stalbaum

I have both radios. Correct, it is mostly "bells & whistles" kinds of differences for general scanning, such as the the 125 being programmable with alpha tags. The extra cost for the alpha tags is worth it I think, but to each his/her own. But I did notice one maybe important difference that might apply the xShadowx's narrower question. The 125 has programmable per channel settings for AM, FM, NFM and Auto, and the 75 does not. I did some tests comparing the 75 side by side with some bubble pack radios (one bp sending and it's twin and the 75 receiving), and the 75 definitely makes FRS and GMRS sound very quiet in comparison. I *believe* this because the bubble pack radios I was testing with use 12.5khz (NFM) only, but I think the 75 receives it as an 25khz FM signal, hence the insipid sound. So later I tried setting my 125 scanner to NFM for the FRS/GMRS channels, and to my ears, the signals from the bp does *seem* to sound more equivalent to the clear reception of the same signal on the bp's twin. (I should try the 75 and 125 side by side, maybe I will try to make that happen!) I also think the 125's auto wave form detection (AUTO) recognizes the FRS narrowband quite well too, again to my ears. For the GMRS channels tested, it seems the same, sounds good. But I understand that some GMRS channels can be either 12.5khz or 25khz, vs. the 12.5khz that the bubble pack radios seem to use. I am unable to test this because I have no such GMRS (25khz bandwidth) radio to test with, but it seems to me that the AUTO mode might be a very good choice for those GMRS channels that might come in at either bandwidth. (Or just set all FRS/GMRS to AUTO and let the robot work...) I'm just guessing on that, and also guessing that maybe you care more about the bubble pack traffic in your neighborhood anyway, because you are far more likely to hear part 95 radios than higher quality part 90 radios. I'm sure there is deeper knowledge in these forums however; I'm kind of new to this. But the 125 is maybe more optimal for scanning FRS/GMRS. I am also guessing that the 75 does not have the same automatic circuitry - it would have to discriminate between AM and FM of course, and I think it obviously does because I am scanning CB. So I think I can confirm that. But no matter what, the 75 receives (well, my ears hear) the bubble pack frs/gmrs signals very poorly, as if it is a nfm bandwidth being played on an FM circuit. Again, I need to get the 75 and 125 next to each other soon... that may confirm. You can hear the scanner either way. Both will work. I noticed the price is way down on - a certain well known website today. I will keep testing though. I think I will have to make some side by side recordings to be really sure.