It is basically a software license to use that feature.
It is basically a software license to use that feature.
All this sucks. I looked at getting one again a year or two back because I live 10 miles from the nearest town and wanted to be able to hear the volunteer fire departments and know if a fire was coming or tornado or whatever since I dont live in the downtown OKC none of the news channels will even tell us if we have a tornado.
We have a scanner, but after everything got trunked etc, we only use it to listen in on the local storm spotters during severe weather periods.
I tried several of those apps and it won't pick up anything in my area. Okc is hit and miss. For instance, I select the fire frequencies and it usually a bunch of police stuff from who knows where.
The best bet is to monitor the local ham repeaters; 2m (144-148 MHz) is probably going to be most active, with 70cm (420-450 MHz) being second. Find out where the local repeaters are (the ARRL Repeater Directory is a fantastic resource here), and scan through them.
Fyrtwuck mentions the weather frequencies (seven channels, starting at 162.400 MHz; you should always be able to find one, and sometimes two or three, depending upon topography; listen to the closest one); they're good for a general overview, but are not updated in real time, so you won't get "tornado on the ground at Luther" or anything immediately useful like that. Still very good for keeping abreast of general conditions, finding out where the watches and warnings are and when they end, etc.
Fyrtwuck mentions the weather frequencies (seven channels, starting at 162.400 MHz; you should always be able to find one, and sometimes two or three, depending upon topography; listen to the closest one); they're good for a general overview, but are not updated in real time, so you won't get "tornado on the ground at Luther" or anything immediately useful like that. Still very good for keeping abreast of general conditions, finding out where the watches and warnings are and when they end, etc.
I just got back into scanning. Wow what a learning curve this new world of scanning has. I got a uniden 536hp and it took several months to get my head around all the new stuff. Thankfully you tube is a big help. I got the upgrade for provoice so i could listen to okc. The radio reference forums helped me a lot to figure stuff out. If you just want to listen at home the live feeds on RR are pretty good. They are on broadcastify and have pretty good coverage. I go online to listen to air traffic control sometimes in Dallas and Atlanta.
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