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Is a detector worth buying at all if you don't have the money to invest in a product with at least mid-level quality and reliable product support? Bravy would argue there's a point of diminishing returns. While there's an ultra-low budget option on our list, it's worth asking yourself if you have the fortitude to deal with the sub-par range and false alarms that lower-tier hardware delivers. In our testing, such units became more frustrating than useful.
Given the choice, I'd suggest opting for a free app like Waze and save your pennies for quality mid-tier equipment. We consistently ran Waze alongside our detectors, and it frequently identified speed traps that didn't set off alarms on our detectors and vice versa. Differences between mid-tier and top-tier radar detectors are less pronounced. Pricier models will get you niceties like directional arrows, which help you locate the source of radar signals.
Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and MultiRadar detection are also generally only found in higher-end units. Whether you shop in a brick-and-mortar store or online, you're going to see long, bulleted lists that contain a dizzying array of features.
Here are the things to actually pay attention to, according to our radar detector experts. Sherbondy concurs, "If you're looking at higher end detectors, try selecting one with the best possible detection range and false alert filtering and that can be updated over time.
The longer the detection range, the more time you have to safely react to a hidden officer, and if you have good false alert filtering on your side, you can be sure you're not riding the brakes for nothing. Those are also emitting radar," according to Bravy.
Additionally, to take false filtering to the next level, GPS should definitely be on your wish list. In addition to auto or manual lockouts, GPS enables low-speed muting, which means less physical toggling between Highway and City modes to silence falsing from automatic store doors and roadside speed signs.
As you've seen, the recipe for a good detector comes down to a handful of qualities and features. Yet, one of the boxes our tester units came in was swathed in a list of marketing claims 29 items long, the first of them being "Maximum Performance.
Some features sound impressive until you realize it's nothing unique. The most inexpensive radar detectors will still make a big deal of their ability to sense signals from all directions even though they can't point you in the direction of the source. Read on below for more insight on this overblown claim. On the other hand, some features seem to have genuine value until you realize not all technology is created equal.
Take RDD immunity, for example, a feature that's a must-have for many buyers. Also among the Claims of Shame? VG-2 detection, safety warning system alerts and laser detection. A radar detector can be a big investment, especially if you're purchasing a top-performing window-mount unit or a custom installed detector, and the longer you plan to keep it, the more future-proof it should be.
Here are a couple of features that aren't a big deal now, but may compromise your detector down the line if it doesn't have them. The first of these features is deceptively bland, but perhaps the most important thing to look for.
A good way to check for this is to visit the support page of the manufacturer's website and look for the radar detector you're researching. Check for the frequency and recency of available updates in the Downloads section, being mindful that if it's a brand-new product, there may not be many updates yet.
Bravy agrees that regular updates are the first step to futureproofing a detector. To learn more about it, see below. One question hangs in the air. With the advent of lidar and the inability of detectors to provide any advance warning of laser guns, are radar detectors doomed for the dustbin? Bravy chuckles at this suggestion.
There are good reasons why radar will remain a significant part of the law enforcement toolkit for some time to come. If anything, they're just upgrading to newer radar guns. Both work by shooting a signal, either radio waves or light pulses, toward a moving vehicle and measuring the change over time in the signals bouncing back. In both technologies, this is a phenomenon known as doppler shift. As a vehicle moves closer to the radar-emitting source, the reflected waves return at a higher and higher frequency.
A radar gun calculates this increasing rate and returns a figure in miles per hour. Though they work on the same basic principle, radar is comparatively sloppy next to lidar, which we will explore later on. Meanwhile, it's the lack of precision in radar guns that gives radar detectors their advantage. The term "radar detector" is a mostly accurate catch-all name for devices designed to detect the presence of law enforcement speed monitoring.
Once upon a time, a radar detector was exactly that: a simple box which alerted the driver to the presence of stray radar signals, likely originating from police elsewhere in the area. Now radar detectors are a mix of technologies such as GPS, laser detection, filtering algorithms, data from the cloud and, yes, good old-fashioned radar detection, with the goal of accomplishing the same thing.
