Uniden BC355N 800 MHz 300-Channel Base/Mobile Scanner, Close Call RF Capture, Pre-programmed Search “Action” Bands to Hear Police, Ambulance, Fire, Amateur Radio, Public Utilities, Weather, and More, Black

It comes pre-programmed with frequencies and the search and nearby functions make it easy to find local transmissions to follow. I looked up some frequencies on the FCC website and programmed them easily. Comes with home and car adapter and car mounting kit. Lacking a lot of advanced functions though. Speaker is weak.

I live in an area that still uses analog communications for emergency services, so I was looking for a simple scanner that I could program with a few banks. This scanner seemed to fit the bill perfectly. Unfortunately, it wasnt until I started to program it that I realized its massive flaw. I honestly dont understand how the designers of this scanners firmware could be so completely incompetent in their design. The police/fire/emergency banks along with air and marine are completely unusable if you are near any amount of traffic at all. The scanner is reported as 3 x 100 bank programmable, where 1 bank is Private 1 is Police/Fire/Emrg and 1 is air/marine. The issue is, the only way to scan programable banks for police/fire/emrg or air/marine is to enable the associated built in channels with those banks. There are almost 4000 channels that get scanned if you turn those on. Your programmable banks get scanned *after* those channels and at 100cps, thats a 20 second round trip. Whats even worse than that, is the scanner only has the ability to lock out 100 of those 4000 channels, so if you are near a city of any size it will hang constantly on digital signals that you cant disable. So what does this mean? Well you cant use a lot of the scanner and setup becomes very tedious. Police and air banks add almost 2000 channels each to your scan. This is slow and with only 100 lockouts you will never be able to filter out the noise in a busy area. If you enable fire/emrg (without police) you add about 300 channels and marine (without air) only adds about 90 and these will allow you to enable the other two private banks. I recommend enabling these and locking out everything local in the pre programmed banks and then adding the channels you want scanned into private, fire, and marine. This gives you control to enable/disable banks with 300 channels total and you should only have about 350 preprogrammed channels to contend with ( hopefully your 100 lockout limit will make these listenable in your area) WX and CB bands are fixed, so you get what you expect there. I dont recommend this scanner at all and I really cant believe it was built this way. A simple setting to turn off pre-programmed banks would make things so much easier.

Over the years Ive owned a number of Uniden BC355 scanners. Theyre simple to use and program, and the audio output is loud and clear. Of course, this is an analog scanner, but for areas like rural Vermont, analog systems are still very much in use. The unit comes complete with AC adapter, DC cigarette lighter cord for mobile use, telescopic whip antenna, and tilt-desk stand. AM aircraft reception is superb, and weather scan requires just simple one-button access. You wont have to worry about what CTCSS tone to use, because the 355N uses carrier squelch, only. If you live in an area served by analog public service radio, this model is perfect to catch up on all the action. (Note if you require digital P25 reception, this isnt the unit for you...for that see the BC996P2 or other digital scanners).

Although this scanner is compact and seems senitive, it is poorly designed. It claims to be 300 channels, BUT this is misleading. 100 channels are shared between Marine Band and Aircraft. In order to use these channels you must let it scan through the pre-programmed frequencies first. On aircraft that means it takes 27 seconds before you even get to your frequencies. In my case, all 27 seconds were dead channels. The same is true for Police &Fire except there are many more pre-programmed frequencies to scan through. If you turn these banks off you can only scan 100 channels. Unless you are willing to use this as a 100 channel scanner, the wait time of going through thousands of dead frequencies is ginormus! You better have the patience of a saint.

