Radar Detectors: Whos Using What?

Do you have the 8500 or the 8500 x50? Even in the EMI chamber, the 8500 x50 yielded sensitivity values that were comparable to the V1.

PoopDawg said:

I have a V1 and a Passport 8500. The V1 blows it away in every aspect.

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Good for you!

Yes. Good for me, unless the vehicle I'm driving has the 8500 in it, cause it's a piece of ****.

The 8500 is an obsolete model, FWIW. The x50 is the "latest".

PoopDawg said:

Yes. Good for me, unless the vehicle I'm driving has the 8500 in it, cause it's a piece of ****.

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whatever

got the 8500 x50 for christmas....cant wait to try it out in the spring. the stang is stored.

ADRENLN said:

got the 8500 x50 for christmas....cant wait to try it out in the spring. the stang is stored.

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try it out asap to make sure it doesn't give you any problems. Use it in your daily driver if necessary! :SNSign:

Detector

ADRENLN said:

got the 8500 x50 for christmas....cant wait to try it out in the spring. the stang is stored.

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You will like it!

true, i guess i will throw it in the dd and make sure it works....thanks!

metroplex said:

The Escort and Bel units are supposed to have a forward antenna and a rear antenna as well.

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No radar detector has 2 antennas (1 faces front of car, 1 faces back of car) other than the Valentine One because Valentine Research has the patent on the arrows and more than one antenna in a single radar detector. The other radar detectors have rear laser ports for laser detection but they rely on the single front antenna to detect radar that bounces around from the rear.

The latest rear radar detection test shows that the Valentine One beats the Escort and Bel by over 2 miles in rear Ka band detection.

metroplex said:

Do you have the 8500 or the 8500 x50? Even in the EMI chamber, the 8500 x50 yielded sensitivity values that were comparable to the V1.

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The Valentine One beats the X50 in sensitivity. Every 6 dBm increase in sensitivity basically doubles the theoretical range of your radar detector on that band. Michael B, the guy who did these tests, works for the radar detector manufacturer Whistler. No Whistlers were tested so he didn't have a bias one way or the other as far as which radar detector had the best numbers.

http://www.radardetector.net/viewto...der=asc&highlight=sensitivity+numbers&start=0

http://www.radardetector.net/viewtopic.php?t=8255&highlight=sensitivity+numbers

You are correct on the antennae. The V1 is the only unit with a rear-facing antenna.

I saw MichaelB's chamber testing a few weeks ago and it was interesting. The 8500 x50 appears to be within 3dB-5dB of the Valentine 1 overall. X-band is quite useless these days unless you want to find out where the local Wal-Marts are located
What is the source of the first test report you posted? Radartest, radarbusters, and speedzone's latest tests still show the x50 and RX-65 as being comparable to the V1 in real world testing. Chamber testing is not real world testing

The Valentine 1 lacks an auto mute feature, and falses on all the bands quite often. In order to get almost the same features as the x50 and rx-65, one would have to buy the remote display mount for the V1 for a total of $440. The upgrades are a cool feature, but they may charge up to $100 or more to upgrade your unit depending on what feature has to be added. So that's $400 + $40 + upgrade costs in the future.

The bogey counter and arrows are quite useless to me because I do not look at the radar detector while driving. I normally set my detector on dark mode and focus on driving. I wish Escort had voice alerts because the Beltronics detectors have very distinct band alerts along with a voice alert. The x50 can detect up to 8 signals simultaneously and display the strength level of each individual signal. However, I do not use this since I set it to dark mode and focus on driving.

http://www.speedzones.com/long_range_test.html
The V1 still shows comparable performance to the x50 and RX-65.

http://www.speedzones.com/over_the_hill_test.html
here the V1 wasn't quite as good as the x50 and RX-65.

http://www.speedzones.com/laser_detection_and_id.html
Here, the x50 seems to detect laser hitting the license plate along with the V1.

http://www.radarbusters.com/support/product-tests/2.asp
V1 has comparable K/Ka performance compared to the x50.

http://www.radarbusters.com/support/product-tests/3.asp
Here is where the x50 and RX-65 shine... The V1 does not have as great of filtering technology as the x50 or RX-65 (will tend to false more). However the bogey counter will give you an idea if it is just a false alert (shopping mall) or a real threat if you look for the remote display or at the detector itself.

Here is the original thread for MichaelB's chamber testing:

http://www.radardetector.net/viewtopic.php?t=16417&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0