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

Ive owned two homepatrols and had reception trouble with both. I thought the home patrol would be easier to program. It is not! The preprogrammed part loads hundreds of unwanted frequencies. The software that comes with it is so confusing to use its crazy! But on to the B996P2. This scanner has great reception with included antenna. Between Radio reference and freescan, programming it was a breeze. Just watch some YouTube videos to get familiar with freescan. And its highly suggested to pay for at least 6 months of radio reference to obtain the correct frequencies in the order and format that the scanner requires its $15. Well well worth the money! The people who give bad reviews of this scanner have no patience or interest in learning a few things. My only gripe is updating the firmware and installing the drivers. I had trouble with it but maybe I was doing something wrong? I dont think so but maybe. It might be a USB 1.0, 2.0, 3.0 compatibility issue. Once that was completed the rest was easy.

Its great for analog and digital. I got the DMR upgrade and that works great too. There is a known issue with simulcast trunked systems, but there arent any of those very near me, so thats not an issue I have to contend with. Its a little less user-friendly than the HomePatrol series. It does do Phase II, which is nice because my state has switched to a statewide PII system.

You definitely need a programming cable and free program software to get all you want....

Its been many years since Ive had a scanner, and this one is all I hoped itd be and more! FIRST, Id suggest the Premium subscription to Radioreference and the FreeScan program. Using Freescan makes programming the BCD996P2 easy, HOWEVER, if youre a beginner, theres a pretty big learning curve, but tough thru it! Youll be rewarded. Currently scanning digital channels, such as the rebanded Raleigh PD/Fire/Wake County Sheriff, and NCSHP, along with others. Also have many conventional channels programmed in, and reception is good, using the OEM antenna. (May purchase another indoor antenna just to see how much more I can pull in. My only complaint is that I had to wait almost a month to get it! (Ordered 12/19/2018 and received on 01/11/2019) Highly recommend this scanner!

The scanner is great, hard to program but with time can be figured out. Shipping was slow because when it got to my town it came thru the post office. they dont move fast even if they are on fire.

Finally figured this thing out kinda. Was fun to set up. I certainly hope it doesnt fail after a 75 mph drop onto the interstate, because the electronics are the same ones from the 80s. Seems like uniden has lost the desire to advance the product. I just hope this thing has the uniden durability from the past era. TOOK A MONTH to figure out how to program it. Uses the antique style usb thing, so you know the people that designed it are not going for convenience, or functionality so much. It needs a type c port.

Replaced my BCT15X with it, programming is much the same, however programming trunked systems is a major pain, even with the software. It helps to a ton to have a subscription to radioreference dot com. Dont even try without it. My only problem is Ive not found a good way to program talk groups, so i get everything, Police, Fire, EMS.... Sometimes all i want is Fire, i get tired of listening to the cops writing speeding tickets. If anyone knows how to do that, please leave a comment.

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.

I basically had to use 3rd party software to program this. I primarily got it to listen to local fire depts. It does have a tone-out feature, but I didnt find that feature particularly impressive or useful since it is basically necessary to sit on the main dispatch frequency (rather than scanning multiple frequencies). So, I was basically forced to either use it on only one frequency, or give up the tone-out feature to make use of the scanner as a scanner. Additionally, my attempts at contacting customer service/tech support were a waste of time. They did respond to my initial email telling me theyd get back to me with an answer, which they never did. Even more than a month later, I still have not received any follow-up from them about my issue. Ultimately, I returned the item for a refund. Its just too pricey and hard to program for its own good.

Took watching a few videos for my husband to get the channels programmed, but the sound is great, and he enjoys hearing the calls as he works in the shop.