Whistler Pro 73 heard good things

**aust3333** · 07-01-2005, 03:06 AM

New to the forum and have some concerns regarding the Pro 73. I commute to downtown Chicago every night from Indiana and I have noticed that I get an awful amount of falses. I have a Whistler 1430 that I also use (I know it's old) but I think it detects well, but the range isn't there. This is the reason I bought the Pro 73 because I saw from the reviews that it was pretty good for the money. The route that I travel is the same everyday and I know the areas where false alerts are, along with the real ones, but for the most part the 1430 stays quiet but the pro 73 is whaling away for most of the commute. I have disabled POP to see if this would help to no avail. Should I just start to get use to the falses in certain areas to distinguish them from real alerts or is there another setting that might minimize the falses. In my honest opinion, I think City 2 mode is the way to go on the Pro 73 wherever you drive. I want to try and make the best of the Pro 73 but the old 1430 is winning this battle. In my town, I pass this intersection everyday and the Pro 73 alerts of X band and Ka band. Granted this intersection has a supermarket and several gas stations and a mini mall. The 1430 will alert to Ka band through this area also but never on X band like the Pro 73. Is the 1430 just that good at filtering? Same for the highway, Pro 73 gives numerous alerts to X band but the 1430 not once gives a X band signal. Any insight is appreciated.

**aust3333** · 07-01-2005, 03:08 AM

Just wanted to add that both detectors were being ran separately.

**nivek2004** · 07-01-2005, 08:08 AM

I use city 2 mode, filters out x band.

As for falses on K or Ka, i only get a few.

ES13Raven · 07-01-2005, 09:43 AM

Originally Posted by aust3333

I have a Whistler 1430 that I also use (I know it's old) but I think it detects well, but the range isn't there.

I think that is the issue right there. The 1430 is older and does not hae the range. To get more range, the unit has to be more sensitive which the Pro-73 probably is.

I would run City 2 mode, with Auto-quiet enabled. If you really want to cut down on the low-strength falses (and also decrease your range) run regular City mode.

**aust3333** · 07-01-2005, 12:50 PM

Thanks for the replies fellas. I was coming home from work this morning and I received a Ka signal at the 1 level and before I knew it, I was right on top of two county cops. The cops were sitting in a parking lot just talking, I am sure they were not running traffic but the warning I received was very late. If I were speeding I would have been busted for sure. I made several passes; four to be exact and the same result happened (late signals). The 1430 only alerted once. Does the cops positioning have a significant factor concerning detection. I was traveling North and the cops were facing east/west. I was a little pleased that the Pro 73 alerted at all since I barely heard a peep out of the 1430. Th environment was pretty wide open on all passes. i even went into the parking lot where they were. A third cop came into play, only he is running K band constant and I did another pass and I picked it up with ample warning time what gives?

ES13Raven · 07-01-2005, 01:13 PM

Sounds to me like the cop could have had it in some kind of stand-by mode, where you were able to detect it but it wasn't on at full strength.

Or it could be that since it was a wide-open area and he was facing away from you that the radar could not bounce off of anything back to your detector.

Just theories :wink:

**nivek2004** · 07-01-2005, 01:20 PM

The 2 cops that were in the lot had the gun set to low power mode.

This will give you less warning, but also reduces how far they can shoot radar.

I have had this happend to me, but still had just enough time to slow down.

The third cops gun wasn't low powered, so you had better warning.

**aust3333** · 07-02-2005, 08:13 AM

Interesting theories guys. I thought that when a cops radar is in stand by mode that detectors would not pick up anything at all. My best friend is a state police and and he will help me test the detector. I going to see if I can possible get some video. My buddy says they use Stalker Ka band. He always alerts me to speed traps when they are setting up. He always tells me where they are and what they are using. I guess that it is ahuge advantage for me but he explained to me one morning that they had the airplane out and he said "just slow down, radar detectors won't help you here bro". Of course they were using VASCAR. My buddy is a great guy, and is often teased by his co-workers as the cop that lets all the criminals go. He called me last week when I was on my way home from work and tole me that they had the laser out and he was the chase car. As we were talking I heard on the radio that they got someone doing 93 through a construction zone (heavy ticket there). I will test with him and report the resutls. Thanks everyone for all you help.

**Green Voodoo** · 07-24-2005, 02:47 PM

We still have cops up here that are using the older constant on radars and they stick them down under the dash and on the seat. When they want to clock a car they pull it up over the side of the car and point it out the window.

When it is on the seat, the detector "sees" the radar but a a smaller strength.