Freescan: Running FreeSCAN on a Mac OSX

[bwreed]

I am able to program my BCD996P2 using my Mac laptop directly, without a windows emulator. I am able to upload and download programming to and from the scanner, as well as, download scanner data from RadioReference, edit that data and install the programming in the scanner. Everything seems to work fine. No cost for any of the software used. I am running Mojave version of OSX

Steps:
1. Download and install from Apple XCode Command Line utilities
2. Download and install MacPorts from MacPorts.org
3. Options: I downloaded and installed "wine" from Winehq.org and am using it. MacPorts also has a port of "wine" that can be downloaded and installed. I have not used the MacPort-wine software.
4. Using MacPorts install cabextract .
5. Download and install "winetricks". Use winetricks to install dotnet45
6. Download freescan and install freescan using "wine"

Once I did the about freescan ran fine on the Mac. However, to communicate with the scanner over the USB port I had to run "wine regedit" and create a string entry in HKEY_Local_Software_wine_ports for the KEY: COM1 and the VALUE: <fullpath to the device file for the usbmodem> ...in my case /dev/tty.usbmodem14201. As the path seems to change each time you connect the scanner to the Mac, this, for now, has to be done each time before starting freescan. I'm sure there is a way around this -- just haven't worked on finding it yet.

Bottom line is FreeSCAN will run on the Mac without any emulator, or paying for a version of windows, etc.

Details for each of the steps above are found by GOOGLING the software and searching within the hits.

 

[K4EET]

bwreed,

I see where you joined us in August 2018 but this seems to be your first post. Thanks for letting us know about the programming information! I also wanted to make sure that somebody has told you:

Welcome to Radio Reference!

Cheers! Dave

 

[bwreed]

Thanks. First joined to get the freq downloads, then posted after having got done figuring out how to program the scanner from a Mac.

 

[K4EET]

Thanks. First joined to get the freq downloads, then posted after having got done figuring out how to program the scanner from a Mac.

You are very welcome! Your post has gotten 226 views as of this posting. There should be some folks that use a Mac and would be most appreciative of this posting.

Cheers! Dave

 

[wscranston]

You're the man! I have Freescan running now on my mac. One question: exactly which registry key is that - I couldn't find a HKEY_Local_Software_wine_ports - thanks.

 

[bwreed]

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Wine\Ports

 

[wscranston]

Thanks, this is great.

 

[ranbush]

Hi bwreed - thanks for posting this info. I am trying to follow your command sequence in Terminal, but I am getting prompted for some extra steps. I saw a recent message from wscranston that he followed your steps and got Freescan to work, so that's encouraging. Maybe my errors will help someone else get Freescan to run on Mac OS.

I'm using MacOS High Sierra v 10.13.6, but I found all the Apps that you mentioned and they all seem to run on High Sierra.

You posted:
Steps:
1. Download and install from Apple XCode Command Line utilities
> No problem for me here.
2. Download and install MacPorts from MacPorts.org
> I got an error saying, "Using MacPorts requires XQuartz" so I dl'd XQuartz and installed it. I'm not sure what to do with it ?

4. Using MacPorts install cabextract
> "Install cabextract" requires Homebrew ?

I found a great tutorial on the web called "Installing Wine on Mac" by David Baumgold, and I followed his steps to install Homebrew and Wine, but when I try to run the Freescan setup executable in Terminal, I get the following error:

imac-2:~ ranbush$ wine fssetup-218-b6.exe
wine: cannot find L"C:\\windows\\system32\\fssetup-218-b6.exe"

I think I'm missing the step you listed of how to use MacPorts to install cabextract. How do you get MacPorts to run?

I definitely don't have a "C:\\windows\\system32\" folder or directory, if that's where Freescan Setup is looking. And I don't know what the "L" is in the error, "wine: cannot find L"C:\\windows\\system32".

Any ideas?
TIA

 

[bwreed]

Hi bwreed - thanks for posting this info. I am trying to follow your command sequence in Terminal, but I am getting prompted for some extra steps. I saw a recent message from wscranston that he followed your steps and got Freescan to work, so that's encouraging. Maybe my errors will help someone else get Freescan to run on Mac OS.

I'm using MacOS High Sierra v 10.13.6, but I found all the Apps that you mentioned and they all seem to run on High Sierra.

