Hi Al

Having just purchased this unit last Thursday, I'm still getting use to
the way a scanner works, and believe it or not, this Uniden BC796D is
my very first scanner, and the very first time I've ever responded to
something in the newsgroups.

Thanks for the correction on the "few KC's off" line. What I should
have said is "five or ten KC"s off frequency". By "off frequency", the
scanner itself is unable to tune in finer steps, and only has "default"
steps, which get close but not right on the frequency I'm trying to
receive.

While looking at just some the various scanners, I noticed that at
least one did not tune the UHF Ham repeater sub-band correctly, and I
was unable receive some of the repeaters in that portion. It would
only tune in 15KC increments. In Northern California the UHF 440 - 450
repeater sub-band has 25KC spacing and in Southern California they use
20KC spacing. This is just one example.

Just went through the entire range on the IC-R20 and apparently the
800Mhz cellular portion is the only area with any gap in it. My
IC-R100 receives the entire range from 100Khz - 1854Mhz continuously
and without any gaps. However, the IC-R100 is probably the slowest
radio around when it comes to scanning. This is the reason for finally
getting a scanner, and the BC796D rips right along at this function!

"Good sensitivity, rejection to intermod and adjacent signal rejection".

Well perhaps I now live in an area where this isn't really an issue.
When I lived up in Northern California, Mt. Diablo produced a fair
share of undesired signals, and then again some were of considerable
interest too!

Best regards

george




On 2005-10-29 11:34:48 -0700, Al Klein said:

On Fri, 28 Oct 2005 10:46:52 -0700, George said
in rec.radio.scanner:

2. Selectable tuning steps instead of the default tuning step ranges
which may be off a few KC's from where you want to listen.

If the frequency is "a few KCs off", someone should notify the
licensee, because they're operating illegally. If it's 5 KHz off,
you're probably trying to receive the wrong frequency. A lot of PS
frequencies found on the internet were found by people who had their
scanners on the wrong frequency, and when you try to match that
frequency with a better scanner, you think that the transmitter is off
frequency. No, it's the knowledge of the person reporting the
frequency that was off. Most technicians know how to keep the
transmitters on frequency - it's what they were hired for.

5. Continuos frequency coverage! This is a very handy option. Even
though the Uniden BC796D has a few gaps, the range is sufficient for my
needs. The Icom IC-R20 covers everything from 100KHZ - 3Ghz, except
800Mhz cellular.

It covers 1.8 GHz cellular? Or did you just forget to mention that?
(Not that receiving it would do any good - there are NO analog
services in the "PCS" band.)

7. Good sensitivity, rejection to intermod

Not in any receiver ever made, if the intermod is external to the
scanner. If it's on the frequency you're receiving, you'll receive
it. GRE, Uniden or a Motorola G-strip (which was probably the
tightest receiver ever made - the thing had cavities for front end
filters).

You may mean a receiver that doesn't suffer much from front end
overload. Typical of Uniden, NOT typical of GRE. (You're almost
assured of overloading the front end of a GRE scanner if you put on an
external antenna, unless you don't live anywhere near any
transmitter.)

adjacent signal rejection

Also not with almost any scanner ever made. Most scanners have a
fixed IF bandwidth. It's difficult to be wide enough to not distort
on an 11 KHz channel and still not pick up adjacent channel
interference with 5 KHz channel spacing.

On Sat, 29 Oct 2005 14:10:13 -0700, George said
in rec.radio.scanner:

Thanks for the correction on the "few KC's off" line. What I should
have said is "five or ten KC"s off frequency". By "off frequency", the
scanner itself is unable to tune in finer steps, and only has "default"
steps, which get close but not right on the frequency I'm trying to
receive.

That's an older scanner that wasn't designed for current bandplans.
It's like an old scanner that can't tune to an 850 MHz frequency.
You're comparing apples to ducks, since there aren't any older tunable
scanners, unless you include ham gear.

While looking at just some the various scanners, I noticed that at
least one did not tune the UHF Ham repeater sub-band correctly, and I
was unable receive some of the repeaters in that portion. It would
only tune in 15KC increments.

At one time UHF equipment operated on 30 KHz channellization, so 15
KHz steps were just fine. (Actually, at one time, a mile was an
unreachable goal at 400 MHz. And frequency stability was so poor that
"frequency" was a courtesy, not a measurement. Look up "Vocaline" for
kicks, or look at
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=5813581566&category=29 6.
Using that today would probably get you free room and board, but I
used a pair of them in the early 60s. Frequency? Around 465 MHz.
Counters were no good up there, so the best we could do was Lecher
lines, so we got the frequency accurate to about 1/4" of wavelength -
as long as it didn't drift to rapidly.)

In Northern California the UHF 440 - 450
repeater sub-band has 25KC spacing and in Southern California they use
20KC spacing. This is just one example.

And modern scanners allow 5 KHz steps.