20 Most Recent Radio Shack Pro-97 Handheld Scanner - Page 9 Questions & Answers

Only a few units can do that, such as the PRO92, PRO96, etc, and you need to buy the software and software interface cable. There is a guy named "Don Starr" who has written some really good programs to do that.

You need to post were you live.

Try pushing the search button. You have to program frequencies in before you can use the "scan" button.

You need police scanner programming software and a cable before your computer will talk to your scanner.
Do a google or yahoo search for police scanner software. About $25 and a cable from radioshack for about the same. The disk that comes with the cable will only let your computer recognize the cable not program the scanner.
Good luck. Waste of money in my opinion but it may be easier then manual programming the radio.

The pro 97 is designed to receive analog signals. You will need to spring for a digital receiver if you want to go digital.

I have the same problem with my pro-79 scanner. The adapter from my Uniden cordless phone works on my scanner, but then the phone won''t work.
I have rechargeable batteries but they don't stay charged very long in the scanner. I know this didn't solve your problem but thought I would let you know about the cordless phone adapter.

I know that if you turn your scanner off over a few days you can loose your frequency # or it will lock the channels out. if they or l/o just unlock then. I also know that all police and ect. went digital, you would to have a scanner that is digital. When they changed to digital some for the frequency # have changed. I had to get the new ones and put them in.

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the best way to use this scanner, for the beginner, is to program a few frequencies. look up online the frequencies for your area. Usually two precincts per freq. then turn on the scanner, when it says "all channels locked" push "pgm" then the freq, xxx.xxxx, then press "ent" the scanner will then scan that freq. If you have too many freq's you will hear too many scattered reports, in other words durring the pause in conversation the scanner will move on to another broadcast and you wont hear the first broadcast in its entirety. when I first got the thing I figured I had to program all channels and sub channels and sub sub channels, its not that hard, I was over-complicating it! this is of course only one way to use this multi purpose scanner, and I am a beginner, good luck.

thanks
Kevin

not all scanners will pick up the same, the hand held can't pick up frequency as far as the other one.

You can find the manual here. Hope it helps!

i have a pro 94 dual trunk scanner,how do you program,and where do you get police frequencys for vancouver,wa

The greeting can be changed using the USB programming cable and a software package such as Win97 from StarrSoft. (www.starrsoft.com) This is not freeware, but they do allow a 30 day fully functional trial. The greeting cannot be changed from the keyboard.

here is a quote from the manual; hope it helps you.


1. Press MAN, enter the bank (0-9) and channel number (00-
99) where you want to store a frequency, then press MAN
again. M and the bank and channel number appear at the
upper left corner of the display (for example: M000).
Press FUNC. Then press e or d. The bank number moves in
the direction of the arrow pressed.
Press FUNC. Then hold down e or d. The bank number
moves continuously in the assigned direction.
Press e. The channel number moves upward one by one.
Or, press d. The channel number moves downward one
by one.
2. Press PGM. M changes to P.
3. Use the number keys and ./DELAY to enter the frequency
(including the decimal point) you want to store.
If you make a mistake, press CL to delete a single digit or press
and hold CL about 2 seconds to delete all digits.
4. Press ENT to store the frequency into the channel.
If you made a mistake in Step 3, Invalid Freq. briefl y
appears and the scanner beeps when you press ENT. Start
again from Step 3.
Your scanner automatically rounds the entered frequency
to the nearest valid frequency. For example, if you enter a
frequency of 151.553, your scanner accepts it as 151.550.

You will also need a software package to program your scanner. Unfortunately the cable does not come with the software. Try going to www.starrsoft.com and download a program called Win97. It is free for 30 days and makes programming a breeze and it can also interface with radioreference.com (if you are a paying subscriber to the radioreference.com site) to download automatically.If you don't mind doing a little typing, you can view the info on the site for free and enter it into the program.

I have a Radio Shack Pro 97 Scanner that I received as a present 1-1/2 years ago. It was working just fine and then suddenly there was no squelch or volume. The keys make noise when pushed, but there is no sound for the squelch or volume. The scanner scans the frequencies but does not stop and play. I went on line and found that other people were having the same problems. I went back to the store that the unit was purchased from and received no help what so ever, they said it’ s off warranty and I was out of luck, nice way to do business??. I think that something that cost as much as this should not be junk after a short period of time. I hope you can help me with this problem I do like radio shack, but I can’t afford to buy items that don’t stand up.

Sincerely

Greg Stevens

e-mail

[email protected]

http://marksscanners.com/97/97.shtml

maybe u have 2 much stuff stored on the scanner and or it might be out of band meaning that scanner does not support that frequiency

The way to program this manually is to go to a channel that doesnt have a frequency (press MAN, the channel number and press MAN again, Then press PGM, type in the frequency and press PGM again. That will store the new frequency. If you need a database of frequencies for your area, go to RadioReference.com.

i can help you with some freq code and may be your scanner

I, too, recently experienced the same difficulty with my two year old Pro97 scanner and was able to correct the problem. I removed the back cover and followed the center wire from the antennae connection to the top board that has the green resistor. With a magnifying glass, I looked at the connection, and as it makes the bend onto the top board, the connection was broken. I carefully soldered the connection from the green resistor to the wire from the center antennae connection. Everything works like new now. If your scanner is still under warranty, you may want to have it replaced.