Modifying an old Realistic Pro radio scanner to receive digital signals. Some, or many people think that analogue is kind of dead these days. And in some ways they are right, it’s certainly not as active as it was back in the day. But there is still quite a lot to listen to if you own an older scanner that has a wide frequency range. But yes, digital is taking over. So now you need spend money on a nice new scanner radio that can pick up all the digital signals. Well, not so fast. Your old Realistic analogue scanner might be up to the job. You see, with some modifications an old analogue scanner can be made to pick up digital signals.

If you have some knowledge of electronics, something called a discriminator tap can be made / added to the radio which enables it to receive digital signals. It will need a computer with software to decode the digital signals. But yes. With a little know-how and a few bits and pieces your old analogue scanner can actually listen to digital transmissions such as NXDN, DMR and unencrypted P25. Take a look at the video by Radionut63 where he shows a discriminator tap fitted to an old Realistic Pro-50. Cool stuff.