For years, radar detectors have been a common tool for those looking to protect themselves from traffic tickets as well as a common obsession with tech enthusiasts. They have come a long way since they were first introduced to the world, with modern options that also protect the user from red-light cameras, speed traps and more.
For a number of years now, the reigning champions that seemed to always cut through the competition (both price and performance) and beat out any of the models that crossed our desks here were Escort Radar’s Passport 9500i and 9500ix models.
The first of the two models took radar protection to a completely new level, boasting new connected features that allowed it to detect common red-light camera and speed trap locations using GPS and a database of known locations. It also gave you the option of marking your own locations, as well as the ability to filter out certain hits where you were certain they were false positives or weren’t a concern. It was incredibly accurate, however, it did come with a slight caveat. The USB port that was supposed to allow you to update this database never worked. It was supposed to be a “coming soon” feature which instead lead to all of us having to upgrade the unit later on to the 9500ix where they improved on the unit’s technology and also fixed this drawback, allowing the unit to properly sync with software via USB (using a laptop or similar solution).
Since then, the 9500ix has been a sword in the stone that couldn’t be budged by a single act of nature (or industry). At least, until new in-vehicle technologies started becoming a normal feature in newer vehicles rolling into the market. Technologies like blind-spot detection, auto-breaking, lane detection, and auto-pilot. These new technologies have been making use of radar to perform their tasks, and it has been causing radar detectors, like the 9500-series models, to pick up a heavy increase in false positives as these vehicles drive by. In fact, in some areas where these vehicles are quite popular, it has rendered K-band on these detectors virtuously useless.
So the companies behind these detectors have been working on developing new means of filtering through these new in-vehicle technologies to help prevent false positives and allow their detectors to learn the difference between blind-spot detection (and other technologies) and the officer pointing a radar gun into your direction. This, of course, requires new hardware and abilities, so you still have to invest in a new detector. However, with your new investment comes huge leaps and bounds. One of these new options is the Escort MAX 360C.
Ever since the first 9500i was sent into us years ago, most of us eventually bought into one due to how quickly it won our techy hearts. So most of us are also quite experienced with how frequent K-band false positives have become over recent years due to these new in-vehicle technologies. However, we recently got our hands on the latest MAX 360C detector. It has since been riding with us for a number of weeks now, moving from car to car as some of us took turns getting a feel for it–and now, we get to share our experience with you.
Design
The MAX 360C features a similar design found in most detectors both modern and classic. A mostly plastic outer body, with all of your buttons spread across the top of the unit. With these buttons, you can manually power the unit on and off, adjust the sensitivity (Auto, Auto NoX, AutoLok and Highway), mark your location, adjust the brightness of the screen, control the volume of alerts (up or down), and a mute button to silence active alerts with.
The color screen is a popular feature found in today’s nicer models, and something not every company has jumped on board with just yet. Thankfully, Escort has been down this road since its original MAX model, so it is something you can likely see in most of the models from this point forward. It does make it much easier to pick everything apart on the screen without having to focus your attention away from the road much.
The screen breaks down between the current speed limit of the road you are traveling, the actual speed of your vehicle, and the status of any active alerts. You, of course, have the ability to modify how some of this information is displayed in the unit’s settings, depending on user-preference or how detailed you want it to be (ie, displaying the actual frequency of an active alert).
It also features directional arrows so that you can tell which direction the alerts are coming from. So you will be able to tell if there is an officer scanning in front of you, behind you, or from the side.
Comparing it to the 9500i/ix models, the layout of visible sensors is nearly identical, as well as button (grouping) location. The MAX 360C is a bit larger in overall size, but not by much and just barely heavier than the 9500 series.
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The mounting style is dramatically different as Escort got rid of their original sliding clip with release-button design and went with a magnetic mount solution that seems to work quite well. We didn’t have a single problem with attaching or detecting the detector from the mount, and not once did it ever make us nervous while on the bumpiest of roads.
The new mount features a short lip on one end so that it doesn’t just snap into place, but instead slides into place slightly and then mounts via magnet. Gravity prevents from detector from ever coming loose on its own.
It comes with your typical 12V SmartCord adapter that includes a USB port (2A max) so that you can also use the same outlet for additional tasks like charging your phone. It features a pig-tailed cable design to reach up to your detector with.
