod", and all it does is allow the display of 800 MHz
freqs. That's because the CPU could also be used in a scanner that would
actually receive 800 MHz freqs. However, the entire RF section needed to
actually receive the 800 MHz band is simply not there.

The 2021 is a bit long in the tooth, slow scan/search speeds and an upper
limit of 512 MHz, but it's a good secondary receiver for VHF and UHF freqs
if they are active in your area. But 800 MHz? Forget about it, unless you
buy a downconverter (which are no longer made).

M

"Tempest" wrote in message
...
Hello all.

Recently I was helping out at my office clearing out a storage room,
and I came across an old PRO-2021 scanner. It had about an inch of
dust on it and I figure it had been stashed there for quite some time.

I took it home and cleaned it up. The thing reeks bad of cirgarette
smoke, and I cleared-off years of nicotine and dirt. Apparently. that
scanner was an integral part of the company back in the day and it was
in the same room with heavy smokers for quite a while.

Looking inside, it appears to have a discriminator tap mod, and the
cellular band was restored.

I plugged it in and it works, but the display is DIM (no suprise).

But I noticed that it just doesn't seem to pick up much of anything
well at all. Sure, it picks-up that NOAA weather radio frequency no
problem -- nice and clearly..

But I haven't gotten it to pick up a single frequency anywhere near
the 800 - 900 Mhz range. Maybe the occasional freq. in the 400Mhz
range, etc.. but it just seems 'weak', if ya know what I mean.

This old stashed scanner didn't have the stock whip antenna, so I
bought a Motorola-to-BNC adapter and tried a couple fo different
rubber-duckie antennas and whatever else I have, and it just doesn't
seem to really pick up much at all.

Is this some kind of known problem? An aged piece of electronics, way
beyond its time, etc.? Is something else wrong, maybe something
relatively easy to fix?

I'd really like to get it working again, even though it's pretty dated
as far as functionality goes..

Thanks in advance for any input.

Kevin