Police/Radio Scanner

d10b · Post by **d10b** » 24 Jun 2006, 15:10

Does anyone have or use a scanner? Preferably in Minnesota. I'm considering buying one but there's a lot to think about. Trunked or non-trunked (guess that would depend of what is used in my area) and the frequency range (if i wanted to try and pickup cordless phone conversations.) Any advice would be much appreciated!

Post by **DNR** » 25 Jun 2006, 08:06

Scanners work, you can search for ham radio/scanner website/group in your area, and they'll list the police frequencies. Picking up mobile phone is easy as pie and makes for some cool listening. You won't get black-ops radio comm, they are encrypted.

The only legal requirement is you can't drive in a vehicle with a scanner - unless you have a ham radio operators membership. I wonder how easy it is to get one, or even make a bogus ID.

Now, the tool I'd like to have is a reciever for all radio frequencies - from my laptop wifi card. I guess I need a card that can pick up more than the 2.4ghz set for 802.11.

Let us kow, this could be a new forum - scanning

Post by **bad_brain** » 06 Jul 2006, 05:36

handheld scanners are sweet, but good ones are pretty expensive (starts at 250-300 bucks), the cheap ones cover only parts of the whole frequency range (10khz-100khz, 500khz-2mhz and 3mhz-5mhz for example) while good ones cover the whole range (10khz-5mhz for example).
there´s a little trick which works at least for germany (don´t know about the frequencies in other countries): newer radios are locked and begin with 88khz FM, but older ones (tube radios especially) start at a lower frequency so you can tune in to the police radio...

Post by **Necrix** » 06 Jul 2006, 11:53

That's pretty cool, Bad_Brain!
I've been wanting a scanner for some time now.

Of course, I don't think I have a radio that old, so I'll have to stick to waiting and buying one.

Later.