Listening to Ottawa Police : radio recommandation

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jmcd13

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Hi everyone. I'm looking for some advice with purchasing a radio capable of listening to Ottawa Police. It is my understanding that they are using EDACS Provoice so am thinking that either an LPE-200 or Jaguar 700p could do the job.

Anyone has any experience or advice?

Thanks!!
 

Forts

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I've had both radios.... both are solid radios that work very well. If I was to buy another one, I'd get the Jag... it's physically a little bigger but there are lots of accessories still available for them and they are DIRT cheap on eBay lately. Jag 700P's can be had for about $30 a pop. You can get one with ProVoice for $100 or less.
 

jmcd13

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Thanks alot Forts! In terms of programming, do you think the better option would be to have it programmed before getting it shipped?
 

Forts

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Personally... I wouldn't. If you go that route you are at the mercy of the person programming it... hoping they set things up properly and don't miss anything. You'd be much better off getting a programming cable and learning how to manage it yourself. And that's of course assuming whoever you buy it from would program it for you in the first place.
 

DOGGY1

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HI Forts,can you tell me where you seen the Jag 700p's radio's with provoice for arounf $100.00.
Was it at e-bay ca or ebay com as I don't seen to be able find any at that price
Thanks
 

Forts

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There were quite a few 700P's on ebay.com a few weeks back... Non-Provoice ones were going for $29 and Provoice ones around a hundred. Just keep checking, I'm sure there will be more. Expect to pay more for a 7100 though.
 
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Edacs with Unitruncker

Ok so my attempt at programming has led me to searching and reading thred after thred...good news is I'm learning, but just when u think u got it there's a whole bigger problem you missed. So here's the run down.


I have two dongles ready, but for now I just use one to fiddle with unitruncker. Sdr# as a signal discriminator, when I tune to the edacs frequencies and the site window pops up and says edacs96 (label) limbo. I know unitruncker won't display the control channel, and as such edacs doesn't broadcast that info. So now what? should I add all the frequency from RR to that site in UN in the order that RR has it on the SID url?(Ottawa public safety).....??? ....but now understand the control channel changes frequently.

How does unitruncker know how to follow dig provoice traffic?

My goal is to have unitruncker follow voice traffic and decoded with dsd.

any help?
 

mmisk

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scanner that has a comm port

What other equipment do you have there? Do you have any scanner that has a comm port on it such as a Uniden scanner. If so It is quite easy to have a scanner follow talk groups when controlled by Unitrunker.

The only problem is you would have to add a tap to the radio to send unfiltered audio to DSD.

Also the second dongle you have can follow talk groups, but I have never been able to get DSD to work using this method, even with a virtual audio application. I have heard that some people have used a second audio card feeding DSD. Perhaps someone else can help you with this.

MM
 
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unitruncker

Thanks for the reply MMISK.

so what your saying, "one dongle by itself and UT won't follow edacs?
can u tell me the basics on UT and programing and some freq?
 

mmisk

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Following Provoice Talk Groups

One dongle on an EDACS control channel sent to Unitrunker will display all tg information on your computer display, but you can do a lot more then that.
Unitrunker can send control data to a scanner via a comm port, and the scanner will follow what ever talk groups you select including provoice talk groups. Then if the scanner has a unfiltered audio tap, you can send that signal to another computer and listen to the provoice audio.
You can also use a second dongle and Unitrunker can send data to SDR# and to provoice talkgroups

As I mentioned before, I could not get DSD to work with the second dongle, but perhaps someone else can guide you with this. I will be playing around with the second dongle method in an attempt to get DSD working this way. I listen to provoice talk groups all the time on another older computer that I set up just for this purpose, and then send the audio to an inexpensive fm transmitter so that I can listen anywhere around my house.

It is quite a bit of work to set up a provoice system, but if you like to experiment, it is a great deal of fun.

Mike
 
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disc tap needed

awesome, for $120 and some many hours I'm enjoying trying to figure it all out. So far i'm i'm 60% there.

