BCD396XT 2 Questions. Firmware and off freq

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N9JIG

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So I am out running around today and noticed I received no hits while "Service Searching" on the rail freqs on my BCD396XT but I was hearing them fine on another radio. When I dialed in a rail freq the BCD396XT heard it fine.

Later in the day as I had the radio in CloseCall mode I noticed that everything on VHF was coming up 5 KHz. high (153.895 displayed when it should have been 153.890...) and 12.5 KHz. down on UHF.

So now I am thinking that these two issues are likely related. If the radio is off freq, the Service Search will not work properly since it really is scanning a set of preset freqs.

I reset the radio (2,9, hold) and it still does the same thing.

So I then figured I would check the firmware. I have 1.10.02. According to Mr. Google there should be a 1.11.01 version but it seems all the links are down. The links from the RR forum post at http://forums.radioreference.com/uniden-forums/257324-new-396xt-1-11-01-firmware-available.html don't work and the YahooGroup Files section only has an older version.

Now I don't know if the firmware update, if I can actually find it, will help me but...


Question 1) Has anyone else found their 396XT off freq like this?

Question 2) Anyone know where I can find the 11.01.01 or newer firmware?

Thanks!
 
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w5tor

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Please be advise that the uniden software is not updating the database from Radio reference.
W5Tor
 

fxdscon

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I reset the radio (2,6, hold) and it still does the same thing.

Question 2) Anyone know where I can find the 11.01.01 or newer firmware?

Thanks!

The reset keys are (2, 9, hold) while turning on the scanner... not 2, 6, hold.

The Uniden site for the firmware updates seems to be down at the moment.

.
 

N9JIG

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The reset keys are (2, 9, hold) while turning on the scanner... not 2, 6, hold.

The Uniden site for the firmware updates seems to be down at the moment.

.

Thanks, I knew that but my fingers were too slow for my fast thinking brain!
 

ko6jw_2

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From the Uniden manual:

"The Close Call feature works better with some types of transmissions than others. It might not correctly display frequency information for transmitters using a highly directional antenna (such as an amateur radio beam antenna) or if there are many transmitters operating at the same time in the same area."

There is probably nothing wrong with your radio.
 

N9JIG

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No, it was way too consistently off freq on a wide variety of transmitters to be caused by a directional or multipath distortion issue. I use CloseCall almost always and this is a recent phenomena for this particular radio and the entire XT series (of which I have close to a dozen all in).

I was in rural areas, suburban areas, even tried it with a could HT's at home and they were all just a little high on VHF and a little low on UHF.

It is definitely an issue with this 396XT.
 

eorange

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ko6jw_2

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If the reference oscillator that provides the basis for the radio's frequency synthesis is off, then the radio needs to go back to Uniden. The firmware will not fix this.
 

N9JIG

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Thanks all. I was able to get the firmware update on Monday morning after Uniden apparently rebooted their servers. Now I need to get the radio off to Uniden service for repairs of the reference oscillator.
 
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