To install it in any other fashion (flat cable ran through molding, etc), you do have to buy any other cables separately. However, if you come from a previous Escort model, then you can likely use your past adapter to power the MAXC with (if you already have a solution ran around). For example, most of our vehicles have the powered mirror kit that mounts the detector right under the mirror and then taps the power for the detector into the back of the powered mirror. Although we’d have to buy a new mount due to the now magnetic design, the previous wire to RJ11 adapter has worked fine with the MAXC in every vehicle it has ridden in during our tests. As for those interested in the mount/wire kit, you can find a compatible one here for the MAX 360C.
Performance
The performance of the MAX 360C is quite noticeable. Side by side with the 9500ix, it avoided most of the false alerts caused by cars passing by that the 9500ix continued to alert for. In fact, it avoided 90-95% of these false alerts. It still got hit with a few K and X band alerts that we couldn’t figure out where it was coming from, but it wasn’t in any way a bother.
As you hit freeway speeds, it grows more sensitive while in “auto” mode to help protect you further, thus it can also increase the chance of false positives, but it still didn’t come close to the number of false alerts experienced by the 9500ix.
The ability to determine the direction of an alert is phenomenal. It isn’t 100% accurate, but it seems to come pretty close. There was only a few times where the arrows bounced back and forth a few times before it knew for sure where it was coming from. In the majority of the cases though, it was instantaneously accurate. This was not only helpful in detecting where an alert is coming from, but it was fun to know this information.
The unit is connected via both Bluetooth to your mobile device as well as Wi-Fi. The updates for the database are done over Wi-Fi, where most everything else is done through the app. So in order to update the database, you have to be connected to a nearby Wi-Fi, like your home. It isn’t always 100% convenient, but if your network is strong enough, it is nice that it offers to update as soon as pull up. Our network here is incredibly strong, so the update yes/no pops up on the screen as soon as we hit the section of the parking lot closest to the building. When an update is available at least (which is frequent enough). The updates do take a little time regardless of network speed, so you are sitting there for a minute or so, waiting for it to finish. However, it is far better than having to sit there with a laptop and USB cable ran to the unit.
As long as it is connected to your phone via Bluetooth while driving, you are able to get the current speed limit of the road as well as live alerts. The live alert system was great for detecting areas that were recently detected by other Escort users that had detected an alert nearby within the last hour or so (there are different levels of detection like “within the last hour”). The only downside, is you seem to have to open Escort’s app every time you get in the car. You can let it run in the background as you switch back to something like Android Auto, but it does create a manual process which can be annoying if you have Android Auto set to automatically open/run when you get into the car. Also, although you always get your current speed displayed on the screen (assuming you have a GPS lock), if the app is not connected, you won’t get the actual speed limit displayed. So this is determined by live data being fed from the app vs anything that is included within the internal database.
There was a few times when opening the app that it required us the login. This happened the first three or so times, which caused us to be a little weary. We didn’t want to have to log into the app every single time we opened it. However, after that, it seemed to jump right into the app each time. So that might have been an unknown anomaly at the time.
The magic of the 360C though, is all about the accuracy of the unit, along with the significantly reduced false positives. This and the directional arrows. Everything else is the icing on the cake since this is what radar detectors are all about. Saving you from what’s happening right “now” (or at least saving your wallet if you have a tendency of wanting to speed).
We wish we could hold onto this one to see how long it lasts as the reigning champion, but this round is a temporary one sadly as it was the first test model we couldn’t hold onto, but it has been an exciting trip during the moment we have had the test model. We’ll have to wait until everyone starts to swap out their current models before you see any additional side-by-side comparisons with the 360C.
Our Conclusion/Summary
We found that the MAX 360C is an amazing new champion to not just the Escort line, but radar detection in general. We couldn’t find a single model (currently) on-site here that could match up to the 360C. We put it side-by-side with models like the 9500i/ix and a number of other models coming from companies like K40 and Whistler, and the 360C had the best accuracy, fastest response, and greatest fun-factor. Its ability to filter out the in-vehicle technology within today’s smarter cars as they drive by is a must-have, and the ability to determine the direction of an alert has been game-changing within the MAX series in general.
