[Official] What's the Best Radar Detector?
 

im in the market for a radar detector. with so much company out there its hard to choose one. can you guys tell me which u guys prefer or think is the best. i need one that can detect regular radar and also a lydar(which is a laser radar).

V1

V1 combined with a Blinder.

V1 100% You can get free software update for as long as you own it! That to me was key, never have an outdated radar detector. Just pay shipping.

No radar is going to save you from laser. Once it detects it, it's too late. You need jamming or other diffusing method to try and defeat laser.

V1, you already kno!

Not 100% true actually, and I have done test to prove this.
A local area I drive through uses K and laser only, K because people ignore it and laser because they can instantly pick you up. With laser, you can beat the laser if you are not first in line, you will get a very small and short burst on the V1 from a reflection from the car in front and will give you a chance to slow down if you are lucky.

This is why it pays not to be first in the line or last.

V1

escort passport 9500i

I will also say Escort. Really both are the best out there Valentine and Escort. The only difference is that Valentine has arrows that tell you where the signal is coming.

I'm a big V1 fan. It takes a little practice to get used to reading your V1 (how to interpret the patterns of beeps and signal strength and arrows in various situations), but once you do you become a lot more situationally aware about radar.

V1 user for years.

I wouldn't have it any other way.

Passport 9500ix. The detector has outperformed the V1 in several comparisons and its GPS capabilities are excellent. I have had a V1 and replaced it with a 9500ix. It is expensive but worth the investment.

Valentine V1 is the best!

The guy that invented the Valentine worked for many years for Escort Radar Detectors.

V1 + Custom Made Connecting Mount for Radar Detector on 350Z and other Cars = :tup:

I've never owned a radar. I've thought about it on occasion, but in the end decided not to because I was afraid it would make me lazy and complacment, just driving around speeding and not paying attention, rather than being situationally aware. Then when you get popped with laser, poof! Instant ticket.

Anyone ever get tickets while running a V1? If so, how many? If it doesn't ever fail you, I would get one. But if the system fails on a routine basis, then I've just got a false sense of security and am asking for trouble.

That is how I look with my V1, it is just an added tool to help increase my eyes in finding things. I keep myself alert and aware, but the V1 can pick up on situations much farther than my eyes will ever see, and with the limited rear view it helps in picking up things from behind that I will miss.

It is not 100% full proof, if the officer does not have his radar on pinging then he will just ride by without you knowing unless you stay aware. The worst situation for me is I turn my V1 off when driving with certain people, I know it bugs them and I do not speed with them in the car, but I must remember to turn it back on when they get out.

:iagree:

Same here. You also don't want to out in front by yourself with regular radar, "if" the officer is doing the "trigger" thing. No one in front to cause your detector to go off, you round the curve and boom, triggered and done.

John

Understand getting complacent, but having a detector has definitely saved me. You still have to stay alert.

I like the Escort 9500. Had a V1 but enjoy the blocking out of false signals that the gps provides. Feel like the detection is equal in both units so it came down to features.

K40 jammer
 

Does any one have a k40? check this video out

YouTube - K40 Radar Detector and Laser Jammer Test

its preference. v1 and the escort 9500 are both great. the thing i like about escort 9500, like par4bmw said, is the blocking of false alarms and also red light detector. i like the how the v1 shows where the signal is coming from. but if it came down to choosing one, i would get the escort. unless you have enough money to buy both and use both of them.

placed an order for the V1 on sunday and it should be here by wednesday if not tomorrow. 422 all together. 399 for the radar and 23 for the shipping. for some reason they didnt charge me tax

own both the V1 and 8500 X50 Passport Escort [blue]. Recommend passport especially around where i live, hills and turns. passport seems to catch it around turns and hills better. as for distance, KA bands are caught faster through my 8500 X50 Passport Escort than my V1 and amps up quicker. I own both, have both mounted hahahaha. V1 is extremely convenient when it shows the arrows. But I figured, if you get a K or a KA, who cares where it's from, just slow down. Can't go wrong with either. But if I had to choose, Passport Escort.

I used to have the K40 laser jammer (which they call a laser "defuser"). Ran it for years, and it never failed me. But when it came time to put a new one in the 370, I switched over to Blinder, because they redesigned the K40 laser jammer with a new 'feature' where it automatically shuts off and stops jamming after 5 seconds of jamming. The theory behind this is that 5 seconds should be enough time to slow down, and by allowing the cop to get a reading on you after 5 seconds, s/he won't think you're running a jammer. Whatever. This is one feature I'd rather do without. I want my jammer to stay on and keep jamming. It's great fun to watch a cop repeatedly hit you with his laser gun, look at his gun as if it's malfunctioning, and hit you again to no avail. I just have to suppress my laughter when I drive by as he stares at me looking bewildered. I still have the previous gen. K40 laser defuser on my wife's car though (it stays on rather than shut off after 5 seconds). Over the years it's saved her about 7 times. Neither one of us has gotten a single ticket from laser since 1999, which is when we started using these wonderful devices. Our V1s have also saved us numerous times, but in my area they predominantly use laser, which suits us just fine.

