All police scanners contain the following standard functions:

The keypad contains buttons, or "keys"", used to control nearly all of the scanner's operations. Buttons are labeled, according to the operation it controls, and numbered for entering frequencies and turning banks on & off. Each button may have more than one function it controls when used in conjunction with another button. The example photos below show the keypad on the Pro-94 Trunking Scanner.

The display has indicators that give the status of what more and action the scanner is operating in the scanner like what channel and frequency it’s on and more. The example photo below show the display indicator on the Pro-94 Trunking Scanner.

This display light allows you to see the display in low-light or dark conditions. (see above photos)

This one is self-explanatory - it controls the scanner's volume.

This squelch knob is used to quiet the background radio noise on a frequency. 

The scan button enable the "Scan Mode" allowing the scanner to scan all active channel banks and unlocked frequencies programmed in those banks.

The manual button enables "Manual Mode" allowing you to manually select a channel to go to or step through channels one at a time. On some scanners, this button may be labeled "Hold". The hold feature allows you to pause on an active frequencies while in search mode.   

The search button enables "Search Mode" allowing you to search for active frequencies within a programmed range of frequencies. When the scanner detects a frequency transmitting, it stops on that frequency allowing you to hear the transmission and the restarts the search once the transmission ends. You can also use the "Hold" feature to pause the search while monitoring an active frequency. This is a great way to find unknown frequencies in your area.  

The "Delay Function" allows you to activate a 3-second delay on any selected frequency causing the scanner to "wait" 3-seconds after a transmission for a reply. 

The lockout function causes the scanner to skip locked-out channels during the scanning mode.

The priority function is used to set the scanner to check a selected channel every 3-seconds so that transmissions on that channel are not missed when the scanner is stopped for transmissions on another channel. You can usually set one channel in each back as a priority channel. (Note: On some scanners, when priority function is in use, all priority channels in active banks are scanned.    

The following features are usually found on new mid to high-end police scanners including trunking and digital scanners.

Many public safety agencies are upgrading to this band for communications. IN addition, all trunk and most digital systems are in the 800MHz band. Digital and trunk-capable scanners are already 800MHz band-capable.

This feature allows you to enter alpha or numerical characters for channel identifiers. This will allow you to quickly see what frequency is active instead of having to remember what frequency belongs to whom.

This feature allows you to follow transmissions from trunked radio systems. Visit our Trunk Radio Systems page to learn more about trunk scanning. Note: A trunk-capable scanner will only work with analog conventional and analog trunked radio systems.

"CTCSS" stands for "Continuous Tone Coded Squelch System", a system that is used to avoid interference between different agencies within close proximity to each other using the same frequency. (Learn more about CTCSS here.)

Computer control allows you to use your computer to remotely control your scanner using your mouse and keyboard. This is done by connecting your scanner to your computer through an available serial port using a special interface cable and scanner software ( cable and software may be included or sold separately). Once connected, you can upload and download frequency and trunking data information as well as record audio transmissions and log all frequency and trunking IDs that were used. You can then later review the data to see if you find anything new or listen to the recorded audio.

This feature allows you to use software to easily program your scanner. This feature is a real time saver! Why? Because manually programming frequencies is a time consuming process! See our Police Scanner Software page for an overview of scanner programming software.

Cloning is a feature that allows you to transfer an exact copy of all programming information on one scanner to another of the same model using an interface cable with 1/8" phone plugs on both ends. The cable connects to each scanner's "PC/IF" jack. Besides cloning, you can also upload and download frequency programming information to and from a PC using a PC interface cable and PC interface software.

This feature lets you set the scanner to continue searching or scanning when is comes across a data signal.

This feature allows you to connect an external speaker or record scanner audio with a tape recorder and even your PC using a "line" cable.  

Specific Area Message Encoding - During a NOAA Weather or Emergency Alert, a code for your specific location will alert you to severe conditions in your immediate area.

Built-in Service search scan for Police, Fire, Emergency, News, Air, Weather, Railroad, Marine, CB, Ham Radio, FRS, GMRS, low-power, racing and more. State-by-state preprogrammed highway patrol, local police and DOT. 

This feature allows you to easily move frequencies from one channel to another channel. Be sure the destination channel does not already have a useful frequency already programmed into it or you will lose it.

This feature allows you to reduce the scanner’s sensitivity from picking up strong signals that may cause interference.

Searches for nearby frequency transmissions and lets you hear a nearby radio without knowing its frequency. Signal Stalker allows user to "lock on" to nearby radio up to 1000 feet away without programming.

Lets you hear local trained severe weather observers calling in their reports. Hear severe weather 3-4 minutes before it is rebroadcast on NOAA weather radio frequencies and 4-10 minutes before you'd get the same warning on local radio or TV. 

SmartScanner is a feature available in the Uniden BC245XLT and some newer Uniden trunking scanners that allows the scanners to dial into the Uniden server via a 1-900 telephone number and automatically program the radio with frequencies, trunking IDs and fleet maps for your geographic area. It does this based on a ZIP code that you supply as well as the distribution of services in your area. 

On EDACS systems, users are uniquely identified by their full AFS ID. Such IDs are seen in search mode and can be programmed into an ID Scan Bank for scanning. XPAND is a featyre that allows you to "filter" the search and scan operations while tracking an EDACS system. It uses the natural heirarchy of the Agency-Fleet-Subfleet (AFS) numbering scheme to do this. Say you know that "Agency 04" is programmed for all police units and that's what you want to listen to exclusively. 

Normally, you'd have to find out what all the unique AFS IDs are for all the police users in this Agency. With XPAND, you simply program the AFS ID by just specifying the Agency, in this case, "Agency 04". The trunking scanner will now only track transmissions which have "04" as the Agency and ignore all others (Agencies 00-03 and 05-15). You can even further refine this "filtering" to track only transmissions of any Subfleet that match the agency and fleet you specified by specifying the Agency, Fleet and leaving the Subfleet unspecified.