spdfile1
/\/\ Junkie
Let me start out by saying I love being a Ham Radio Operator. I've had my license for about 12 years now and upgraded to General Class this February. I thoroughly enjoy helping my local ham radio community be the best it can be. By getting in my car and driving around South Florida confirming repeaters to see which are on the air and which aren't, by posting weekly reminders of local ham radio related info on my QRZ page, and by helping two clubs host there weekly nets & hosting my own 70cm net to foster increased communication on the 70cm band. Needless to say I put myself out there. And it's no wonder that I find some that are less than appreciative of my actions. A few months ago I received a Motorola MT1000 16-Channel VHF radio. I was very happy and promptly purchased a battery & antenna for it. But I wondered how am I going to program this phenomenal radio? I saw a place on-line (Supplier of New Motorola Radio Parts Batteries and Accessories.) that will program Genesis Series radios among others. So I figured that was my ticket. One day about a month ago I got talking to a fellow ham on a local repeater and long story short it turns out he has an old Panasonic Toughbook CF-27 with the RSS software installed. He said he would program my radio for me. What a delight and to watch him use the software and program the radio made me want to get more Motorola Genesis Series radios and also be able to program them up myself. Upon looking on-line and talking to my friend I quickly learned that you need an older computer that runs DOS, RSS software, hardware (RIB box, cables, etc). I also read that people were getting sued by Motorola back in 2000 and then there is the sticky note from this forum "Are you looking for free programming software?" from 2007 which made me think I'm doomed simply because my intention was to purchase the many inexpensive Genesis & Jedi Series radios off Ebay and other outlets such as Hamfests and program them myself as well as advertise to my ham radio community who may have said radios laying around just waiting to be programmed or those wishing to purchase said radios and need them programmed. I also knew my intentions and once I advertised those intentions the less than appreciative folks would have a field day with me saying all sorts of things I can't do. Sooooooo I decided to call Motorola Tech Support and get the facts straight from the source.
I called there Tech Support 800 number and spoke to a nice lady. I told her I have a peculiar question to ask. I said I'm a ham radio operator (she probably thought oh boy another one of these guys) and my question is about Genesis Series radios. She said I'm not familiar with those & I thought this is going exactly how I hoped!!!! She said do you have a model #? So I gave her the Model # off the above radio which is H43GCU7180AN. After about a minute it must have come up on her computer and she says I show it to be an MT1000. I said that's correct. Her response was wow that's an old model. I said it is but they are worth there wait in gold to us hams!!!! I said my question is I have a friend who programmed it up for me using the Radio Service Software but I want to do it myself and for my ham radio community. I said I'm not looking to sell the software or make money off programming peoples radios but I don't want to get jammed up and have lawyers knocking on my door or have Motorola track me down like someone mentioned in a forum. She laughed and said well we don't track people down and I can assure you we won't be knocking on your door. She said the Radio Service Software is proprietary software but is unsupported software as far as Motorola is concerned. She says we don't even sell it anymore. I said well I can get it no problem but can I use it is the question. She went on to say basically don't come to Motorola for help or support with it because again it is unsupported. Her main reasons were 1 RSS is DOS based which is old technology and 2 the channel spacing implementation mandated by the FCC on 1/1/13. She said the new mandate is 12.5 KHz and these older radios programmed by the Radio Service Software are 25 KHz radios which are basically only good on the ham bands.
Apparently a lot has changed since the 5 individuals were sued by Motorola back in 2000 for utilizing the Radio Service Software illegally and even since the Sticky note entitled "Are you looking for free programming software?" was posted in 2007.
So interpret this as you see fit but I'm going ahead and preparing the great laptop (Toshiba Satellite 4020CDT) I happened to stumble on for free at a ham radio club meeting last week that will do exactly what I want it to do. Run RSS!!!!!!
I called there Tech Support 800 number and spoke to a nice lady. I told her I have a peculiar question to ask. I said I'm a ham radio operator (she probably thought oh boy another one of these guys) and my question is about Genesis Series radios. She said I'm not familiar with those & I thought this is going exactly how I hoped!!!! She said do you have a model #? So I gave her the Model # off the above radio which is H43GCU7180AN. After about a minute it must have come up on her computer and she says I show it to be an MT1000. I said that's correct. Her response was wow that's an old model. I said it is but they are worth there wait in gold to us hams!!!! I said my question is I have a friend who programmed it up for me using the Radio Service Software but I want to do it myself and for my ham radio community. I said I'm not looking to sell the software or make money off programming peoples radios but I don't want to get jammed up and have lawyers knocking on my door or have Motorola track me down like someone mentioned in a forum. She laughed and said well we don't track people down and I can assure you we won't be knocking on your door. She said the Radio Service Software is proprietary software but is unsupported software as far as Motorola is concerned. She says we don't even sell it anymore. I said well I can get it no problem but can I use it is the question. She went on to say basically don't come to Motorola for help or support with it because again it is unsupported. Her main reasons were 1 RSS is DOS based which is old technology and 2 the channel spacing implementation mandated by the FCC on 1/1/13. She said the new mandate is 12.5 KHz and these older radios programmed by the Radio Service Software are 25 KHz radios which are basically only good on the ham bands.
Apparently a lot has changed since the 5 individuals were sued by Motorola back in 2000 for utilizing the Radio Service Software illegally and even since the Sticky note entitled "Are you looking for free programming software?" was posted in 2007.
So interpret this as you see fit but I'm going ahead and preparing the great laptop (Toshiba Satellite 4020CDT) I happened to stumble on for free at a ham radio club meeting last week that will do exactly what I want it to do. Run RSS!!!!!!
