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 that's flat terrain to the top of the Willis Tower.
If you have marginal (P-25) 800 Mhz signal levels you won't get many signal bars lit up, it won't trunk track right and you may see talkgroups show up on the display but no audio is heard/garbled/breaks up because it can't 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 you're 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 frequency's (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 you'll just pull your hair out. You can't 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.
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From the manufacturer
Uniden BCD996P2 Digital Base/Mobile Scanner
The BCD996P2 comes equipped with Uniden exclusive features like Advanced Dynamic Memory System, Close Call RF Capture Technology, and GPS compatibility. It includes support for digital systems, including the latest APCO Project 25 Phase II systems.
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TrunkTracker VFollows communications on APCO 25 Phase 1, Phase 2, X2-TDMA, Motorola, EDACS and LTR trunked systems. |
25000 Dynamically Allocated ChannelsRoom for all your local systems and more. |
Continuous Band Coverage25MHz to 1.3GHz Excluding UHF TV and Cellular. |
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| Conventional | Analog Trunking | Digital Trunking | Database (Digital) | |
| Customer Reviews |
2,954
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1,403
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943
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3,201
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| Price | $99.70 | $170.42 | $361.08 | $527.64 |
| Handheld | BC75XLT, BC125AT | BCD325P2 | BCD436HP | |
| Base/Mobile | BC355N, BC365CRS | BCT15X | BCD996P2 | BCD536HP |
| Unique | HomePatrol-II | |||
| Use For | Gifts, Amateur Radio, Rural Public Safety, Air Band, Auto Races, Military Air Shows, Marine, Railroad | Everything to the left, plus, Analog Public Safety, Technical user in areas w/o digital trunking systems | Everything to the left, plus, Analog Public Safety, Technical user in areas w/o digital trunking systems | Digital Public Safety Program by Zip Code |
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How to program your BCD996P2 Scanner
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News Photographer Honest Review - Uniden 996P2 Scanner
Luis Santana
Reviews with images
Awesome but.. Not for Lexington Ky Public Safety or Encrypted systems.
Box includes:Scanner, telescoping antenna, dc harness for direct wire, a.c. plug, car adapter plug, mounting bracket and instruction booklet.This is a great scanner does as advertised and more or less is equal to Amazon reviews, but.... FIRST!! This scanner WILL NOT play audio on fully encrypted systems at all... Period. You will see it key up but hear nothing. SECOND!! This scanner WILL NOT "descamble" or "unencrypt" a system. If you hear a "static hum" when a channels keys up then it is encrypted. There is no way to decode it. THIRD!! Does do ProVoice and DMR systems AFTER a PAID upgrade from Uniden. ProVoice is $45 and DMR is a whopping $60. Check the systems you will be using to see if any of this will apply to you. Best way is to use Radio Reference.com FOURTH!! PROGRAMING IS A PAIN IN THE ASS!!! Probably most important thing I can tell you and best advice I can give here would be pay for a Premium account on RadioReference.com. Your paying over $350.00 for a scanner it would be WELL worth it to fork out $15 more for 180 day subscription. This makes programing... better... still will take a while for most to figure out all the features like Systems, Groups, Channels and Quick Keys. The scanner comes with a usb programing cable. The reviews saying the speaker is low or muffled is accuratish. I think some reviews were a little harsh, but it could for sure be better. After all we are paying ALOT for this machine. I did order an external Uniden speaker for $16, 2 days After I got the scanner. Overall review is 5 stars. The updates, encryption and things mentioned above aren't the scanners fault. That's the Uniden company. This is as much machine as I need and I would recommend it to anyone. I'm picking up transmissions from up to 60 miles away with the antenna that came with it. I'm going to include a picture from the booklet showing trunking systems this will cover as well as a few more. !!REMEMBER!! CHECK THE SYSTEMS YOU ARE GOING TO SCAN TO SEE IF THEY ARE DMR OR ProVoice (expensive updates available) ALSO..IF ITS ENCRYPTED.. YOU WON'T HEAR IT!!
Top reviews from other countries
raul aaron hernandez del angel
Excelente Funciona En México
Reviewed in Mexico on January 22, 2023
raul aaron hernandez del angel
Reviewed in Mexico on January 22, 2023
en mi pueblo local decodifica bien una repetidora P25 , también puedo escuchar estaciones DMR , “recordemos que debemos comprar una licencia para activar la función DMR al igual de NXDN y si son algo caras”.
Además debe tener mucha paciencia y tiempo para poder configurar el equipo ya que al principio si es difícil , si usted no tiene paciencia entonces ni lo compre.
No se pueden escuchar estaciones encriptadas Digitales .
El idioma del equipo es en inglés .
Images in this review
Mr M L Lawton
Very quick delivery from USA
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 24, 2023Bill
this is a great product and well worth the money
Reviewed in Canada on January 7, 2017Jeff Macdonald
Love my new scanner great quality
Reviewed in Canada on October 25, 2020