Joe: the answer is yes... Yes they can be worthwhile, Just be aware of their limitations. There's times when the flat jamming is more usefull... but in the presence of ECCM and distance it rapidly loses effectiveness. The problem comes in a black sense... that the broadband ones were a bit too unselective... setting one off in a large urban area was guaranteed to get you too much attention as you shut down almost everything in a 25m radius... just large enough to pinpoint the jammer and you for authorities!
Lethe if I was ignoring the new rule in SR4a...
Yes, I'd limit the basic jammer to jamming certain frequencies without discrimination (the rule says you can target individual nodes). Then use the smartjammer to target individual nodes. The problem is since it only works signal... and effectively everything is a commlink operating in the same band on the same frequenies... otherwise drones couldn't talk to the riggers comm... and so on. See above comment about the drawback of blacking out everything in a small radius... and unwanted attention. Really the only meaningful things talking outside that band would be say maybe military comms (I'd assume they get non-standard frequencies mods as a basic feature). Or something really niche and specific like say a radio station.... (assuming most people in the 2070's don't just listen to internet radio... though they probably still do have broadcast services).
That said, I see room for differentiation between the two devices within the rules and descriptions...
Basic Jammer: jams everything except specifically named nodes excluded from it's operation. (call it protected frequencies so you don't blind yourself). The rules state this... so hidden nodes you might NOT want to jam get nailed if you don't know they're there. It also states you can change the list of EXCLUDED devices with another action. It's indiscriminate still... anything not excluded is still included...
On the other hand, the smart jammer specifically says that it can jam only a single node to the exclusion of everything else, because it adds the capability to jam only a list of nodes. In fact, that's listed as a selling point. That and they include a built in scanner (not present in the vanilla jammer). So it's not as if you're not getting something extra for your money. There is extra capability in there I'd use. I could technically leave a smartjammer on all the time... and only give it a limited list of nodes it would automatically detect and jam for me. Something I could never do with a vanilla jammer.
