transceivers

All modern day beacons run on a 457 frequency which was made a law since 1997. If you want a greater range beacon go analog which require lots of pratice. When I got good I could find 2 beacons in 2 minutes. This should be standard. But if this is your first beacon I would suggest digital. I have since upgraded to DTS Tracker and works quite well with limited range. Dont get the X1. I heard bad things and one guy died because his was'nt transmitting.

Go with a pure digital if its your first beacon.
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Royal Oil..........

tx man. not dying is my goal and this is my first one.

get one of the digital yellow ones witht the arrows and distance meter. i think its an orthovox but i dont feel like finding it

you may be thinking f1 but its analog, blue case and yellow dial. Older pieps have a yellow case but there is no yellow digital beacon. X1 is a red casing.
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Royal Oil..........

I own a Barryvox. I'd recommend them to anyone expert or novice at transceiver use. It's very intuitive and is both digital and analog. As with any transceiver, the key is to practice lots with whatever you get, there are a few different good transceivers out there...

one thing to keep in mind (although very secondary to safety related features) Is what type of batteries does it use? AA or AAA or something else. It's nice to have your equipment work on the same batteries so you can switch them over if need be)

from backcountry store.com:
The Barryvox Transceiver, now distributed by Mammut, was introduced in the US a few years ago and has been a huge hit with backcountry enthusiasts of all abilities. It is a giant leap forward in transceiver technology offering both analog and digital search modes and the ability to switch back and forth between the two. A stream of range and directional data appears on an easy to interpret digital display, guiding the user along an induction line to the buried victim. There is no need for manual adjustment as you approach the victim. Simple one touch button operation is intuitive and easy to use—even for the uninitiated. Runs on 3 AAA batteries for a minimum 200 hrs. transmission time. It comes with THE most comfortable and best designed harness system we’ve ever seen.

^ the other equipment I was talking about is headlamps etc... both my beacon and my headlamp work on AAA's...

One reason I did'nt buy the barrovox is because of the crystal screen, hard to see in low light conditions and not possible if in the dark, DTS tracker has LED lights that no matter what conditions light, dark, windy snow you will be able to see the lights.
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Royal Oil..........

The Barryvox can switch over to analog mode too. Great beacon for those who have never owned one or dont practise much with them.

The best range is the SOS in true terms it gets about 60 meters although it says 90. remember beacons send circlular signals so if the sending beacon is on a different angle then the searching beacons range is affected.

Most important is to find a beacon you are comfortable with. I like the SOS cheap and strong but I also have a barryvox for my wife and friends one touch and they can find you. The only problem with digitals is limited range and multi searches.

Which ever you buy practise its not easy at first trust me I walked over a beascon twice in my first really deep buried practise.
P.S. JAPAN HAS SICK POWDER

Yeah the barryvox ones are really nice. I would defintly suggest getting one of those. Also tons of peeple have good things to say about the Backcountry Access ones.

I think rails in general are just a phase. - Anthony Boronowski

you can sometimes find them on ebay for 80 bones

Hell yahh. im up in the motha fucka

The barryvox is said to win a lot of the search competitions as well... My roommate took his level one this year and the instructors were all praising it...

as for the screen... that's why I have the same bateries in my headlamp :) (but I don't get myself into THAT many no-light conditions while skiing so taking out my headlamp is sufficient.

Go into a store and play around with a few and see what you like. There are a few good models out there... I've heard good things about the SOS model

Dude there's a chart out there and has all the beacons and the fastest search times in a competitions. Ofcourse the DTS Tracker blew the competion out of the water.

BTW how old was your friend when he got his level 1?
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Royal Oil..........