Baldwin County and the PSR800

[garys]

I'm down in Baldwin County for a few days visiting family. I've had a few hours to listen to the county and have the Alabama First Responders 700Mhz system programmed in. Results are mixed. I get MedStar Channel 1 quite well. In fact, it's the busiest talk group I hear. I've also received Loxley PD and Summerdale PD as well and a bit from Ocean Beach. Interestingly, there is no simulcast site that I could find. As a result, I think that much of what I hear is based on who is affiliating with which tower. One of the flaws (from my view point) of the way that the PSR800 operates is that in a multi site system it will lock on the first signal it finds and stay there. Unlike the Unidens, you can't program the dwell time for each site.

There is a work around for this involving duplicating a system in EZScan and using a different site as the first site the scanner samples. If I were going to be down here longer, I'd reprogram the scanner with each site as a different system with the talk groups assigned to the same scan list. I'd also label each site and select the display option to show the site label. That way I'd know if this system simulcasts across sites or if it requires an affiliation of a talk group to a site for traffic to be carried. MedStar, being county wide probably has units affiliated with most if not all sites. The sheriff probably does as well, but since their traffic is encrypted, it doesn't do much good for me.

Phase II P25 audio is not as crisp as Phase I audio. Then again the DSP software was only in Beta when GRE America went belly up, so it probably would have gotten better. And of course no other scanner currently processes Phase II audio, so it's our only choice.

Daphne and Fairhope are still active on their LTR systems.

I have not been able to get anything on either Mobile County or Mobile City. I'm going to recheck the frequencies I have programmed to make sure that I have the correct. I know that Mobile PD and FD have abandoned the analog system, but I should get something there and I certainly should be getting traffic on the Mobile County system. This is another area of the PSR 800 I don't like. With the Unidens when I manually step through a system I get both frequencies and talk groups. With the PSR I get only talk groups, which makes it impossible to troubleshoot frequency programming issues by actually listening for data channels.

I will say that the PSR 800 has a lot of nice features that the Unidens don't. Scan lists and scan sets are two of them. The EZScan software is very versatile once you take the time to learn how to use it. Not perfect and not really designed for advanced users, but it does a good job of programming and does allow for some customization.

If I lived down here and could get a PSR800, I'd invest a lot more time in configuring the scanner to do a better job receiving the 700 system. At this point, since I won't be back in this area or anywhere else with a Phase II system, I'll just wait until Uniden comes out with their next generation of scanner. If GRE isn't going to get back into the market, Uniden could do a lot worse than incorporating the Scan List and Scan Set concepts into their scanners.

 

[bob-the-scanner-man]

Just got back from Gulf Shores. Since I live in Birmingham I don't keep up with system changes in Baldwin County so I didn't know that everyone had switched over to the new system. Had me wondering for a while why I couldn't pick up Medstar on their conventional frequency with my BC246T. Of course, even if I had known beforehand my other scanner is just a Pro-96(which I didn't bring with me) so it wouldn't have worked with their system either.

I always enjoyed listening to them and the Sheriff on my scanner while I was in the area. Since I'm only there once a year it wouldn't be worth it to invest in a new scanner.

 

[garys]

I have to say that the radio environment has changed dramatically since I was first there in March of 2012. I took my 346XT along for that trip and the only things I couldn't hear were Gulf Shores and Ocean Beach. This year most everyone is on the 700Mhz system, except for Fairhope and Daphne. The sheriff is encrypted, which is a shame. Mobile County is about the same, but the city is drastically different. The only TG I heard on the city system was listed as a PD traffic channel and I didn't hear enough to confirm that.

A couple of things I did discover. First, the county EDACS simulcast site frequencies aren't readable in Fairhope. I'd have thought they would be, but no dice. I started to hear them on the Saraland and McGregor sites and got a lot of traffic. I found that the best 700 sites were Spanish Fort and Robertsdale. I also found out that I hadn't packed the RS 800 Mhz scanner antenna, I'd packed an Icom FA 1443B dual band ham antenna. That's pretty much deaf on 700/800, which explains part of my problem. I also continue to be unimpressed by Austin antennas. I had a Condor which belongs to the owner of the scanner and it was not much better than the Icom antenna. I bought a RS antenna and the last day and a half I picked up much more signal on the 700 system and Mobile County. Ooops.