The new magnetic mount design is wonderful and incredibly user-friendly. The app and Wi-Fi approach is nice in the sense that you no longer have to have a physical cable ran to the unit with a laptop in your car. Updating the database is much easier than it used to be. The only catch there is the necessary manual interaction of having to open the app every time you get into the car, to complete the information available to you on the detector. The live alert system is so much better than having to keep your ears glued to a solution like Waze, and there has been a number of times where our eyes have seen exactly what the previous driver (Escort subscriber) saw.
This is by far our current reigning champion and it has been a fun experience of pitting it side-by-side with these other models. It’s amazing to see how far these companies come with radar detention and we can’t wait to see where the industry goes from here.
It is an expensive detector though. Incredibly expensive if you have already spent a lot of money on their detectors in the past, and are now finding these past models to be half-way useless due to all of the false alerts that are out there now. Then, also factor in the fact that you have to pay additional annual fees to continue to be able to update the already expensive detector. This can be quite a hit that feels below the belt for some. So that is the only thing that had a heavy effect on the final score for us. Beyond that, this detector still gets the gold medal.
Note (11/2020): It will be available for $100 off via Escort’s website this Black Friday!
| Buy from Amazon | Buy from Escort | |
Our Rating | Average Price* $649.99 |
*Average price is based on the time this article was published
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Discovered Issues:
Magnetic mount and compass modules within cars — We found that vehicles that have compass features built into the mirror or locate the compass module behind the mirror, may have issues if the mount for the detector is mounted nearby due to it being magnetic. It could cause issues with the compass resulting in erratic readings or becoming stuck in a specific direction. To resolve this, mount the radar detector as far from the compass module as possible. This also means you wouldn’t be able to use the mount adapter that mounts the detector to the bottom of the mirror (if you were looking to take that route). If you don’t make use of the vehicle’s compass, then this is not an issue. If you have a vehicle that features a compass module that isn’t near the mirror (ie, in the dash or other location), this shouldn’t be an issue. This issue has been tested and confirmed using both a Mercury Sable and a Lincoln MKX as valid scenarios.
Additional Images:
Specifications:
OPERATING BANDS
X-band 10.525 GHz ± 25 MHz
K-band 24.150 GHz ± 100 MHz
Ka-band 34.700 GHz ± 1300 MHz
Laser 904nm, 33 MHz Bandwidth
RADAR RECEIVER/DETECTOR TYPE
Superheterodyne, Varactor-Tuned VCO
Scanning Frequency Discriminator
Digital Signal Processing (DSP)
LASER DETECTION
Quantum Limited Video Receiver
SENSITIVITY CONTROL
Highway, Auto, Auto No X, Auto Lo K
DISPLAY TYPE
Graphic Multi-Color OLED
Bar Graph
ExpertMeter
SpecDisplay
5 Levels of Brightness with Full Dark Mode
POWER REQUIREMENT
12VDC, Negative Ground
Escort SmartCord USB Included
COMPACT SIZE
1.38” H x 3.25” W x 5.15”
USER PREFERENCES
User Mode: Advanced / Novice
Pilot: Scanning Bar / Full Word
Arrow Mode: Single / Multiple / Band
Display Color: Blue/Green/Red/Amber
Speed Display: On / Off
Cruise Alert: Off / 20 – 160 mph
Over Speed: Off / 20 – 160 mph
Over Speed Limit: Off / Spd Limit / 5 over / 10 over / 15 over / 20 over
Meter Mode: Standard/FR1/FR2/Spec/Expert/Simple
Tones: Standard / Standard+ / Mild
AutoMute: Low / Med / High / Off
AutoLearn: On / Off
Units: English / Metric
Language: English / Spanish
Voice: On / Off
GPS Filter: On / Off
Auto Power: Off / 1-8 Hours
Bands: X/K/KN1-KN4/Ka/KaN1-KaN10/Ka-POP/Laser/TSR
Markers: Other/RedLight/RedLight & Speed Cam/Speed Cam/Speed Trap/Air Patrol
Clear Locations: Marked/Lockouts/Defender/Format
Wi-Fi: On / Off
Bluetooth: On / Off
Auto Update: Off/Database/Firmware/All
Perform Update: Firmware/Database
Are you a manufacturer or distributor that would like us to test something out for review? Contact us and we can let you know where to send the product and we will try it out.
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