Uniden BCD996P2 Digital Mobile TrunkTracker V Scanner, 25,000 Dynamically Allocated Channels, Close Call RF Capture Technology, 4-Line Alpha display, Base/Mobile Design, Phase 2, Location-Based Scanning

This scanner is capable of receiving the majority of everything (not encrypted) in the Police/Fire/Public Service/Military Air/Gov/Misc bands in either analog or digital modes. It receives APCO P-25 digital (both Phase I & II) signals great for me with a stock antenna but I am in a good location to receive two actual P-25 trunk radio system site towers with good signal levels. With digital 800 Mhz signals though, you may need less antenna. About 6.5 inches in length is a good 800 Mhz antenna. With an attic mount ST-2 antenna on a tv antenna booster, I can receive analog signals 60 plus miles away cleanly but thats flat terrain to the top of the Willis Tower. If you have marginal (P-25) 800 Mhz signal levels you wont get many signal bars lit up, it wont trunk track right and you may see talkgroups show up on the display but no audio is heard/garbled/breaks up because it cant decode the digital modulation, or it just might be encrypted. When you get trunking lock on a control channel in APCO P-25 mode, the actual frequency will show up (small) on the display, otherwise you just get NFM on the display which means youre not tracking the system and it will not work. But once you get lock on a control channel, if it all works correctly, it grabs talkgroups at will and you will have to label them or sort out what you wish to really listen to as there will be plenty of (channels=talkgroups) at busy times. With digital trunking systems, it depends on the tower near you having the talkgroup channels you want to hear available on that tower. As far as digital trunking signals go with any digital scanner, all bets are off. The signals fade out at times, some of these RF tower signals get more/less power alloted to them on each tower. In order to fully monitor one P-25 system, the scanner may have to listen to 6 or more towers (in one system) that are all directions from you with varying RF power levels on each frequency, in order to properly receive ALL of your chosen channel (talkgroups) in that Police system you want to hear. If this seems too complicated, well it is. There is a Computer Control channel on P25 digital trunking systems that tells the police system computer what frequency to use or hop to (each split second) and you may get that individual frequencys (talkgroup) good/bad/gone off various towers (and all at nearly the same time yet!) This is called simulcasting distortion and makes listening to any APCO P-25 digital Police trunking radio system extremely hard for any new digital scanner. And the nasty winds, rain, leaf foliage too all mess havoc with these signals. No getting around this. You may be in a good/bad location, it all depends. You may have missed details in your programming, yes I did too many times. Could be your location, your antenna, your programming, proximity to too many other site towers, winds, (high winds or hot/humid air seem nasty on narrow P-25 signals), or the big TV/Radio/Cell Towers nearby with mega kw watts etc. It is a huge complicated mess even for an expert radio engineer to deal with. A lot of it is...trial and error with P-25 digital. Does it track control signal? No. Move antenna/radio a few inches, try again. But the BCD996P2 (once setup right) excels at receiving everything great! This scanner works Great for me in my location even on the factory antenna. And the bandscope mode is fabulous too. I love it. It is up to you to sort out the critical-channel-programming first before you use it. Study the Radio Reference website, it might take time. I would advise to use a computer to program this scanner, otherwise youll just pull your hair out. You cant program this scanner by using zip codes like some others. Freescan (sixspotsoftware) is a great Free program to use, I use it, others exist too. You can plug the scanner into your PC via the included USB cable. My Win 7 PCs found it right away (You setup Control Scanner, Set com port to auto find in Freescan and it should find your scanner on a com port. Then you upload your channels/lineups to the scanner) But first you need to find the frequencies in the Radio Reference website. Freescan also has a Cut N Paste frequency import method which works fine as you select from database info. An outside scanner antenna used with at least an RG-6 cable is optimal for the best reception with this extended coverage scanner to hear everything. I also use a cheap (75 ohm) TV antenna signal booster with 18 db gain, on 50ft RG-6 and a 4 port ant splitter. I have a lot of RF signal levels (using bandscope mode) but no overload that I can see or hear. But for local signals (20 miles or less) you probably will do just as well with the back of set stock antenna, for both analog channels and digital systems. For 800 Mhz specific signals, use a 800 Mhz antenna like a Remtronix. The scanner can be used in the car, it comes with 2 DC power cords, one with a lighter plug, it has a nice bracket and includes the AC adapter. This unit is the base model of the portable BCD325P2 hand held scanner. They are the same to operate/use and program. This 996P2 model has a bottom fire speaker with a deep bass audio sound on digital systems and it sounds like a loudness circuit in a stereo, compared to my RS-652 desktop scanner which has a tinnier sound. You can choose one of 7 colors for the display and it has many signal adjustments for each channel/system, which is why you need patience. You can upgrade this scanner now to receive ProVoice, Mototrbo and DMR but Uniden charges an extra fee for each one. I do not have these upgrades and may not get. These new digital scanners are frustration devices to many people. For the expert, yes, this scanner is marvelous, you can hear everything except Encrypted signals. Be sure you have days/weeks of time and patience to spend with this thing first though. The learning curve is very steep. It is not plug it in, put in a few channels and listen like in the old days. Every channel has about a dozen parameters to setup first, a P-25 digital system may have 2 dozen parameters to setup first, then one dozen items per channel on top of this. This scanner does Not use an SD memory card to store channels/data to. These can be problematic and cause odd errors of all kinds. But the BCD996P2 scanner is a techs dream to use (once programmed properly) and a upgraded cousin to my all time favorite pal the Uniden BCD396XT portable scanner. But this scanner is still quite a challenge for anyone to setup/operate/use. Five stars because it is simply a phenomenal scanner (with exceptional abilities) targeted to mostly expert scanner junkies.

