Changing pro-197 hold time on "roam"

[wyomingmedic]

Am getting some of my odd issues resolved with my pro-197 and scanning a multi site vhf trunked system.,

Having a HI and LO roam threshold setting of 95/82 seem to be working well. But not 100% yet!!

While in one of my poorer reception areas, I did some looking at the signal strength of the various towers. Some of them drop into the low 60s, but will shoot up into the 80s or 90, all within a few feet of travel. This is entirely understandable with a VHF system in an extremely mountainous environment and would explain why I have some "choppy" sounding radio traffic.

What I am noticing is that my scanner does not scan away from a weak tower (below the LO point) upon getting a poor signal. It seems to linger for awhile before switching. And during that linger, the signal may climb over the LO threshold for a brief moment, and start the lingering moment again.

So my question is, is there a way to change how fast it scans away from the low signal tower? My only options are to manually program this, or with the ARC500 software. It has some promising sounding settings under the "expert" tab, but I am not sure enough to go messing with them.

Hopefully I have expressed my point well enough that somebody has a chance of answering it.

Thanks,

WM

 

[OsloViking1975]

Am getting some of my odd issues resolved with my pro-197 and scanning a multi site vhf trunked system.,

Having a HI and LO roam threshold setting of 95/82 seem to be working well. But not 100% yet!!

While in one of my poorer reception areas, I did some looking at the signal strength of the various towers. Some of them drop into the low 60s, but will shoot up into the 80s or 90, all within a few feet of travel. This is entirely understandable with a VHF system in an extremely mountainous environment and would explain why I have some "choppy" sounding radio traffic.

What I am noticing is that my scanner does not scan away from a weak tower (below the LO point) upon getting a poor signal. It seems to linger for awhile before switching. And during that linger, the signal may climb over the LO threshold for a brief moment, and start the lingering moment again.

So my question is, is there a way to change how fast it scans away from the low signal tower? My only options are to manually program this, or with the ARC500 software. It has some promising sounding settings under the "expert" tab, but I am not sure enough to go messing with them.

Hopefully I have expressed my point well enough that somebody has a chance of answering it.

Thanks,

WM

I will try my best here.
This is from the easy to read manual markscanners.For Pro 197/106/PSR 600
This should help optimize your scanning parameters.

heres is the firs thing to do:
Set the TSYS to ROAM to receive systems/sites with the strongest signals. Set Threshold Hi to 85 and Threshold Lo to 55.
Next to get to the expert settings: Press PGM/ Then FUNC/Then F3 that will bring you to the expert settings. Now scroll down to these settings here:
Set the SQ Wait 1 ('In-band SQ Timeout/Squelch Time Same Band in the software) down to 5.
Set the EndtoneMot (Endtone threshold in the software) down to 80.
Set the 96CC HD2 TO (Digital detect timeout/Digital Detect Time in the software) down to 45.
Follow all these recommended settings and don't forget to hit done and save all the way through.
Tell us if it helped you or not.

Good Luck

 

[wyomingmedic]

Thanks for the OV. I did do those listed changes, except for the 96cc HD2 as it is already at 30. I cut it in half and went to 15. Seems better.

I also reconfigured the received signal strength settings which gave me a clearer picture of what I could get.

I then downloaded the newest DSP and CPU firmware which seemed to do a lot.

While all of that helped, I was STILL not completely happy with the digital decode. So I scoured everything I could find on the topic. From different user settings, to reading theory about digital trunking and multipath, I read a LOT of info.

What I finally found while messing with the ARC500 software (and subsequently the radios manual) was the OPTION to receive in 5khz steps between 136 to 174. What I found said, "without enabling the 5khz option, you may program 150.005 (and the radio will display 150.005) but it will actually receive at 150.000.

So, being that a lot of my frequencies are 5khz spaced, I clicked the setting. Pretty much fixed my problems. Radio is now almost perfect. There are still some bubbles, but those are to be expected.

SOOOOOO, Who thought if this great option? Where on EARTH does a radio NOT show the correct frequency? I don't mind having to select the spacing, but I want the display to show me where the heck I actually am.

At any rate, if you are having problems, look into the 5khz spacing option.

WM

 

[Loverickbass]

How did you configure the signal strength settings?

Cole

 

[wyomingmedic]

I did it with the ARC500 software under the 'expert settings".

I changed it to the recommended settings in the "easier to read" instructions and I noticed a much better correlation between the received signal and the bars on the visual graph.

Default were,
B1=370
B2=450
B3=520
B4=610
B5=680

Modified are
B1=470
B2=540
B3=610
B4=680
B5=750

These are of course the RSSI readings. Before, you would have a decode % of less than 80, but the graph would show 100% signal strength. With then new settings, it is a lot more "true to life".

Hope this helps,
WM

 

[Loverickbass]

Thank you! I'll give it a try tonight.

Cole

 

[trunker]

I will try my best here.
This is from the easy to read manual markscanners.For Pro 197/106/PSR 600
This should help optimize your scanning parameters.

heres is the firs thing to do:
Set the TSYS to ROAM to receive systems/sites with the strongest signals. Set Threshold Hi to 85 and Threshold Lo to 55.
Next to get to the expert settings: Press PGM/ Then FUNC/Then F3 that will bring you to the expert settings. Now scroll down to these settings here:
Set the SQ Wait 1 ('In-band SQ Timeout/Squelch Time Same Band in the software) down to 5.
Set the EndtoneMot (Endtone threshold in the software) down to 80.
Set the 96CC HD2 TO (Digital detect timeout/Digital Detect Time in the software) down to 45.
Follow all these recommended settings and don't forget to hit done and save all the way through.
Tell us if it helped you or not.

Good Luck

Mistake - 96CC HD2 TO should be DG Int Prime - marksscanners