Radar Detectors

X50 is Outstanding! Escort Passport 8500 X50 Radar Detector I have had five radar detectors during my 25 years of driving. I am not an expert, but I can offer an opinion...

Escort Passport 8500 X50 Radar Detector Key FeaturesDetection Mode:City / Highway modesDetection Area:Front / RearVG-2/VG-3 Alert:V...

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Following is my original Escort Passport 8500 review exactly as submitted in 2003. Read to the end where I have added comments on my newly-purchased 8500 X50, August, 2004.

ORIGINAL 8500 REVIEW:

First of all let me make it clear that originally all that I cared about was radar and laser detection range, but the 8500 has made me a true believer in all of the bells and whistles that a high-end detector can have. I had owned an Escort Passport 6800 for about seven years. The 6800 had been used exclusively by my fiance for the past three years or so (I now work in law enforcement and thus don’t need a radar detector) and she had been thoroughly satisfied with it, but recently the strong advertising promoting the 8500 had finally won her over and she decided it was time to take advantage of Escort’s 30-day “test drive” policy. We obtained an 8500 for $274.99 at a local electronics discounter– not bad considering we saved $25 plus postage compared to ordering directly from Escort.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

Inside of the attractive, full-color 8500 cardboard box (covered, of course, with some of the rave reviews that grabbed my fiance’s attention in the first place) is a faux-leather, snap-lid carrying case containing the goodies. Detector, Smart Cord, window mount, spare suction cups, and adaptor sleeve for the cigar lighter plug (a very nice detail for those who need it) are nestled inside form-fitting soft velvet over plastic, akin to the packaging one might find a moderately-expensive watch inside of. Behind a cheesy-feeling plastic strap is the owner’s manual, which is nearly as complete as one could ever hope for. The manual is one of the most thorough I have ever seen for any electronics device, using a combination of illustrations and reproductions of the detector’s LCD to cover almost every imaginable detail of the detector’s operation. It is so simple even a dog could probably operate the detector after reading the manual just once, and there is a removable Quick-Reference card inside the front cover that would be handy to keep inside of a vehicle with multiple drivers whom may not all be familiar with the detector. The basic principles are simply reading the display, using the front-mounted mute button, operating the two top buttons in “normal” mode (when the detector is first powered up) and operating those buttons in “programming” mode.

THE HARDWARE

The detector itself is slightly larger than my old 6800 and weighs considerably more. The platinum finish is a welcome break from the drab black and dark grey colors that seem to dominate the electronics world. Although a bit busy-looking at first glance, with all its screen-printed labeling, the top-mounted dome (presumably some aspect of the rear-detection system), and two top buttons, the 8500 is as simple as it is elegant. Inside of this small package, with this few number of controls, lies a technological beast waiting to be unleashed. My two pet peeves of this detector lie in its greater-than-expected size and weight, and the Smart Cord. Don’t get me wrong, I love the Smart Cord feature, but I wanted to hardwire this detector into the vehicle just as my 6800 was wired and not to use a cigar lighter-style apparatus. However the 8500 only includes the cigar lighter cord. We ended up using the existing wiring from the 6800’s hardwired Smart Cord and the 8500 works just fine with it. Another suggestion I have is a remote-mount full-featured mini control panel. There is already a jack in the 8500, which someone told me was to integrate the detector with an Escort jamming system so that one actually knows when a signal is being detected and jammed, but the manual states the jack is for an earphone. Hmm…perhaps if the jack is used for data and not just audio, Escort could work on a small remote-mount control center to complement the 8500.

OUR UN-SCIENTIFIC RESULTS:

After owning the 8500 for about six weeks, we have nothing to say short of WOW! After playing around with all of the settings, we decided to leave the display on the dimmest setting, in Expert Meter mode, with Auto sensitivity. Since the detector is mounted in a fairly invisible location anyhow and we don’t see the display most of the time, the dim setting was fine for all but the sunniest and busiest conditions.