You posted:
Steps:
1. Download and install from Apple XCode Command Line utilities
> No problem for me here.
2. Download and install MacPorts from MacPorts.org
> I got an error saying, "Using MacPorts requires XQuartz" so I dl'd XQuartz and installed it. I'm not sure what to do with it ?

4. Using MacPorts install cabextract
> "Install cabextract" requires Homebrew ?

I found a great tutorial on the web called "Installing Wine on Mac" by David Baumgold, and I followed his steps to install Homebrew and Wine, but when I try to run the Freescan setup executable in Terminal, I get the following error:

imac-2:~ ranbush$ wine fssetup-218-b6.exe
wine: cannot find L"C:\\windows\\system32\\fssetup-218-b6.exe"

I think I'm missing the step you listed of how to use MacPorts to install cabextract. How do you get MacPorts to run?

I definitely don't have a "C:\\windows\\system32\" folder or directory, if that's where Freescan Setup is looking. And I don't know what the "L" is in the error, "wine: cannot find L"C:\\windows\\system32".

Any ideas?
TIA

Hi RanBush,

Sorry to take so long replying... I haven't been on in a bit.

I'm not sure of how well Homebrew and Ports will interact. I suspect, not well. I used ports to install cabextract via the command:

sudo port install cabextract

that works fine for me.

If you get this step to work the rest should flow ok. I've not been down the path you've taken so I cannot speak to it.

 

[ranbush]

Thanks for following up, bwreed. I tried going through the install process again, and ran "sudo port install cabextract", but when I try to run "wine fssetup-218-b6.exe" I still get the error "wine: cannot find L"C:\\windows\\system32\\fssetup-218-b6.exe". I know the MacOS doesn't use .exe files but I can't figure out where to change the "C:\\windows\\system32\\" location.

Maybe I'm not meant to use FreeSCAN on the Mac. I've decided I'm going to send my Uniden to scannermaster.com and have them program it.

Thanks again.

 

[Murenovich]

This is great and definitely will be trying this today. I have been using virtual machines for the past 2 years on my Macs to program my scanners and radios, I only recently had to cave and buy a simple windows mini pc to program my XPR because the cable i have didnt work with any of my virtual machines.

Thanks for following up, bwreed. I tried going through the install process again, and ran "sudo port install cabextract", but when I try to run "wine fssetup-218-b6.exe" I still get the error "wine: cannot find L"C:\\windows\\system32\\fssetup-218-b6.exe". I know the MacOS doesn't use .exe files but I can't figure out where to change the "C:\\windows\\system32\\" location.

Maybe I'm not meant to use FreeSCAN on the Mac. I've decided I'm going to send my Uniden to scannermaster.com and have them program it.

Thanks again.

Theres a simple free solution using virtual machines on your Mac and Windows 7 but theres a catch. The license for windows only lasts for 45 days and needs to be re-armed every 45 days to keep the machine going. You can re-arm up to 5 times so you get a total of 225 days of free legit Windows. This is the perfect solution if you just want to program your scanners one time and aren't going to change them often and save yourself the money & time you'd spend with scannermaster.com.

You can download the Virtual Machine from Windows at https://modern.ie and selecting the Virtual Machines tab. I suggest selecting IE11 on Win7 and then virtualbox for your platform. Virtualbox can be obtained for free from Oracle VM VirtualBox. Install the Virtual Machine and viola you have windows. Then any of the software instructions including driver installations for programming cables is the same as it is on any windows machine.

If you or anybody has questions about this method please feel free to PM me.

P.S. This way also works with Parallels Desktop, VM Fusionware & Vagrant but I only have experience with VirtualBox and Parallels.

 

[wscranston]

Under Wine, the C drive is mapped to ~/.wine/c_drive I suggest downloading the fssetup exe to ~/wine/c_drive/Program Files (x86) and then specifying the full path to wine using

wine 'C:\Program Files (x86)\fssetup'

Note you need the quotes to avoid shell interpretation. I then made a bash alias to invoke freescan directly:

alias freescan="wine 'C:\\Program Files (x86)\FreeSCAN\FreeSCAN' 2>/dev/null >/dev/null"

Good luck! BTW I also tried to get the Butel software running but ran into web service errors when accessing the RR database. So just using freescan for now.