They didn't charge you tax because they're in Ohio and you're in CA. No big mystery there.

I just bought the Passport 9500ix. It's incredible. Excellent detection range and the integrated GPS is worth its weight in gold. It learns false alerts and automatically blocks them. Thus, I rarely get a false reading in my regular route. If it goes off...I'm hard on the brakes. It also reminds you of redlight cameras which has probably paid for itself already in that respect alone.

gotta agree with everyone else. it's gotta be V1

V1 those arrows are a life saver!

But how do you guys detect when I run VASCAR?

We don't. No electronic counter-measure is 100% foolproof, esp. against non-electronic tactics. Electronic counter-measures should be treated as a supplement, not a substitute, to paying attention, being alert, and using good ol' common sense.

Well said semtex. It's amazing how many speeding tickets I've written to people with radar detectors. Radar, lidar, vascar. Most of the time, by the time you know we're there it's too late.

FWIW- My radar stays on "hold" until I see someone flying.

Vascar rocks too, it's great when people pass me on the interstate. Gotta love an unmarked Hemi Charger!

Well, "unmarked" is relative. Usually I'm pretty good at picking those out, there's usually some tell-tale signs, but sometimes they aren't obvious until you get close.

I've gotten 3 radar tickets with my V1 in the car (and avoided many, many others). Two times it was because I had turned off the V1 while working on the car in the garage, and forgot to turn it back on (it's hardwired, and I usually just assume it's on - one was very recently, my only 370Z ticket). The other time was a really smart well-prepared cop with some flavor of instant-on Ka radar. He positioned himself about 1/2 mile past a hill that you can't see over on the highway, and he was waiting and not using the gun until he actually saw an obvious speeder crest the hill. So there was no early warning, but I saw him on the side of the road a split second before he lit up the radar (and sent my V1 going going berserk) and luckily I managed to bleed off a lot of speed before he got a lock. It was still a pretty heavy ticket, but it could've been much worse if I hadn't spotted him and started reacting before he pulled the trigger.

Nothing is fool-proof, but a V1 has definitely cut down on my rate of tickets in the long term. I've been seeing more and more radar/laser enforcement around Houston the past year or so. I'm guessing this is economically motivated by the city's budget in this economy, so I kinda treat it like a semi-randomly-enforced road tax, and my V1 is my tax professional that helps avoid me getting screwed too bad. It especially feels that way when you see them randomly pulling cars out of 80mph traffic (in a 70) repeatedly, when nobody's really being unsafe at all. It's like shooting harmless fish in a barrel.

Of course it would be more ideal if traffic enforcement would focus on actually targetting the rarer truly unsafe drivers regardless of speed, and let speeders off if they're not doing anything that's clearly unsafe. From a god's-eye rational view, it's pretty clear to me that me (being an experienced and attentive driver) in my car (which is exceptionally-well maintained by me personally and designed for this kinda stuff) doing 90-110-ish in little to no traffic is far safer than someone who doesn't really know how to drive to begin with, isn't paying attention to conditions and other drivers, with brakes that haven't been serviced in 3 years, going the speed limit in the fast lane while trying to gulp down a starbucks and jabbering with someone on their cellphone. But unfortunately officers don't have a god's-eye view of every situation, so I guess they do what they can, mostly. I just wish more of them would at least try to be rational about it, instead of being ticket-vending-machines.

isnt it illegal to have a laser jammer? i think it would be a better idea to hardwire the jammer somewhere in the car with an on and off switch so once you see the cop you slow down and turn off the jammer so he gets a reading because if he doesnt then his gonna know that you got a jammer and stop you right?

isnt radar detector illegal also in some state?

Virginia, Washington D.C, and military bases.

haha i can get away on military base im military police haha

hawaii is clear for jammers but cali is illegal ******* california always has stupid laws. ill be back there in feb 2010

thats why you need to have a jammer that you can turn off once you see the cop.

From what I researched before I got mine this is the best one, it is so sick it knows were the sit and everything I love it.
Amazon.com: Cobra XRS 9960G Voice Alert 15-Band Radar/Laser Detector with 1.5-Inch Full-Color Display, GPS Locator, and Red Light/Speed Features: Electronics