Watch the Android/Amazon Stores for Siren

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mitbr

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I have also noticed audio clipping and "carry over audio", i.e., it doesn't quite play all of the audio of a channel before it displays the next channel that it stops on, especially if there is a hesitation in the audio. For example, let's say I'm listening to City Police Tac 1. There is a slight hesitation at the end of the transmission of the last bit of audio; meanwhile, the scanner displays the next active channel, County Sheriff Dispatch. It will display County Sheriff Dispatch but actually play the last second or two of audio leftover from City Police Tac 1.<br />
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Also I have noticed that during scanning, if you have a digital channel set as NAC/Color Search, Siren will display only "NAC Search" and not "NAC/Color Search".

Same symptoms here. I get a short replay of the last bit of audio.

Sent from my SM-N910V using Tapatalk






I have noticed this exact behavior.

I am in Infrastructure Mode and have tried multiple Android devices with the same result. I don't have any issues on the iOS version nor with ProScan on 2 different computers (to eliminate it being my local network/wifi).

Thanks for checking in with this info. So it seems as though this audio clipping issue is specific to the Android Siren app.

Is anyone else having this problem?
 
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coolderb

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People said if they do some port forwarding it should work i dont know im not pro in Networking..just radio systems

Sent from my LGMS631 using Tapatalk

Simple port forwarding will not work. You need to use VPN. Some routers have the VPN server feature built-in. You can log into those routers and activate it. The next step is to setup the VPN client on your phone or tablet. The VPN Client is built-in on IOS devices. Not sure about Android devices, but they are readily available on the Google store. Once the VPN client is setup and you connect to it the Siren app. will be able to connect to the scanner the same way (same IP address) that it would if you were connected via wi-fi at your home.

The attached screenshot shows what the VPN setup screen looks like on my Asus router.
 

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garys

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For those who care, running the WiFi hotspot on my Android phone sucks down the battery. I think the display plays a part in that as well. In any case, I keep the phone on charge when I'm running it in the truck.

Also, it would be nice if the volume control was split so that I can turn up the ap volume without turning up the scanner volume. I know it can be done with the volume control on the phone, but it would be better to do it in the ap.
 

UPMan

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Would probably be better for battery life to let the scanner be the access point and have the phone connect to it.
 

garys

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Only on my phone, connecting to anything via WiFi turns off the Mobile Data. So, if I'm trying to do anything requiring internet connectivity, I'm out of luck. I was looking for a way to override that when I discovered the mobile hotspot mode.

I don't know if iPhones or new Adroids (mine is over two years old) allow simultaneous WiFi and Mobile Data use. If so, then using the scanner as the AP makes sense.

Or have I just missed the function that allows both?

Would probably be better for battery life to let the scanner be the access point and have the phone connect to it.
 

wbswetnam

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Today I've been playing around with the AP connection for use when I'm using the BCD536HP in my car. I find that I get the best results turning the audio all the way down on the Android phone and simply using it for the display, and listening to the audio directly from the scanner. I have finally found a use for this 5-year-old Samsung Galaxy 2 I've had in the junk drawer for the past two years!
 

cellphone

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Garys, pick up another phone and dedicate it as the remote head for the scanner. With the release of this app, you can pick up a prepaid Android phone with 4.5" display for $10 to be your remote head. You never have to activate the phone service.
 

KC1UA

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Thanks for checking in with this info. So it seems as though this audio clipping issue is specific to the Android Siren app.

Is anyone else having this problem?

I am experiencing this problem as well, exact symptoms, using an old HTC One M8 phone via infrastructure mode. I have not tried AP mode yet but will do so this evening.

Using my iPhone 6 and an old iPhone 4 I don't see/hear this issue occurring.

This is a very neat development; looking forward to future versions and options. Thanks.
 

KC1UA

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Some further observations this evening. Your mileage may and very likely will vary.

1. When trying the AP mode with the same HTC phone setup I noticed a slight improvement in the audio clipping issue, but it clearly still is an issue.

2. When using the old iPhone 4 I notice a considerable delay between the display stopping on a received channel and the audio from the channel appearing. In most cases 2+ seconds. This seems to be somewhat akin to what happens with many scanner feeds that have alpha tagging.

3. When switching back to infrastructure mode and using the same iPhone 4 the display/audio delay actually seems to improve, averaging (by the highly effective "one thousand one, one thousand two" method) maybe about a 1.5 second delay from display to audio.

4. My iPhone 6 in infrastructure mode also shows a delay between display and audio, although it seems to be a bit less than the 4. I did not try it in AP mode, yet.

5. In all cases the audio via the iPhones remains superior to that of the Android.

None of the above are gripes, just observations. The overall concept is a great one and in time I expect it'll become even better.
 

garys

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I thought of that, but I have my truck set up to use the phone as sort of an MDT. I do some long distance trips and use Siren (now), Google Maps, the phone (!), and sometimes the Internet.

I have a bracket on a goosneck mount and power for the phone. The hotspot works well and doesn't use any data since the scanner connects only to the phone and not to the internet.

I had a 12 hour road trip to northern New Jersey and back to Boston and got to use Siren quite a bit. It works well and makes using the 536 mobile a breeze.

