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Hey, there he is!  Long time, no talk to!  How's the world in Tom-land?  Hope all is well!  Haven't seen one of your patented silly news stories in Timmie's in quite a while!  I was getting worried that the world was turning normal or something! 

And here I thought nobody read them! <g>

Just been keeping busy around here with things more like working (home and work type stuff) than anything else. Have also had a computer go down on me and am dealing with that. Of course, it was the one that I use the MOST.  Have another one acting up and need to see what's up with it. Never rains but it pours, you know?

Tom

I think pricing is just being set by what the market will bear. Scanner development seems to be at a standstill compared to the development you see in other electronic industries. Ham rigs are also slow in development too, the only new rig to preview in dayton this year was a new Icom (ic-7200)which was basically a 718 with 6m capability and a rearranged front panel that looks like it came out of mad-max. Thats cool and all but its the only new thing out of all those big companies.

While the prices stay quite high on the equipment also. May be something to do with low volume? I've been <ahem> "impressed" (not in a good way) with the price level of these radios. And I thought sticker shock on my part was pretty much over. <wide grin> sure found out differently looking at the ham radios!

Tom

I have had the 996 for almost a year now and would highly recommend it. It does everything that a scanner needs to do plus it has GPS support which I believe the GRE lacks. I never played around with a GRE though. I think Tom has both types so he can probably chime in on this...

Nope, he doesn't (have both the GRE and the 996).

I have been watching the fighting, er discussion, on the 396 group at yahoo about which is "best". Seems general consensous (sp?) is that the GRE is more inclined to overload than the Uniden. That would be important if you were in a dense population area (metro area) which would be the BEST place to use a scanner (to me).

As for the vscanner stuff - not sure that this is a plus (for me). Seems rather odd to me actually. You have to have memory to STORE the information, right? Then why only load 1/21st of it in at a time? In the docs for FreeSCAN I see there is an approach that you can use to "simulate" this with the 996 if you want to go that way. The other thing with the 996 is that you can essentially do this anyway with the startup configuration approach (for one) or the gps coding (for another approach). The example they give in the manual for the startup is a couple places in Texas. The nice thing about the GPS coding is that the radiio will track where you are and switch to the systems coded for that area if you are moving around.

Then there's the NAS (I think is what it's called). At any rate, I believe this is a network number (think it's like a mac address on a network adapater - shows what computer or station is calling). Now why this is so important to the folks that "need" it, I've never heard that part of the explanation. Maybe this is "ignorance is bliss" on my part.

IOW, I'm pretty happy with my 996 and how it performs. Suppose there will always be something else "better" (newer) out there that I can wish for, but not really planning on moving any time soon. If I do something, it would be along the handheld lines because I don't have one that does digital.

More than you EVER wanted to know about how I think, eh? <wide grin>

Tom

Nope, he doesn't (have both the GRE and the 996).

I have been watching the fighting, er discussion, on the 396 group at yahoo about which is "best". Seems general consensous (sp?) is that the GRE is more inclined to overload than the Uniden. That would be important if you were in a dense population area (metro area) which would be the BEST place to use a scanner (to me).

As for the vscanner stuff - not sure that this is a plus (for me). Seems rather odd to me actually. You have to have memory to STORE the information, right? Then why only load 1/21st of it in at a time?

I guess they were worried about people having to scroll through so many systems and getting confused. But yeah, what if you wanted a system from vscanner folder 4, and one from 8, and one from 13, then what?? Copying and pasting? Sounds like control panel hell.

In the docs for FreeSCAN I see there is an approach that you can use to "simulate" this with the 996 if you want to go that way.

yeah that anonymous author of those docs seems to have a lot of interesting ideas!

The other thing with the 996 is that you can essentially do this anyway with the startup configuration approach (for one) or the gps coding (for another approach). The example they give in the manual for the startup is a couple places in Texas. The nice thing about the GPS coding is that the radiio will track where you are and switch to the systems coded for that area if you are moving around.

Then there's the NAS (I think is what it's called). At any rate, I believe this is a network number (think it's like a mac address on a network adapater - shows what computer or station is calling). Now why this is so important to the folks that "need" it, I've never heard that part of the explanation. Maybe this is "ignorance is bliss" on my part.

I think that NAS thing is there to decode the radio ID, so you can assign a specific one to Officer Mahoney for example and when he keys his radio it will show up on the display. Kinda neat I guess. Some people are making a big stink over it on RR because uniden doesn't do this. Glad I dont work in customer service.

Hiya Tom!

Interesting stuff on the GRE's.  Sounds like a bit of the "grass is greener" syndrome for some folks.

The couple of radios I was eye-balling went bust anyway (the bidding got too rich for my blood.)  Since I already have a 246T, and there's very little digital work being done right now in my neck of the woods, I'm going to hold off on the upgrade.  Besides, I've found a new love. Here's her picture:



This, my friends, is a Meade ETX-125PE 125mm Maksutov-Cassegrain catadioptric telescope.  I'm a bit of a star-gazer, although it's been years since I've been able to get out under the stars and observe.  This little honey has Ultra High Transmission Coatings on the optical glass surfaces, dual direct motor drives that will slew the scope in any direction on both horizontal and vertical axes, an integrated LNT (Level North Technology) that will detect with precision which direction is magnetic north and assist in "aligning" the scope for tracking objects automatically.  It has an AutoStar #497 controller that contains over 30,000 celestial objects and will automatically align the scope to accurately face whichever object you choose in seconds.  You can hook it up directly to your computer or laptop and control the scope from the keys, and with an optional CCD imager, you can take digital photographs of the planets, moon and nebulae.

This scores a 9.9 out of 10 on my Techno-Geek Schwing-O-Meter!