I've been in Nashville the past several days and the scanner works very well up here. I pick up both the Nashville Type II and P25 Phase I systems quite well and the new TN statewide P25 Phase II system also. Audio continues to be much better on the Phase I system than the Phase II. I think that if GRE stayed in production, they'd have released another version of the DSP.

I still plan to wait and see what Uniden releases before looking for another scanner.

 

[Ensnared]

Mobile & Baldwin Systems

I have to say that the radio environment has changed dramatically since I was first there in March of 2012. I took my 346XT along for that trip and the only things I couldn't hear were Gulf Shores and Ocean Beach. This year most everyone is on the 700Mhz system, except for Fairhope and Daphne. The sheriff is encrypted, which is a shame. Mobile County is about the same, but the city is drastically different. The only TG I heard on the city system was listed as a PD traffic channel and I didn't hear enough to confirm that.

A couple of things I did discover. First, the county EDACS simulcast site frequencies aren't readable in Fairhope. I'd have thought they would be, but no dice. I started to hear them on the Saraland and McGregor sites and got a lot of traffic. I found that the best 700 sites were Spanish Fort and Robertsdale. I also found out that I hadn't packed the RS 800 Mhz scanner antenna, I'd packed an Icom FA 1443B dual band ham antenna. That's pretty much deaf on 700/800, which explains part of my problem. I also continue to be unimpressed by Austin antennas. I had a Condor which belongs to the owner of the scanner and it was not much better than the Icom antenna. I bought a RS antenna and the last day and a half I picked up much more signal on the 700 system and Mobile County. Ooops.

I've been in Nashville the past several days and the scanner works very well up here. I pick up both the Nashville Type II and P25 Phase I systems quite well and the new TN statewide P25 Phase II system also. Audio continues to be much better on the Phase I system than the Phase II. I think that if GRE stayed in production, they'd have released another version of the DSP.

I still plan to wait and see what Uniden releases before looking for another scanner.

At present, I am sitting here in Mobile listening to Mobile county. I've not heard a peep from MPD. As you stated, this system has been abandoned, for what? I wonder if they will be headed to the 1st responders? I am unfamiliar with this area's programming issues since I'm visiting from out of state.

I'm going to program 1st responders with two Wildcards on my PSR500 and see what surfaces.

Tomorrow, I will head down to Ono, Island to monitor things. Thanks for you update.

I thought of buying another GRE, the PSR 800, but I'm going to wait this out since my city is using Phase I at present. Hopefully, someone will offer another alternative to the PSR 800.

I experimented with loading 6 different sites with corresponding TG's for the county. It seems to be working much better. I loaded each site into a separate scan list. Now, I can select the best one for my monitoring area.

 

[garys]

On the 996XT Yahoo group there is a guy who insists that Mobile City is on a Harris P25 system, but has no information on frequencies or anything else.

Your PSR500 will decode the control channels, but most of the Talk Groups are Phase II, so you won't hear much.

With the PSR500, you can do multisite trunking. I don't like it as much as the way the Uniden DMA scanner do it, but much of that could well be that I'm much more used to the Uniden scanners.

Like you, I'm not hot to buy a PSR800 as I'd be worried about repair service, firmware updates, and at some point database updates.

My hope is that the upcoming Unidens have Phase II capabilities.

At present, I am sitting here in Mobile listening to Mobile county. I've not heard a peep from MPD. As you stated, this system has been abandoned, for what? I wonder if they will be headed to the 1st responders? I am unfamiliar with this area's programming issues since I'm visiting from out of state.

I'm going to program 1st responders with two Wildcards on my PSR500 and see what surfaces.

Tomorrow, I will head down to Ono, Island to monitor things. Thanks for you update.

I thought of buying another GRE, the PSR 800, but I'm going to wait this out since my city is using Phase I at present. Hopefully, someone will offer another alternative to the PSR 800.

I experimented with loading 6 different sites with corresponding TG's for the county. It seems to be working much better. I loaded each site into a separate scan list. Now, I can select the best one for my monitoring area.

 

[davewhall29]

I've been in Nashville the past several days and the scanner works very well up here. I pick up both the Nashville Type II and P25 Phase I systems quite well and the new TN statewide P25 Phase II system also. Audio continues to be much better on the Phase I system than the Phase II. I think that if GRE stayed in production, they'd have released another version of the DSP.

