DSDPlus

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mtindor

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There is no longer any reliance on Cygwin. However, you will need to have lame_enc.dll. To get lame_enc.dll you can follow the instructions here:

Audacity: How do I download and install the LAME MP3 encoder?

Of course, once you install that, you'll want to find lame_enc.dll and copy it to the directory where DSDPlus is.

I believe lame_enc.dll is required because DSDPlus supports output to both .wav and .mp3

Mike

PS: I imagine lame_enc.dll can be found many places on the internet as a single downloadable file, but I would recommend against anyone doing that. So many sites that provide individual DLLs are bad news sites.
 
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mtindor

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Another tip for anyone trying this out:

Although autodetection of protocols [-fa] is default and seems to work extremely well, if you know the type of signal you are attempting to decode, you should "force" it using the appropriate options, [eg: -f1 for P25, -fr for TRBO, etc]

This tip is nothing new and has always been the recommendation for DSD as well. But it seems a lot of people don't follow it. If you know the type of signal, force it and then the decoder will have no doubt about what to do with it.

Mike
 

frazpo

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frazpo

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The option to reset the recording file daily or for a certain time is great. I seem to be decoding NXDN better with this version. Id like to know if anyone else is decoding better on NXDN.
 

mtindor

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The option to reset the recording file daily or for a certain time is great. I seem to be decoding NXDN better with this version. Id like to know if anyone else is decoding better on NXDN.

You should be decoding everything better, especially P25.

I've tested:

NXDN48 IDAS Voice - sounds great
NXDN48 Trunked Voice - sounds great
NXDN96 Conventional Voice - sounds great
- one or more of which DSD will not decode

NXDN48 trunked control channel - DSDPlus can detect this
NXDN96 trunked control channel - DSDPlus can detect this

If you know what an NXDN signal sounds like and you aren't getting any decode, force -fn or -fN and see what happens. It pays to force the mode if you know what the mode is.

P25 Phase 1 Voice - sounds great
TRBO Voice - sounds great

In all of the above, the same sample input .wav files sound better (are decoded much more thoroughly) on DSDPlus than any version of DSD that I have.

So I would really expect that for any mode it claims to decode, it is probably doing a better job at decoding it. I can say that for sure with P25 Phase 1 and TRBO, both of which I've done a lot of testing with weak signal / noisy audio source and it still decodes it extremely well.

If you're listening to a TRBO channel and there are conversations on both LCNs, you'll hear both conversations at the same time. Stereo decoding.

I haven't had the opportunity to test Provoice, but I would expect that it does a great job on Provoice as well.

Mike
 

frazpo

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DSD Plus?

Mike this subject has been beaten to death but I thought you could not decode Nxdn trunked? is that right?
 

mtindor

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Mike this subject has been beaten to death but I thought you could not decode Nxdn trunked? is that right?

To my knowledge, no currently available DSD windows binary can decode NXDN trunked. I'm not sure if the current DSD 1.6 / mbelib 1.2.5 source on Github can or not.

But, don't confuse this with DSD. This is DSDPlus and is not DSD.

DSDPlus decodes NXDN48 trunked voice. It may decode NXDN96 trunked voice, but I don't have any such system around to test it on. I'm not even sure if there is such thing as NXDN96 trunked.

That's why I say this: If you hear a signal that you know is NXDN, try decoding it with -fn or -fN (one or the other).

Mike
 

frazpo

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Has anyone had any luck on improving decode rates with the fine tuning options? If so briefly explain what made most difference.
 

mtindor

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Has anyone had any luck on improving decode rates with the fine tuning options? If so briefly explain what made most difference.

I've done it a few times. The fine tuning will improve decode, but it might not improve it so much that you notice it audibly. Every signal I've tried it on already had a decent decode rate, and so to my ear I really didn't notice much difference.

I followed the directions in the txt file that came with it. The tuning procedure is quite monotonous (lengthy / boring / repetitive). So unless you are getting lousy decodes, it might not be worth going through the effort.

I obtain my audio from a discriminator tap. What works for one person will differ from what works for another person because I think it is very dependent upon the setup you are using. For instance, if I can increase the magic number by 10% by using a particular set of tuning values, there is absolutely no guarantee that those tuning values will increase your magic number if you applied them. If I switch to my RTL dongle and record audio from the same transmitters, the values I use with the discriminator tap are not the same ideal parameters when applied to the dongle audio.

Mike
 

frazpo

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Thanks. Just trying to reduce a few variables. I haven't toyed with any settings much and just thought I would ask. I to am using Disc Tap. There is no comparison with DSD. I am decoding a system now that I rarely had success with using DSD.
 

mtindor

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The advanced tuning was extremely cumbersome. I ended up creating a batch file to help cycle through the advanced tuning. I used a batch file to speed up the process of going through a couple hundred variations. I'll try to document what I did so that you can try it out if you wish. It'll have to wait a day or so before I can get around to it though. It's far from perfect, but it did cut a little bit of time off of the advanced tuning process.

Mike
 

Jay911

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Nice Christmas present! Yes this identifies NXDN96 trunking (and yes there is such a thing). I think I might park it on the local repeater and see what it comes up with. I just wish I got more than a continuous stream of "NXDN96 TB CCDATA", like what the CC data is. :)
 

Jay911

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Are the rules about signal level the same as with the original DSD (i.e. you don't want 100%)? I left my setup running overnight with the CC of a single-site NXDN96 channel (voice on control) set at ~13-20%, and this morning I have a 2300kb file of just beeps and blurps and what might be single-syllable fragments of voice comms. Granted, some of that might be the unregistered Virtual Audio Cable shouting "Trial" every few dozen seconds, screwing up the decode, but I want to make sure I have everything else sorted before I pay for that. The signal is quite strong, the strongest available to me. I was figuring on getting it working on this before moving to other NXDN voice and the various TRBO systems popping up around town.
 

KC1UA

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I usually use DSD for DMR decoding but I'm trying this version on a fairly strong P25 conventional signal and it just doesn't want to work. This same system uses the older DSD and the -f1 -mg options to get pretty good decode of the same signal.

I'm using an R820T dongle into a registered version of VAC and the latest beta of SDR-Radio. It's a Windows 7 Pro 64 bit machine. One thing I do notice is that it's doing a far better job of showing the NAC than the older version...but the audio is atrocious regardless of the input level. It does a nice job on DMR voice though, but so did the older version. I'll try it with a discriminator tapped BC898T later but I am definitely not having much luck with the dongle on P25.
 
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