Paging radio experts

[Hawkmoon]

My local police department recently went from an analog service to digital, rendering my new scanner obsolete before I even got it out of the box.

I can't afford a new, digital scanner. I've heard that there are software solutions that would allow me to use my computer as a scanner. Does anyone know anything about this? Is it purely a software solution, or does it require an adapter card or dongle of some sort to act as the antenna? Cost? Utility?

Please enlighten me.

[Perd Hapley]

There are many scanner apps available for smartphones. Not sure if your department would show up on any of them. You may have to ask the dept.

[Nick1911]

I have a cheap rtl-sdr that I've used to see what signals are around here, and did pick up the local police digital radio.  Unfortunately, they were running P25 with encryption, so I wasn't able to do much with it.

[Hawkmoon]

There are many scanner apps available for smartphones. Not sure if your department would show up on any of them. You may have to ask the dept.

Not looking for a smart phone app. I want something I can run in the background on my computer when I'm at home.

[charby]

Sometimes you can listen via a website feed. Other times they are scrambled or they kill the repeater output (broadcast in simplex) so no one can listen, so I'm told.

[cordex]

As charby mentioned, there are websites like broadcastify.com.

I’m sure there is software to convert the raw analog output and convert it to the digital trunked signal and then convert it to a usable format but don’t expect it to be cheap. A big part of the cost of the digital scanners is the royalty fee for that technology.

You’d probably also have to have a software defined radio like Nick mentioned, which I doubt your analog scanner supports.

[RocketMan]

You might try the RTL-SDR solution that Nick mentioned.  It's a digital broadband radio receiver capable of receiving almost any radio transmission mode.  It can receive from about 50 MHz up to over 1.1 GHz.  It plugs into a USB port on a laptop or PC.  There's lots of good, free software for Linux and Windows out there to operate those things.
Hook up an antenna to the RTL-SDR, plug it into a USB port on your PC (I recommend using a USB extension cable to make things easier), and fire up the software.  I've got one that I've used for lots of stuff, including finding empty channels for our wireless mics at church.  It picks up the local cop shop and fire department radio just fine.  Ham radio repeaters and simplex stuff in the VHF and UHF bands work well, too.
Like Nick mentioned, however, if the agency is encrypting their transmissions, you won't be able to hear anything but noise of some kind.  If it's just a trunking system, there are solutions out there that use two RTL-SDR units to listen in.

Check these folks out.  They're legit.  https://www.rtl-sdr.com/

[Hawkmoon]

You’d probably also have to have a software defined radio like Nick mentioned, which I doubt your analog scanner supports.

My analog scanner doesn't support digital, that's why I need a new scanner. But the digital scanners are way out of my price range, so that's why I'm looking for a computer solution. "Software defined radio" -- is that what I need to be looking for/at? I don't even know the lingo.

[RocketMan]

My analog scanner doesn't support digital, that's why I need a new scanner. But the digital scanners are way out of my price range, so that's why I'm looking for a computer solution. "Software defined radio" -- is that what I need to be looking for/at? I don't even know the lingo.

The RTL-SDR unit both Nick and I mentioned is a dongle that plugs into a USB port on your PC.  That dongle is the software defined radio.  It is an actual digital radio receiver, and a pretty good one at that.  It is "software defined" in the sense that computer software running on a PC is used to control the radio.  The better or more sophisticated the software, the better the radio performs, and the more features it can have.  Lots of the free software available is quite good and feature rich.
Take a look at that link I posted above.  That site has lots of information for both beginners and experienced users of SDRs.  The SDRs are manufactured under contract for them, and you can buy them in a shop at that link or through sites like Amazon.
I have one of their SDRs, and it is a good piece of kit.

[Perd Hapley]

Not looking for a smart phone app. I want something I can run in the background on my computer when I'm at home.

If there's a phone app that does something, usually there's a desktop version.

https://apps-for-pc.com/police-scanner-for-pc/

[Hawkmoon]

If there's a phone app that does something, usually there's a desktop version.

https://apps-for-pc.com/police-scanner-for-pc/

RATZ!

Looked good -- until I got to the part about needing an Android emulator to use it on a Windows computer.

:sigh:

[cordex]

Is the goal to hear police radio on your computer, or to learn how to set up and run a trunked radio scanner from an SDR dongle?

If the former, have you checked any of the various websites that stream police scanners to see if they have your location?

If the latter, good luck and let us know how it turns out.

[Hawkmoon]

The goal is to be able to hear my town's police and fire radio calls while I am working at my computer.

I had no idea that there was such a thing as a web site that streams police and radio. I wonder if such a site would cover a suburban town with a population of under 10,000.

[cordex]

I don’t know which channels are most likely to be used by your local police but you may find them here.
https://www.broadcastify.com/listen/ctid/308

[Hawkmoon]

I don’t know which channels are most likely to be used by your local police but you may find them here.
https://www.broadcastify.com/listen/ctid/308

Worth a try. It does have a listing for my town (sort of) -- separate listings for fire/EMS and police, but maybe they're no longer on the same frequency/channel. But ... they don't have my town as a separate listing, they provide a dump for the entire county. I'll try it for awhile, but I suspect I'm going to have to give up because there's no way for a listener to know what department is talking.

