Great Bargain
Written: Jan 19 '01 (Updated Jan 24 '01)
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Pros: Excellent sensitivity and selectivity on all bands, with competitive laser detection
Cons: Complicated programming, VG-2 Guard Alert
The Bottom Line: This radar detector is one of the best bargains on the market. The Bel 880 offers superior protection against the difficult Super-Wide Ka-band for the money.
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| batman2k1's Full Review: Beltronics BEL 880 Radar Detector |
I am an 18-year old male freshman, so you know that my car insurance bills are very expensive now and would be unbearable if I received a ticket. Hence, I made the investment in this radar/laser detector to prevent foolish tickets. Within the first day of owning the Bel 880 I was thoroughly impressed. It all starts with the bright text display. The Bel 880 offers more than hard to find dots or dashes and voice alerts; it offers a high clarity text display and articulate voice alerts that can help you quickly assess the threat and keep your eyes on the road.
When I actually got onto the road, it must have been the worst day for a person not armed with a radar detector to be driving because traffic ahead and behind me were blasted twice on the K-band and three times on the Ka-band. The Bel 880 gave full alerts to those threats and distinguished them as "instant-on" threats. Next, while driving in hilly terrain, the Bel 880 sniffed out "instant-on" X and Ka-band threats, according to my estimation, at least a mile away.
The Bel 880 also performs well in the City-mode. While driving in Baltimore City, the detector falsed only once. This shows that noisy detectors and erratic X-band falses can be easily held to a minimum with this detector.
I only have two problems with the Bel 880. First, programming the selectable features on the detector is quite complicated. There are many functions that require the depression of more than one button and the holding of one button for a certain amount of time. While I feel it is worth it, if you are driving there are just some adjustments that cannot be made. My final problem is the function of the VG-2 Guard Alert. Since I travel in Washington D.C. frequently this is important to me. The Bel 880 stops radar detection when VG-2 signals are encountered; in D.C. these are encountered often, so I usually just turn my detector off in these situations.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
batman2k1
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Reviews written: 2
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