At the heart of a radar detector is a superheterodyne receiver, which can pick up electromagnetic radiation emanating from a police officer's doppler gun. The reason that detectors can warn of police presence sometimes miles in advance is because radar guns are inexact. As they shoot out a signal, the wave spreads beyond the intended target and proceeds to bounce off other surrounding objects, sending it in unintended directions.
Radar detectors sense this stray radiation and are able to identify it as the kind of radiation likely to have originated from speed enforcement radar. This information is conveyed to the driver via visual and auditory alerts, which identify the type of radar, its strength and depending on the hardware, the direction of its origin relative to the vehicle.
The information coming from your radar detector can get technical. The more you're willing to learn, the more you'll understand what it's trying to tell you. X Band: Though it has been retired by the majority of jurisdictions, this is the oldest police radar band still in use.
Law enforcement operates exclusively on the While X band is less affected by poor weather, it's also easy for detectors to pick up at a distance. You can start to see why it's been mostly discontinued. X band can still be found in use in rural areas and generally underfunded regions where the cost to upgrade equipment remains prohibitive. Outside of these types of areas, it's reportedly still widely in use in Ohio and New Jersey.
Many detectors allow you to disable X band detection altogether since it's rare to encounter legitimate law enforcement using it. K Band: This is harder to detect from long distances and requires a lower power output from police equipment, so it's easy to understand why K band was adopted by law enforcement. Police operate exclusively in the Frustratingly, many other radar sources operate in this range including automatic doors and BSM systems on other vehicles.
This noise is what makes the K band especially problematic for radar detectors, and it's the reason good false filtering is a must. Ka Band: Officially approved for use by the FCC in , the Ka band is the most recent frequency range to be employed by US police departments for speed radar.
Ka band guns use even smaller antennas than either X or K band and less power as well. Among the bands, Ka is the most difficult to detect at a long distance as its guns fire a narrower beam and operate at lower power. If there's an upside, it's that few other sources of radar operate in the Ka band.
So when you receive a Ka alert from your radar detector, it almost always originates from speed enforcement and should be taken seriously from the jump. MultaRadar: This is not a separate band as much as it is a new technology. MultaRadar, which is also known as MRCD, MRCT or photo radar, uses the K band, but instead of remaining on one frequency as in the examples above, it sweeps up and down the frequencies within a given range.
This is called frequency modulation as opposed to traditional continuous wave radar , and it's invisible to radar detectors that aren't equipped to pick it up. In cases where it can be detected, the window of warning is extraordinarily small. Photo radar is not yet ubiquitous throughout the United States, but it is widely used in Europe and Canada, and is increasingly coming into use stateside. In Canada, it's frequently set up in an unmarked truck, which photographs speeding vehicles from behind to capture their license plates so a citation can be issued via mail.
Here it can be found in cities like New York and Chicago. Radar band cheat sheet: Here's a simple TL;DR for radar bands and how you should react if you're alerted to each type. You'll need to check your manual's instructions for setting up your radar detector, but here are some tips that may differ from the manufacturer's instructions.
Follow them at your own discretion. Placement: Most laser-radar detector combination units will instruct you to mount the detector as low as possible on the windshield without obstructing the sensors behind anything solid like the windshield wipers. This is likely to optimize the chance your detector will pick up laser if shot, since laser guns aim at the grille or headlights.
We recommend optimizing your radar detector for picking up radar because laser detection isn't useful for the reasons we've cited. To get the best possible radar range, you should mount your detector as high on the windshield as you can without obstructing the sensor.
Aiming: The angle at which you mount it matters as well. For proper detection, the mount should be adjusted so that it is parallel to the road surface. Power: While certainly not wrong , per se, if you're committed to using your radar detector on a regular basis, consider hardwiring the unit. Some higher-end detectors even ship with the cabling for a permanent install.
It makes it a little bit cleaner. Settings: In terms of configuration, Sherbondy says drivers should get to know their detector for the advanced and customizable system it is.
The internet is a treasure trove of people who want to help drivers optimize their detectors. Bravy offers up one easy thing most users can do to immediately improve their radar detector experience.
Do a little research, and you can quickly find out if you live in one of the few places where this old tech is still in use. For the best radar detection results, mount your detector as high as possible in the windshield without obstructing the sensors. Climb in the driver's seat for the latest car news and reviews, delivered to your inbox twice weekly.
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