Understanding the Different Features of a Radar Laser Detector

If you are a fast driver, or are looking into buying an advanced sports car like a Porsche or a Corvette, it might be wise to think about purchasing a laser radar detector. While radar detectors of the past tended to be unreliable and sometimes impractical, the laser radar detectors of today have made many advancements. Old-fashioned radar detector models would often pick up false signals from radar that originated from vehicles and locations that were not police related. the frequency that these false signals occurred made it virtually useless to use the detectors. The main problem with these old units was that an electromagnetic field was used to pick up their radar ranges, meaning that objects ranging from garage door openers to telephone lines would set off a machine. As you can imagine, users decided that radar detectors were more of a nuisance than a functional technology that could help them avoid speeding tickets.

Nowadays, radar laser detector manufacturers have come up with more precise, more functional detectors which do a much better job of performing the task radar detectors were intended for – alerting drivers of upcoming radar activity. One solution that has proven very helpful in this industry is the utilization of GPS features. Radar detectors which include GPS functionality allow users to input locations where radar monitoring devices have already been installed throughout the city. The best radar detectors have software that already includes the majority of these locations. These high activity radar locations will be input and stored for use at a later date in the devices memory. In addition, sites that often cause false alarms can also be stored into the memory in order to ignore these same locations in the future.

One tip that can help users get the optimal performance out of their radar detectors is to mount your detector either in the dashboard or on the windshield of your performance vehicle. Mounting detectors in the lowest position possible in one of these two locations will give the best overall detection range while also maintaining the highest concealment advantage. As a driver, you will also want to have maximum accessibility to both highway and city modes. When you’re driving it’s hard to remember that for the laser radar detector, driving in the city is vastly different than driving on the highway. That covers everything in the way of placement and use, but there are a number of features that differentiate one detector from the other.

360-Degree Laser Radar Detection

If you see this term when you are purchasing a laser radar detector for your performance car, you should know that it is basically a useless feature, as well as a misnomer. In essence, no radar detectors really use 360-degree detection. Lasers are really only accurate when the target object is headed towards the detector dead-on. As the object continues to move further and further off angle, the accuracy of the device decreases respectively.

Speed Sensitivity

If you are using a GPS enabled radar detector, it’s always going to know how fast you are moving. The best radar detectors will use this information to increase or decrease their sensitivity to existing radar, thus reducing false alarms. The frequency that garage door openers tip off your radar detector will be significantly decreased when using detectors which utilize this technology. This turns out to be a highly useful feature, and one that you should definitely look for before you purchase a radar detector. Tests show that detectors which use this speed sensitivity technology virtually smash detectors which don’t have this functionality.

AlertLock

This aforementioned feature analyzes different radar variables including frequency and location of transmitted radar. If you frequently get false signals from garage door openers or ambulances, you can tap this button to ignore similar frequencies of radar. Over time, your radar detecting will become more accurate.

Mark Location

This feature is basically a database of known radar locations, including but not limited to, speed cameras. Because these locations change frequently while cities increase the number of red light cameras and speed cameras, the best laser radar detectors include a manual feature that allows you to add new locations on the fly.

These are the most important features that you should look for when purchasing a laser radar detector. The advances in technology have made it possible for these detectors to be much more useful now than they ever have been in the past. It is now considered a wise investment to look into purchasing one of these devices, especially if you have bad luck when it comes to speeding in your Mercedes Benz SL600.