How to Select the Best Radar Detector

Are you considering purchasing a radar detector to help you avoid expensive speeding tickets?

When selecting a radar detector that is just right for you there are a number of things you need to consider.

• The location where you will be using the detector
• The type of driving you do
• The sensitivity of the detector
• The filtering abilities of the detector
• How you will mount it
• And your budget.

And because of all these things we put together this 9-minute video to assist you.

Where will You Be Using Your Radar Detector?

Detectors are legal to use in all passenger cars in all 50 states with the exception of Virginia and Washington D.C.

Now if you do drive in Virginia there is something you need to concern yourself with and that is the Spectre RDD.

The Spectre is a radar detector detector used by police in Virginia, which is able to detect over 95% of the radar detectors being sold today.

So if you do drive in Virginia we would recommend that you consider a stealth radar detector that is engineered to defeat these devices such as the Escort REDLiNE, the Beltronics STiR or the Stinger VIP.

What Type of Driving Do You Do?

If you’re a road warrior, doing mostly highway driving you will want to select a detector that is rated for highway use, such as the Max2, the REDLiNE, or the STiR Plus.

Detectors that are best suited for highway use are classified as 4 and 5 star radar detectors having over 8 times the capture distance of a police radar gun.

So one question you maybe asking yourself is “why would I need all that range on the highway?” well here is the deal.

A common practice police use to catch speeders is using instant on mode on their radar gun.

Basically the officer is keeping his radar gun in standby mode, not transmitting any radar signal at all until he has a speeder in site.

Because of this you need two things to avoid ambushes like this a rabbit and a high performance radar detector.

A rabbit is someone going the same speed as you or slightly faster a mile or so in front of you.

When the officer shoots your rabbit to capture their speed your detector will alert you to slow down.

Now if you only drive in the city you would only need a radar detector that has at least a capture distance of 4 times that of the officers radar gun rated as a three star detector, such as the Passport.

However if you do drive in both a city and highway environment then you’ll would need a detector that is rated as both a highway and city radar detector, here is why.

The Escort Redline is rated as a highway radar detector only and when you use this detector in a city environment you will be getting a significant amount of false alerts.

However if you selected the Passport Max2 which is rated as both a highway and city radar detector the advanced filtering of the Max2 would filter those out.

Do You Hate False Alerts?

The chief complaint of radar detector owners is false alerts and recently this has become even a bigger problem, here is why.

Car manufactures have been installing adaptive cruise control and blind spot monitors in new cars, which operate on the same band police use, K-band.

Because of this MOST radar detectors being sold today are rendered useless because of the overwhelming amount of false alerts it receives.

As an example here is a quote by Car and Driver regarding the filtering characteristics of the Valentine One during their recent test.

“One annoyance is incessant false alarms—the Valentine’s filtering isn’t very effective. On our 22-mile loop, the V1 called out 53 threats – Because of this determining what’s a cop and what’s not is left to the driver…”

And here is a quote from Car and Driver regarding their review of the Passport Max and Max2

“Passport uses a new type of digital signal processing (DSP), which can reduce false alarms from some non-police-radar sources. Think of DSP as a pair of Bose noise-canceling headphones for radar reporting. By reliably identifying noise, the Max can focus on real police-radar threats, leading to faster and more accurate warnings.”

Now the four best radar detectors on the market today that have the ability to filter out these types of false alerts are the Stinger VIP, the Passport and the Passport Max and Max2.

What is the Difference Between the Max and the Max2?

The Max2 also includes an internal Bluetooth chipset that enables it to tap you into Escort Live where your radar detector will share real time alerts with other Escort and Beltronics radar detector users.

As an example your detector will alert you to police spotted alerts, speed trap alerts, air patrol alerts and will even share with you Ka band and laser alerts from other users in your area.

Where will You Mount Your Radar Detector?

There are basically two different types of radar detectors, remote mounted and windshield mounted.

Remote mounted radar detectors are designed to be concealed within the car with the radar detector antenna hidden under the grill and the display installed in the cockpit of the car.

These types of radar detectors are significantly more expensive then the windshield mounted radar detectors however they do have added benefits.

The most important benefit is that they are stealth to the eye meaning no one would ever know that you’re car is equipped with a radar detector.

The second type of detector is a windshield mounted radar detector, which is designed to mount to the windshield of your car.

All of these detectors do come with some type of suction cup for mounting and power cable.

Now if you’re in California mounting a radar detector to your windshield is illegal.

Because of this you may also want to consider purchasing one of our BlendMount mirror mounts or dash mounts.

Now if you’re a motorcycle rider you can accessorize your detector with one of our Techmount motorcycle mounting systems and our HARD System heads up display.

What is Your Budget?

If money is no object and you want the very best in radar and laser protection you may want to consider the Stinger VIP, which retails for $5,999.00.

However if you’re like most of our customers your budget is a lot less then this so because of this I’ve put together the best detectors in each class.

One of the most important factors you should factor in when selecting your detector is its ability to detect the new low power digital radar guns police departments are now buying.

Because of this the best entry model radar detector I would recommend that has the ability to do so with a 4 times the capture distance is the Passport, which retails for $349 before our VIP discount.

Then the other two detectors I would recommend are the Passport Max and the Passport Max2.

The Passport Max retails for $549.95 before our VIP discount and the Max2 retails for $599.95 before our VIP discount.

Now signing up for our VIP discount is free and only takes a few seconds of your time.

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