The sensitivity of this unit to radar signals absolutely astounds the mind. I thought the old 6800 was great, but the 8500’s performance is exponentially greater. In fact the rear sensitivity is so incredible that on multiple occasions both my fiance and myself have forgotten that we had the 8500, and thought back to how the 6800 could only detect something that strongly if it was directly in front of the vehicle. Countless times the 8500 detected the presence of “Instant On” (being someone who works traffic radar for a living, I have never seen anyone actually call it that except for radar detector ads…in reality there is a rocker switch on the radar unit’s control and when the unit is in standby mode, the operator just flicks the switch momentarily to the ON position to get a reading– I think it’s actually simply called Standby Mode) mode K and Ka band radar so far before the cruiser’s location that there was no problem at all slowing down before traveling to within radar range. In some cases where K or Ka band was being used in its normal mode, the 8500 detected the signal at least a mile before the cruiser running radar was even visible on the horizon– something the 6800 could perhaps do only on a flat open highway, and something that impressed all who saw it in action. To put it in a nutshell and make this review as concise as possible, allow me to simply say that anybody who witnessed the 8500’s performance– including myself– was left in absolute awe. There is no detector I or my friends have seen, and that includes fancy (but admittedly not new) remote-mounted devices, that has come close to being in the same league as the 8500 in terms of detection range and features.

Neither my fiance nor I have yet to encounter a laser signal with the 8500, but judging by the radar band performance of this detector, I bet the laser detection abilities would be stellar as well.

Every rose has its thorn, and with the 8500 it is falsing and picking up stray signals from alarm sensors, etc. In any area with door control devices and whatnot, the 8500, just like the 6800, goes bananas registering every single one of them as an incoming radar signal. Granted that is the detector’s job since any transmitter on those bands should activate it, but the ads seem to indicate that somehow Escort had worked on that problem. The user could, of course, program the detector for reduced or eliminated X band sensitivity since most of these devices are on X band, but where we live there are also plenty of police departments using X band radar, so the time spent changing the X band settings could cost a driver a citation if care is not taken to bring the sensitivity back up before leaving the X band-polluted area.

Also just like the 6800 had done, other radar detectors in passing vehicles can set the 8500 to a Ka band alert. While annoying, one can basically pick out a false from a true signal from just looking and seeing the detector in a passing vehicle’s window.

X50 8500 REVIEW, August, 2004:

I just completed a 30-day trial of the X50 detector…and it is a keeper. Our original 8500 is bound for eBay. Here is what I have to say about the X50:

As I mentioned above, my main purchasing point for detectors is range, since my sometimes-lead-footed fiance tends to drive fast on any road with more than one lane. We just completed a two-week road trip on the east coast and I had a chance to witness the X50 in action.

I do not know if Escort reads these reviews, but I hope that they do. My first and foremost comment is that the allegedly “upgrade-able” 8500 seems to be not that way at all. Reading comments on automotive newsgroups and after one call to Escort (where I was put on hold about 12 times while the call taker tried to answer my question), it does not seem that Escort is willing to even consider upgrading already-owned 8500s to X50 status until at least the 2004 Christmas season. And when it is possible, it will cost around $100, possibly more. Keep this in mind if you are a current 8500 owner who is expecting to upgrade.

The X50 definitely has improved detection range on K and Ka bands. I tested it against familiar, fixed police radar trailer locations and there is at least a 10% greater distance than the 8500 was able to detect. Roughly speaking, at 40MPH, a K band signal that the 8500 could detect at about 3/8 mile away can be sniffed out by the X50 at at least half a mile. This is in a hilly suburban environment, so I am sure on a highway those numbers would be greatly increased. I also finally received my first laser detection with the X50, and it was at about 600 feet from the source, with the laser operator visibly not even aiming at my vehicle, rather the car that was about 200 feet in front of me. This was in a remote area and we were the only two vehicles around; I would imagine that the actual laser detection range is greater except there were no other vehicles around to “shoot” at, and thus no laser signals present earlier than the first one I detected. But that was enough to make me a believer! By the time the operator aimed at me, I was slowed well enough not to attract attention.

Other than the superior range, most of the comments I had about the 8500 are the same for the X50. One final positive point I’d like to make…no matter what people say (and I received two emails and some comments about this), the 8500 was prone to “falsing” from burglar alarm signals, etc. Well the X50 absolutely has nearly zero false alarms. That’s right…we’ve covered about 5000 miles with the X50 and my fiance has had about three falses, and on our long trip there were only a handful more. This compared with the 8500 original model, which gave false alerts literally on a daily basis.

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Tags: 8500, Escort, remote

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