[FiddlerClamp]

The funniest thing was that people were convinced that you could cut more diodes (if only you knew which ones) and enable more hidden frequencies. They couldn't understand that this was a one-shot deal. I imagine there were quite a few that ended up destroying their scanners trying.

[grendelt]

"Let's see, my crystal radio only has this one diode but it can only receive AM. I bet if I cut it I can hear everything!"

[MertsA]

Well funnily enough you can actually get some heavily distorted but still intelligible audio out of an FM channel demodulating it as AM if you shift the frequency over off of the center of the channel and decrease the bandwidth to only get half of the FM bandwidth. First time I heard that while playing around with a SDR I was so confused as to how that was working.

[jacquesm]

At 15 cents per diode I don't think that would be a particularly expensive fix or worth throwing out an otherwise perfectly good scanner for.

[sokoloff]

The set of people who just cut away additional diodes under the theory that would unlock further features has minimal overlap with the set who can DIY replace that diode for $0.15.

[jacquesm]

I highly doubt that. Cutting away a diode means you have some tools, aren't afraid to 'void the warranty' and likely means that you know what you're doing. Those are likely people who also have a soldering iron sitting around somewhere and know how to use it.

Everybody else would have someone else cut that diode in the first place.