So, as i was using UT for the first time, I now know how to program when the site appears. I would get the second instance of SDR# to follow calls (jump freq.) but dsd won't decode. I would get some writting out of it but nothing much no grabbled sound, nothing. I also callibrated both dongles in the middle of freq. I heard something some where that if your cpu is at 90 to 100% dsd won't decode. I have a PRO-46 that I will blow the dust off..I had a disc tap installed on it when I first attempted this many months ago. But I'm sure it wasn't installed correctly(missing capacitor) and not on the right pin on chip. I run one dongle on CC and look at the uniscope then compare to the audio form the scanner, NO match. That guy at Pro-comm is going to get a visit from me again.

Anyways I'll get the disc tap working and hopefully my cpu will run at 30-40% so dsd can decode.
 

mmisk

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SDR# and DSD

Sounds like everything is working except for DSD. I am working on this and I plan on installing a second sound card to handle the input for DSD, will let you know how it goes. Lots of traffic for Remembrance Day
on tg 3-024. Unitrunker will let you lock out all non provoice tg's so that you can send what you want to hear to DSD. I-Calls will still go through but it isn't a problem. I am fortunate to have a radio that tracks provoice talk groups, so I have the radio sending the signal via a tap to DSD and it works 100%. I still want to get this working on my main computer with two instances of SDR# , Unitrunker, and DSD. So far everything is working except DSD.
 
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dsd issues

So i have it all working with two dongles, I forgot to set dsd to provoice and then after -fp bammm!!!! action.

I hear voice but seems to be choppy..I heard that i might need a better antenna for better decode. But if there are no breaks in dsd i'm getting a good signal?

still choppy but when it comes from the dispatch (female voice) it is pretty clear and can make out the conversation. Or could it still be my cpu usage? higher cpu usage bugs dsd?

Still waiting for pro-46 with disc tap, to run less cpu usage.
 

rfortin

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question

There were quite a few 700P's on ebay.com a few weeks back... Non-Provoice ones were going for $29 and Provoice ones around a hundred. Just keep checking, I'm sure there will be more. Expect to pay more for a 7100 though.


I've just recently found a feed that provides Ottawa Police. I know that are provoice encrypted. I I were to buy a jag 700, what would have to be done to actually hear the Ottawa police? Is there a web site that will walk me through the setup?
 

webstar22

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I've just recently found a feed that provides Ottawa Police. I know that are provoice encrypted. I I were to buy a jag 700, what would have to be done to actually hear the Ottawa police? Is there a web site that will walk me through the setup?

The only two scanners that you will hear provoice on are the
BCD536HP and
BCD436HP

with the new firmware and the provoice unlocking key.
 

DaveH

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Ottawa PS is scheduled (last I've heard) to transition to the new P25 system where they are expected to be totally encrypted (unlike now) next month. It seems hardly worth the cost/effort to set yourself up. If anything you could monitor with DSD+.

Dave
 

mmisk

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Someone is Streaming OPS

It looks like someone has started streaming OPS to the general public.

Well, they won't be for much longer......
 

Forts

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I've just recently found a feed that provides Ottawa Police. I know that are provoice encrypted. I I were to buy a jag 700, what would have to be done to actually hear the Ottawa police? Is there a web site that will walk me through the setup?

Just because it's ProVoice doesn't automatically mean it's encrypted. And the fact that people are listening with their Uniden scanners proves that.

And no, you won't find a website telling you how to program an EDACS radio. If you aren't sure how to do it, chances are you likely shouldn't be.
 

OttawaBob

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Folks. Don't waste your money on trying to listen in on the City's EDACS (and ProVoice) system.

All users of the system are being (and have been) moved to a new P25 Phase 2 system. The EDACS infrastructure has run way past its expected lifecycle and better interoperability will be available with the P25 system (among other things). In my personal opinion, it's a testament to the EDACS system and comms admins that the system had worked so well for so long given the geographic area and number of users on the system. Kudos..
 
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