The only thing I noticed is that if a channel is in NAC search (and I presume PL search) mode, found NACS are not displayed on the siren screen. All I saw was "NAC Search" even though the scanner found the NAC. The found NAC was on the 536 screen.

Other than that, the ap ran fine.

Garys, pick up another phone and dedicate it as the remote head for the scanner. With the release of this app, you can pick up a prepaid Android phone with 4.5" display for $10 to be your remote head. You never have to activate the phone service.
 

eaf1956

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With the release of the android version I put a 536 in my mobile. Worked fine at first, but having left the scanner going and taking the android device out of the vehicle I had connection issues the next time. Only way to get it to work again was a Reset to Factory on the WiFi. And even doing that one time I got a message about a WiFi module error on the scanner. Reset it a 2nd time and it was OK. Just hate having to reset every time I go mobile to get a connection. (since the scanner is not very accessible) Text is bigger on the Android version but you do lose some content. And it also has connection issues on a 536 in the house if I use AP mode, Sometimes the scanner shows an IP of 0.0.0.0

I tried leaving the house scanner going in AP mode after a good connection and tried to connect to it hours later and it would not connect. Seems as if after a period of time the AP mode doesn't work if it doesn't maintain a connection. Also on newer Android phones if you have smart network turned on it won't find internet connection and won't stay connected. You have to acknowledge a message that comes up on the phone about no internet access.
 
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blantonl

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I don't know if this has been reported yet, but trying to avoid a talkgroup using the latest version results in the "quadruple bonk" - possibly a bug in sending the wrong command to the scanner.
 

nosoup4u

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After using an old android phone as a remote head for a while now, I have to say SIREN has been working really well. 2 small changes I would like to see

1) automatically connect to the last AP. I don't see why we need to hit the accept button every time we start the app, especially in AP mode.

2) Can we have a real signal meter, rather than the numbers? I prefer the meter myself.
 

Bmacs

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Android Siren Bugs

Since we don't yet have a dedicated "Siren bugs" thread (apologies if we do - I didn't find it), here are a few annoying items I have found trying to use it for a couple of weeks.

1. You can't override the 10 mi range when using a GPS. I set the range to "0" as instructed when using a mobile GPS - but the app changes it back to 10 miles within a minute or two... I keep changing it to "0", and the app changes it back!!!

2. You can't lock out "SEARCH" TGs. When you have a system setup for ID search, the app will not let you lock out ANY TG that is "found".

3. I have 2 different radios (one a very early SN and the other 1 year newer), and the older radio is not as stable in infrastructure mode. My setup is my Droid Turbo 2 as a mobile hotspot, my Samsung tablet running Siren and Google Maps, and my 536 in infrastructure mode. On a regular basis, Siren reports "waiting for scanner", then disconnects. The ONLY recovery is to power cycle the 536. Rebooting the tablet and/or my phone will not allow the radio to re-connect. With the newer radio - I NEVER see this issue, with the exact same setup (phone and tablet). All are running the latest firmware in both the radio and dongles. i will try to reload all and see if this persists.

Thanks,

Bill
 

scanboyca

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Since we don't yet have a dedicated "Siren bugs" thread (apologies if we do - I didn't find it), here are a few annoying items I have found trying to use it for a couple of weeks.

1. You can't override the 10 mi range when using a GPS. I set the range to "0" as instructed when using a mobile GPS - but the app changes it back to 10 miles within a minute or two... I keep changing it to "0", and the app changes it back!!!

2. You can't lock out "SEARCH" TGs. When you have a system setup for ID search, the app will not let you lock out ANY TG that is "found".

3. I have 2 different radios (one a very early SN and the other 1 year newer), and the older radio is not as stable in infrastructure mode. My setup is my Droid Turbo 2 as a mobile hotspot, my Samsung tablet running Siren and Google Maps, and my 536 in infrastructure mode. On a regular basis, Siren reports "waiting for scanner", then disconnects. The ONLY recovery is to power cycle the 536. Rebooting the tablet and/or my phone will not allow the radio to re-connect. With the newer radio - I NEVER see this issue, with the exact same setup (phone and tablet). All are running the latest firmware in both the radio and dongles. i will try to reload all and see if this persists.

Thanks,

Bill

Well this is somewhat encouraging to hear that other users are also experiencing disconnects with their 536 over wifi. I use my scanner in Infrastructure mode (connecting to my home wifi network). I run Siren on my Android phone or tablet or use VLC on my Windows7 laptop. Audio streaming will randomly stop sometimes after several hours or just a couple of minutes. The only cure is to power cycle the 536. When streaming stops I can still ping my 536 but cannot restart streaming without a reboot. Very frustrating. I purchased a wifi controlled AC power outlet so I could reboot my 536 from my network. I luckily haven't corrupted my SD card yet by pulling AC power for reboot.

I really wish Uniden would look into this problem. When it works it is great.
 

AE7Q

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Siren bug testing?

This is another silly bug: If you use the Siren app to enable/disable via the "Quick Key" button, you get a keypad with digits but no "." (period). Uniden obviously knows how to get the correct keypad (with a "."), because they do for "Number Tag".

You can switch to the "special character" keypad for the "." and then switch back, but what a nuisance !!! Setting "Quick Keys" from the app is much more convenient than from the scanner.
 
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