[Hawkmoon]

Has anyone tried this one? https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/police-radio-scanner/9wzdncrfjbzw#system-requirements

Is this like the one Cordex provided a link to, or does this one require an antenna dongle?

[RocketMan]

Has anyone tried this one? https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/police-radio-scanner/9wzdncrfjbzw#system-requirements

Is this like the one Cordex provided a link to, or does this one require an antenna dongle?

That's just a phone app that allows one to listen in on police and fire communications being streamed on the Internet by third parties.  No radio is involved on the user end.  Your phone is not acting like a radio receiver.  It is not picking up police and fire comms directly.
If someone is streaming police and fire department radio comms from your locale on the web, you should be able to hear them with that app or another one like it.
If your locale's police and fire departments comms are not being streamed by someone, then no app like that one will do you any good.

[Hawkmoon]

If your locale's police and fire departments comms are not being streamed by someone, then no app like that one will do you any good.

I think it was Shakespeare who wrote, "Aye, there's the rub."

Yes, both the link Cordex provided and this one (which I downloaded and installed) stream various department frequencies, and both cover towns on both sides of me -- but neither covers my town specifically. Since it's my town whose radio traffic I want to monitor, they don't help.

[cordex]

If someone isn’t broadcasting the what you want to hear via the web from their scanner then your realistic option is to buy a scanner if it is important to hear what is going on. Without knowing exactly what system your local cop shop is using, I can’t advise you on the cheapest option, but one that is likely to work and that is easy to get started with is the Uniden Homepatrol line (either the fixed radio or the handheld). These have the capacity to decode trunked digital traffic which many departments are shifting toward and come preprogrammed with the relevant configurations.

However, those cost around $450-$500.

[Hawkmoon]

If someone isn’t broadcasting the what you want to hear via the web from their scanner then your realistic option is to buy a scanner if it is important to hear what is going on. Without knowing exactly what system your local cop shop is using, I can’t advise you on the cheapest option, but one that is likely to work and that is easy to get started with is the Uniden Homepatrol line (either the fixed radio or the handheld). These have the capacity to decode trunked digital traffic which many departments are shifting toward and come preprogrammed with the relevant configurations.

However, those cost around $450-$500.

I know our local PD just shifted over to digital, and I think a friend who used to run a scanner mentioned that the new service is encrypted, so that's probably the issue. So a dedicated, physical scanner probably is what I need ... and $450 to $500 is not in a range I can afford right now. I've gotten by thus far without a scanner so I guess I can continue on. But in the past when I heard sirens or saw the cops and/or fire department racing down my road, I could call up my friend and ask him what was going on. Since the cop shop has gone digital, my friend's scanner doesn't work, so he can't tell me what's happening.

[cordex]

Just to be clear, there is a distinction between “digital” and “encrypted”.

A digital system might require a scanner with specific capabilities while an encrypted system also requires specific codes. A useful analogy might be analog TV vs HDTV broadcasts vs Dish/DirectTV satellite broadcasts.

To a person with a scanner incapable of deciphering the new system it might seem encrypted but it may not actually be. The county I just moved out of used the P-25 digital trunked system for most communication but set up an encrypted channel for SWAT deployments.  So far I don’t believe they have used the secret squirrel channel at all.

[RocketMan]

If your locale has switched over to a trunking system for their public service radios, you could still use a couple of RTL-SDR radios to receive their comms.  There is a tutorial on the RTL-SDR site telling how to do this here.  It seems daunting at first read, but many of the steps listed are not necessary with the RTL-SDR dongles.
The tutorial provides a lot of information on how such a system works and how to set it up.  The software required is free and open source.  You could set one of these systems up for a fraction of the cost of a new scanner if you already have a PC or laptop available.
Of course, all of the above assumes your locale is not encrypting their comms.  If they are, you are pretty much stuck.

[cordex]

That's good info, RocketMan.  I may give that a shot.

[RocketMan]

Glad you liked it.  I wish I had more time to spend on my radio hobby, but my wife has me working on her website pretty much full time.  So much for being retired.   

[AJ Dual]

I recommend getting the RTL-SDR dongle and some software even if it turns out your local PD's new digital system is encrypted.

With free software like SDR#, its plug-in add-ons, and other free software pakages, you can do dozens of cool "radio things". You may need to home build an antenna of a certain design for certain things, but it can be done inexpensively and there's online tutorials for making them.

ADSB aircraft tracking with real-time maps.
Weather satellite pictures of Earth
Aircraft voice comms.
Shortwave radio
Broadcast HDTV on the PC
Listen in on HAM bands

All sorts of stuff. That's just a few.

People (with the proper antenna) even do amateur radio astronomy with those little dongles.