Railfan Technology > Radio Shack question

Does Radio Shack still sell the PRO series handheld scanners?????
I've scoured the website and can't find anything.

Mike Bannon
St Catharines, ON

No RS scanners any more. They may carry other brands, though.

algoma11 Wrote:
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> Does Radio Shack still sell the PRO series
> handheld scanners?????
> I've scoured the website and can't find anything.

If it helps, OEMs for the Radio Shack scanners were GRE, Uniden, and Whistler. Uniden is still around, but GRE has gone out of business. Whistler took over manufacturing of some of the GRE models and sold them with a Radio Shack name, is what my quick research says.

My local Radio Shack, the last in our county, was a bare shell two weeks ago. Everything down to 50 percent off but not much left including small parts.

The quality of Radio Shack scanners was inconsistent for years--some models pretty good, some pretty awful. Poor product quality and competing web retailing doomed Radio Shack. A friend of mine, a former Radio Shack retailer, told me one time the that the second best business decision he ever made was opening a Radio Shack store in the early 1980's; the best business decision he made was closing it in the early 2000's--he was a tech guy and foresaw what the internet was going to do to his business way ahead of a lot of people.

As for Uniden and GRE, I've had two GRE scanners over the years. Both stunk--the high-end digital one I still have is absolutely USELESS for listening to the analog railroad channels--it has, bar none, the absolute worst sensitivity and selectivity in the railroad band that I've ever seen in a radio (even using an antenna tuned to the railroad band). I, as I noted in other posts, have a Uniden BC-125AT scanner that I use for purposes other than railfanning. If it holds up, it's not bad for the price. Durability is a real question in my mind, though--the other Uniden scanners that I've owned all died young. I haven't owned any Whistler products, but they are not held in high esteem by the folks that I know who work in the radio communications field. I'm especially skeptical about Whistler scanners since they essentially took over GRE's product line.

I don't mourn the loss of Radio Shack--any electronic components that I need I can order online and get within 1-2 days.

Forget Radio Shack. They're going "bye bye". All sales final, no returns,
and they will not honor any warrantys.

Who will completely die in 2018 first: Radio Shack or Sears/Kmart ?

When I look up the BC-125AT, Amazon suggests getting the newer model, which is BC75XLT and it is cheaper both on Amazon and Ebay.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/04/17 08:17 by joemvcnj.

Thanks for all the input-I saw that BC75XLT model. It has potential!

Mike Bannon
St Catharines, ON

algoma11 Wrote:
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> Thanks for all the input-I saw that BC75XLT model.
> It has potential!

Don't do it. The BC-125AT is a better radio, in my opinion.