This radio works well for both standard and trunked frequencies that don’t use simulcast. Be sure to research the area you live in and the channels you want to scan. More and more of the country is using integrated P25 systems. While this can handle P25 Phase 1 and 2, it doesn’t work well if those are simulcast-same frequency from multiple towers. Simulcast exists in many if not most metro areas that use P25. The SDS100 or 200 are needed to properly listen to those sites.

While the unit works very well, with band searches finding almost everything; transferring what it finds to memory functions is rather more complicated than earlier scanners. It is well worth it to have it programmed by a service that does this in most cases, especially with the trunked systems; unless the system users themselves will supply the information to you. Finding ALL the information yourself can be time consuming. Personally, I politely ASK for the needed information from municipalities, in writing, and supply easily filled out forms FOR the information; and I find that some are helpful while others give you a bunch of BS, assuming you know nothing about FCC rules and regulations and/or the fact that licenses are required for their communications equipment; (which makes the needed information readily available to them, IF they would supply it on the provided forms.)

I have 40+ years experience using programmable scanners and I found this to be difficult at first. The user manual could be much better. Dont try to program from the front panel, almost impossible, use a programming software to program. The scanner preforms better than I expected, picks up distant signals good. Over all, I recommend this as a scanner for someone that has experience with programming trunking systems. If you are just starting out in scanning this could be difficult for you to use and learn.

picks up for a distance, really easy to program if you use the right software radio reference oh and read the instructions and you will have a very nice scanner

There is a learning curve in programming it. However, it is much easier to program with the Computer and upload the information. I bought ARC-XT Pro to program it, and a Radio Reference subscription. I am happy with both. This scanner is very sensitive, has good quality audio and enables you to listen to almost everything the Police and Fire use. I am also receiving commercial and military aircraft, trains and HAM Radio. With the included antenna I could hear the local police and fire easily in my basement. With an outside antenna I now hear the state.

The BCD996P2 Arrived this morning. It’s a breeze to program with the computer. If you’re a bit of a scanner geek you won’t have much trouble. As for people who don’t program their own scanners or are just starting out and in too much of a hurry to learn the scanner you probably will get frustrated. I really like the quality of the audio coming from this radio. It’s very easy on the ears. I’ve been listening to p25 phase 2 out of three counties all day in my living room with just the stock antenna. The radio has a ton of features and anybody who likes tinkering and experimenting with radios will never get bored of this scanner.

While this scanner is not the most complex thing ever designed it does take time to understand and learn. Uniden has made a poor job trying to make sense of the terminology that this scanner uses, but once you trial and error you’ll understand it. My recommendation is to use RadioReference for information about scanners as well as this one. My last point is to avoid Priority Mode unless you actually know what it’s purpose is, and colour code your frequencies if you use a lot.

This is a great desk top scanner. It does have a learning curve, which means you can expect to do some learning! My experience with software called FreeSCAN and RadioReference.com made set-up SO much easier. A 1-yr subscription to RadioReference is $60 at this time, well worth it as it does make set-up using FreeSCAN much easier! All in all, No Regrets, as the scanner price on Amazon is VERY good. Im in a low spot, still reception has not been an issue. The sound quality is good, but there is always room for improvement. Otherwise, no complaints. It is complex, yet doable with some patience and flexibility.

Nice radio but too difficult to program. Actually had to contact third party to purchase software to program the radio. I will probably get it programmed but if asked. I wouldn’t purchase this again.