Questions and Answers
This section contains the most frequently asked questions about Scanning as a hobby and about its technical aspects.
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Questions & Answers
| A |
| Q: What is Alpha Tagging? |
| A: Alpha Tagging allows you to put a name to a channel such as "CBD Police" - your scanner needs to support alpha tagging |
| Q: What is Analog and what does it mean? |
| A: Analog is the modulation type of the transmission. The disadvantage with analog is the loss of information in transmission - for example over long distances. |
| Q: What is APCO25 and what does it stand for? |
| A: APCO Project 25 is an industry standards for digital mobile radio mainly aimed at government and utility services. APCO stands for Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials International |
| Q: What does Attenuation do? |
| A: An attenuator inside a scanner will reduce a high powered signal to reduce or prevent interference through overloading caused by that signal. |
| Q: What is a Audio AGC chip? |
| A: Similar to the attenuator,AGC limits modulation peaks to specified levels - usually controlled by the on-board chip. |
| B |
| Q: What is a Band? |
| A: A band is a set range of frequencies - such as the Citizen band or Air Band |
| Q: What is a bank and what does it do? |
| A: A Bank is a collection of channels that may be programmed to represent a range of a specific group. Such as a bank of police frequencies would make it easier to scan through all of those frequencies quicker. |
| Q: What are birdies in scanner terminology? |
| A: Birdies can be caused by high-power signals, a birdie will interfere with the scanner search function. To prevent birdies, many scanners have attenuators (see attenuator) |
| C |
| Q: What does CB stand for and who is talking on that band? |
| A: The Citizen Band channels are intended to provide short-range radio communication between non-licensed individuals (ie truck drivers and other enthusiasts.) |
| Q: How can you explain the meaning of a "channel"? |
| A: A channel is a a specified frequency band for the transmission and reception of radio (or other) signals. |
| Q: What is a Close Call RF Rapture technology? |
| A: The close call RF rapture technology is licensed to Uniden and enables a capable scanner to lock on the strongest signal in the surrounding area - good for racing or sporting events. |
| Q: What is CTCSS? |
| A: CTCSS stands for Continuous Tone Controlled Squelch System and provides a sub audible tone alongisde the voice transmissions. |
| D |
| Q:What does Data Skip do? |
| A:Many frequencies contain different types of information. Some don’t only contain voice but also data packets (for example the Ambulance uses data on certain frequencies). A data skip function on the scanner will enable you to ignore the data and block it out. Useful if you dont have the ability to read data packets. |
| Q: What is DCS? |
| A: DCS stands for Digital Coded Squelch amd provides digital transmission of data alongside voice audio. |
| Q: What is digital and whats the difference to analog? |
| A: Digital is the new format for communication (as opposed to analog). Digital is provides better reception and more reliability to its users. There is also an enhanced privacy as digital scanners are very expensive and may not be capable to pick anything up depending on the type of digital encoding used. |
| E |
| Q: What does EDACS stand for? |
| A: It stands for Enhanced Digital Access Communications System and is a high performance trunked two-way radio communications system. See trunking |
| F |
| Q: What is Fire Tone Out and can I use it? |
| A: Fire Tone out is used by uniden (bearcat) scanners to listen to beep tones that are sent by operators of emergency services. For example, police will assign 1 or 2 beeps depending on the urgency of the operations. Using a Fire Tone out capable scanner on a compatible frequency will enable you to only receive transmissions that are deemed important enough to be picked up. The successful use really depends on if your scanner can do it and if your emergency services support it. |
| Q: What is the definition of a frequency? |
| A: A frequency is a digit assignment on the radio spectrum (for example 408.000). A frequency can range from very low to very high (in the GHz) range. What you can enter and receive depends on your scanner. A frequency is stored inside a channel. |
| G |
| H |
| I |
| Q: In trunking what is an ID? |
| A: Every user in a trunking system is assigned an identification number. The ID can be used to search for a certain radio user or group. |
| J |
| K |
| Q: What is KHz and what does it stand for? |
| A: KHz stands for Kilo Hertz and the position of the frequency on the spectrum. |
| L |
| Q: What does lock out on my scanner mean? |
| A: At one stage, you may want to lock some channels out while scanning (maybe because there is noise on the channel or unwanted data bursts). Most scanners have a lock out function |
| Q: What is an LTR? |
| A: LTR is a trunking system. Not all scanners can pick up LTR. |
| M |
| Q: What MHz and what does it stand for? |
| A: MHz stands for Mega Hertz and indicates the position of the frequency on the spectrum. It equals to one million hertz, which is a unit of frequency equal to one cycle per second |
| Q: What has motorola got to do with trunking? |
| A: Motorola is involved in the development of trunking networks (mostly digital). One trunking network is named after it. |
| N |
| O |
| P |
| Q: What is PMR? |
| A: PMR is similar to PBR but only for short range transmissions. Such as in the same building. |
| Q: What is PBR and what is it used for? |
| A: PBR stands for Private Business Radio. It is used for what the name says. PBR is used by businesses for its advantages such as good mobility, improved battery life of mobile units and wide coverage. |
| Q: What is a primary channel? |
| A: You can select a primary channel to monitor communications, if a signal is received on this channel, the scanner will automatically get back to the received signal. Some scanners are capable of doing that. |
| Q |
| R |
| S |
| Q: What does the squelch function do? |
| A: Squelch can be seen as something like a noise gate - squelch can be adjusted on most good scanners allowing the raising or lowering of the noise gate. If no squelch is selected, all signals will come through including the background noise. |
| T |
| Q: What is trunking and how can I use it? |
| A: Trunking mainly serves the purpose of letting many users use a selected group of channels without interfering with each other. Trunking also improves security, privacy besides increased capacity. The 800MHz systems are the best known. |
| U |
| Q: What is UHF and what does it stand for? |
| A: UHF stands for Ultra High Frequency and operates between 918 - 926MHz however it varies from place to place. |
| V |
| Q: What is VHF and what does it stand for? |
| A:VHF stands for very high frequency. VHF is short range but if operators are nearby, it provides a very reliable system. VHF ranges are 30 MHz to 300 MHz |
| W |
| X |
| Y |
| Z |
Disclaimer: Information on this page have been researched carefully but will still contain errors.