So far only a handful of talkgroups on the TN statewide system is using Phase II, they are mostly still on Phase I. Most of the statewide towers have been built Phase II capable, but only THP Dist 1, 2 & 5 have Phase II talkgroups (all encrypted), but there main dispatch talkgroup is Phase I. The rest of the towers are slowly being switched over to Phase II capable. The Nashville sites are all still Phase I, even on the statewide system, as far as I know.
I have a PSR800 and I've noticed that the audio is different depending on what site I am picking up the transmission from and how far away I am from that tower. And I have noticed on the TN statewide system a lot of garbled transmissions (not encrypted, but it sounds like the transmission isn't getting into the tower).

 

[garys]

Thanks for the update. I probably just didn't notice the Dg versus D2 on the statewide system. I don't know when I'll be back in Nashville (soon I hope) or what scanner I'll have. The PSR800 isn't mine and has to go back to the owner at some point.

There is another thread in this forum about the multipath distortion, which would explain some of what I've heard on various P25 systems.

One interesting thing, at least to me, is that I didn't hear District 3 (which I think is Nashville) on the P25 system. I don't know if that means that THP is still on their old system or something else is going on. I did hear Dist 1, 2, & 5 very well, though.

So far only a handful of talkgroups on the TN statewide system is using Phase II, they are mostly still on Phase I. Most of the statewide towers have been built Phase II capable, but only THP Dist 1, 2 & 5 have Phase II talkgroups (all encrypted), but there main dispatch talkgroup is Phase I. The rest of the towers are slowly being switched over to Phase II capable. The Nashville sites are all still Phase I, even on the statewide system, as far as I know.
I have a PSR800 and I've noticed that the audio is different depending on what site I am picking up the transmission from and how far away I am from that tower. And I have noticed on the TN statewide system a lot of garbled transmissions (not encrypted, but it sounds like the transmission isn't getting into the tower).

 

[davewhall29]

Yes, District 3 (which is Nashville) is still on the analog low band vhf. They are waiting for a few more towers to go online before they switch over completely. Just to have coverage for all the area.

As far as the multipath distortion, I had not thought of that but I would say that is probably what you are hearing.

I got my 800 just before GRE went out of production, and got a real good deal on it, so I couldn't pass it up. I could sell it right now and double my money.

 

[garys]

That makes sense. I actually only saw one THP cruiser in Nashville, but we were mostly downtown. He stopped a guy and was on scene for a while before the tow truck came. I guess it was a bad night for the car owner. I didn't have the scanner with me, so I wasn't able to listen.

I really do like the 800, but I wouldn't buy one right now.

Did you buy the one that was listed here for an absurdly low price?

Yes, District 3 (which is Nashville) is still on the analog low band vhf. They are waiting for a few more towers to go online before they switch over completely. Just to have coverage for all the area.

As far as the multipath distortion, I had not thought of that but I would say that is probably what you are hearing.

I got my 800 just before GRE went out of production, and got a real good deal on it, so I couldn't pass it up. I could sell it right now and double my money.

 

[davewhall29]

Actually, I've had mine for about a year now. Bought it online. I really enjoy it though.

 

[garys]

Actually, I've had mine for about a year now. Bought it online. I really enjoy it though.

Cool. I still kick myself about once a week for not jumping on the one listed here. I think it was listed around $350.00 or so, unused. I thought about for about 10 minutes too long and it was gone.

 

[davewhall29]

Cool. I still kick myself about once a week for not jumping on the one listed here. I think it was listed around $350.00 or so, unused. I thought about for about 10 minutes too long and it was gone.

I got mine for about $250 from someone who apparently didn't know what they had. At that time, they were running $350+ everywhere else. Oh well, his loss is my gain.

 

[Paco-Jerte]

I got mine for about $250 from someone who apparently didn't know what they had. At that time, they were running $350+ everywhere else. Oh well, his loss is my gain.

I had a chance to get one at 200 but passed caz it was the one that the face was not shiny and had worn out already. Looked ugly so I passed up on it.

Sent from my SPH-L900 using Tapatalk 2

 

[BamaScan]

Is Orange Beach the only one still using p25 phase I on the 700 mhz ??

 

[garys]

Is Orange Beach the only one still using p25 phase I on the 700 mhz ??

I think Gulf Shores, but I'm not 100% sure of that.

 

[Ensnared]

Gulf Shores Encrypted

I think Gulf Shores, but I'm not 100% sure of that.

When I was recently visiting the area, I heard Gulf Shores on the Alabama 1st Responders TSYS. They were fully encrypted. Yes, Orange Beach was in the clear, phase I transmissions.