Uniden Home Patrol - II First Look

Check out my first look at the new Uniden Home Patrol-II.

Uniden Home Patrol II Announced

The Uniden Home Patrol II was just announced last week.

So what is different from the HP-1?

The Home Patrol II adds P25 Phase II compatibility and USB charging.  It is also a darker color.

If you aren't familiar with the Home Patrol I, the Home Patrol 1 and 2 feature a touch screen color display.  P25 digital trunking.  Also pre-programmed information by location.  You just type in your zip code and what types of agencies you want to monitor and you are scanning in no time!

You can check out the full specs on Uniden's website.

Whistler Scanners Coming Soon

Here is a sneak peak at what Whistler Group has in store for us on the scanner front.

Whistler Scanner Page

Whistler WS1010 is an analog 200 channel handheld scanner that scans frequencies from 29 to 512 MHz.  Seems to be a very basic, no frills analog scanner.  Next up is the Whistler WS1025.  It is the desktop version of the above WS1010.  Again, same frequency coverage, analog only.  These 2 seem to be rebadged GRE PSR 100 and PSR 200.

WS1010

WS1025

Next are the new digital trunking scanners.  They come in handheld (the WS1040) and the base/mobile scanner (WS1065).  You may notice that they look familiar.  That's because they are rebadged GRE PSR 500 and PSR 600 radios.   Both the 500 and 600 were very good scanners so I would expect that these new Whistler scanners would be much in the same.  No hard release date for any of these scanners have been published as of this writing (February 2014).

WS1040

WS1065

I did a How to with the Radio Shack Pro-197 (same as GRE PSR-600 (WS1065)).  I also did a review on the PSR-500.  They are both very capable scanners with tons of great features.  So I look forward to the Whistler branded scanners.

This post on RadioReference.com hints at newer scanners coming down the pipe.  The WS1095.  That would be the never released PSR-900.  So one would assume if that is true they would re-release the PSR-800 with a revised model number.  But only time will tell if Whistler will innovate in the radio scanner space.  I am glad Uniden keeps the competition after GRE went down.  GRE always made great radios.  With Whistler in the business now, I hope competition breeds innovation between the two companies.

Check out Whistler's Facebook page for a sneak peak video of the WS1065 in action:

Post by Whistler Group.



Thanks for looking!

Uniden BCD536HP Initial Impressions

The BCD536HP is Uniden's flagship scanner.  And it is awesome!  With the large LCD screen, playback and recording as well as the WiFi (future as of 2-5-14) app.  This is a very nice scanner.  Here are some pictures and a video of my first impressions.  Enjoy!  Please excuse the smudges and dust, I will have better pictures and a full review soon!

LARGE LCD compared to the BCD996T below it.

New Uniden BCD436HP coming January 2014

• The BCD436HP is the first scanner to incorporate the HomePatrol-1's ease of use in a traditional handheld scanner. Simply enter your zip code, and the BCD436HP will quickly select and scan channels in your local area. Here is a quick rundown of the BCD436HP's major features.
• 4 Gigabyte microSD card holds the entire USA and Canada database of radio systems, plus leaves room for hundreds of hours of audio recording.
• Programmable Alert LED lets you set a specific color to alert you when a channel becomes active.
• TrunkTracker V with support for APCO Project 25 Phase I and Phase II, X2-TDMA, Motorola, EDACS, and LTR Trunked Radio Systems
• Quick Key access to 100 Favorites Lists, 100 Systems per Favorites List, and 100 Departments per System.
• Discovery Modes help you find new channels on trunked systems and frequency ranges.
• Analysis Modes include Band Scope, RF Power Plot, Trunked System Analysis, and EDACS/LTR LCN Finder.
• Flexible Easy Channel Selection using Zip Code or GPS and Service Types — just pick the kinds of channels you want to hear and tell the BCD436HP where you are and let it do the rest.
• Easy Scan Control using the dedicated System, Department and Channel Hold buttons.
• Complete Front-Panel Programmability — create custom Favorites Lists either using systems from the main database as a starting point or program your systems from scratch.
• Temporary Avoid lets you quickly silence unwanted systems, departments, or channels while allowing you to restore them by cycling power.
• Backlight-on-Squelch option allows the backlight to remain on during an entire transmission.
• Date/Time indication on display with time stamping for recordings.
• Trunked and Conventional Channel Priority with Priority Do-Not-Disturb
• Close Call® RF Capture with Do-Not-Disturb automatically tunes the scanner to nearby transmissions without interrupting reception in progress.
• NOAA Weather Alert with SAME
• Two-Tone Paging with up to 32 tone slots
• Flexible Scanning — scan from any combination of the main database and Favorites Lists
• Included Sentinel Software makes database and firmware updates simple. Also allows you to create, edit, and manage your Favorites Lists.
• USB PC Connectivity - Serial GPS input for location-based scanning using the Uniden GC-GPSK or other compatible GPS receiver.
• 3 AA Battery Operation provides up to 8 hours of operation.
• SMA-type antenna.
• 192 x 160-Pixel Dot-Matrix Display
• Select/Volume/Squelch multi-control
• Side-actuated Function and Menu controls
• Backlit Display and Keypad
• Rotating Belt Clip
• Rugged construction with Rubber Side and Bottom Impact areas to improve impact resistance.

Current discussion on this scanner can be found at RadioReference.com  More information is available at http://info.uniden.com/NewScanners including the Uniden launch video, pdf of the owners manual, and a link to download the Sentinel software to start playing with.