This unit is versatile in that it is easily moved from a desktop installation to a vehicle installation - and it is ALMOST a portable unit except that it needs an external power connection. It is small and light enough to be moved about easily, and compact enough to fit in many cubby holes. Unlike some mobile units, its exterior is clean enough to look fine sitting out in the open on a desktop, yet it can be quickly/easily attached to a (pre-installed) mount in a vehicle, although it does require manual attachment of the power and antenna cables. Of course, the mobile mounting bracket could be used instead to mount the unit, say, under a shelf or whatever. Functionally, it works well in most respects. I was a little surprised that it seems to be a bit less sensitive than the old crystal-controlled scanner that it replaced. The backlit display is readable under most lighting conditions, but some indicators would seem quite small for quick reading in a mobile installation - unless the unit can be located fairly close to the observer. Fortunately, its not necessary to see them clearly during normal scanning mode. I havent yet used my unit in a mobile installation, but Im wondering if the buttons will be easy to see and access under poor lighting conditions. The buttons are small enough and spaced tightly enough that they might be difficult to use in a moving vehicle and/or with a gloved hand. Generally speaking, the unit is easy to use, but some of the functions dont seem to be intuitive - and so I often have to pull out the manual to do the operations that I use only rarely, in order to get all of the necessary steps in the correct sequence. The most tedious aspect is when manually programming (or removing) specific frequencies. While not particularly difficult, the process is time-consuming. It would help a lot if this unit had the ability to be programmed from a computer, because this likely would save a lot of time in the process. Meanwhile, programming frequencies by capturing actual transmissions is straight-forward, quick and easy - so long as the someone cooperates by transmitting on the desired channel when you want to capture it. I am still rather confused by how the channel banks interact with each other - and how to configure them properly. But, Ive been able to get the unit set up to do almost all that I need it to do. (The missing piece is that I dont know how to access the PL channels that are used in this area). The unit does retain its programming when power is removed - although I havent confirmed this over the long-term. The only problem Ive run into is being unable to find any specifications for the necessary impedance of the external speaker, and wasnt even able to find out from Tech Support. This isa rather concerning. Hopefully, they will be more helpful if there are any other support needs. Overall, I do like this unit, and I feel it is a good value.

This receiver was purchased to replace a mid-80s BearCat 20/20 scanner that had provided outstanding service for nearly 35 years. Unfortunately, the BC355N does not measure up to the high standard set by its much older sibling. The audio is weak and the optional BC23A amplified speaker is required if you want to hear an intelligible broadcast from across the hangar (40 feet). On the plus side, reception with an external VHF antenna is very good.

Works great not A problem

As many have stated its easy to program add the freq to memory . However it is very difficult to get the freq displayed to program it into memory. Without keybord direct entry you must get the scanner to land on or close to the freq you want to add . Yes the up down arrows with the scanner in hold will allow you to manualy enter the freq . However the up down steps do not allow for inbetween freq entry . Speaker is very tinny and a lot of white noise in background so if you like listening to static this is the one for you . This can be corrected with a good external speaker. I own 6 other scanners and this is not the quality I expected of Uniden . Also be aware the reviews listed for this scanner seem to be mixed up from other scanners. This review is for Uniden 800 MHz 300-Channel Base Mobile Scanner (BC355N)

I wanted a scanner for a long time. I use to pull up radio reference and listen to the stream of my local police traffic but the quality was bad and unreliable. This scanner appealed to be because I wanted one like this style, not the portable radio looking ones, as well as the feature of being able to use it in the home and car. It took me a little while to figure out how to use it even with the instructions but after 10-20 minutes I had my local sheriffs dept. tuned in. I was so happy, the quality was 100x better than the internet stream, it sounded like they were right next to me compared to what the stream sounded like. I was impressed by the amount of accessories that were included with the scanner. Most companies would require you to purchase all the stuff that was included with this. There was a car antenna, a house antenna, AC adapter, DC adapter, and a hard wire kit for the car. I purchased a different antenna for the top of the car as well as a speaker. The only wish I have is that it went a little louder, when your in the car and driving at 60-75 MPH its hard to hear with the road noise. If you have it you can plus your AUX in for your car and have it come across your speakers but itll only come out of one side. I dont know anything about scanners but Im 100% happy with my purchase. Its something Ive wanted for a long time and it does exactly what I wanted. Dont be discouraged if you have trouble figuring it out at first. The instructions dont cover everything so you sort of have to teach yourself some things.

The BC355N is perfect for those who desire a simple easy to setup and operate radio. Ability to key pad frequencies into unit would make it a 5++. I have owned a significant number of radios over the years and must say this is a great unit for the $. I will also say that a scanner is only as good as the Antenna which is attached to it so before you give up on a radio add a better antenna first. Phil Tee Staten Island NY