BCD436HP/BCD536HP: bcd436hp question about what to hold

[Clats97]

Hello, im new to all this so i dont know much. Im wondering what im supposed to "hold" if i want to properly scan a system. For example, theres a system called "Algonquin College" with a site called "algonquin tower" and a department called "facilities" with 5 channnels such as security, IT, HVAC, property management.

What im wondering is what do i hold if i want to scan the system properly? do i leave the department on "algonquin tower" or on "facilities"? Or does it not make a difference?

Basically i need to know if i hold the tower or the department thats named facilities. The manual was no help .

Thanks

 

[hexagon_keyhole]

Hello, im new to all this so i dont know much. Im wondering what im supposed to "hold" if i want to properly scan a system. For example, theres a system called "Algonquin College" with a site called "algonquin tower" and a department called "facilities" with 5 channnels such as security, IT, HVAC, property management.

What im wondering is what do i hold if i want to scan the system properly? do i leave the department on "algonquin tower" or on "facilities"? Or does it not make a difference?

Basically i need to know if i hold the tower or the department thats named facilities. The manual was no help .

Thanks

Let me deconstruct it a little to help break it down-

System Name: Algonquin College
Site: Algonquin Tower
Department: Facilities
Channels: Security, IT, HVAC, Property Management

Assuming there's only one site, if you want to listen to just "Property Management" you can hold on Property Management.
If you want to rotate between the channels, you can hold on Department which would cycle between the channels in that Department.

Generally speaking, holding on a Channel or Department will get you the correct site and system.

If there's more than one site, sometimes holding on a particular Channel/Department + Site will help keep things in order and not waste time. A different site might have a different set of frequencies that the scanner would waste time looking at; narrowing it down helps.

Hope this helps!

 

[Clats97]

Let me deconstruct it a little to help break it down-

System Name: Algonquin College
Site: Algonquin Tower
Department: Facilities
Channels: Security, IT, HVAC, Property Management

Assuming there's only one site, if you want to listen to just "Property Management" you can hold on Property Management.
If you want to rotate between the channels, you can hold on Department which would cycle between the channels in that Department.

Generally speaking, holding on a Channel or Department will get you the correct site and system.

If there's more than one site, sometimes holding on a particular Channel/Department + Site will help keep things in order and not waste time. A different site might have a different set of frequencies that the scanner would waste time looking at; narrowing it down helps.

Hope this helps!

So i want to scan the channels, but im unsure as to whether I place the hold on the site or the department called "facilities". Whats the difference between the site and the department, practically speaking? This may help me figure it out.

Also, on a different note, do you know how to use "RF Power Plot" to determine the best placement of an antenna? i was told the feature can be used for that but cant find anything on how to do it. Do you know how to use RF Power Plot?

 

[hexagon_keyhole]

So i want to scan the channels, but im unsure as to whether I place the hold on the site or the department called "facilities". Whats the difference between the site and the department, practically speaking? This may help me figure it out.

Also, on a different note, do you know how to use "RF Power Plot" to determine the best placement of an antenna? i was told the feature can be used for that but cant find anything on how to do it. Do you know how to use RF Power Plot?

Think of a site as a set of radio frequencies that only operate at a particular site:

Site A only uses Frequencies 1,2,3,4.
Site B only uses Frequencies 5,6,7,8.

If Site A and B are really far apart and you are only at one site (or close to it), no need to scan the furthest one as you can't pick it up. The scanner doesn't know that you are far away from the other site, it just knows that you told it to scan both sites. You would be wasting time scanning the extra frequencies at the other site that could potentially cause you to miss transmissions.

Departments and Channels are going to be independent of frequencies on a trunked radio system; you do not scan the frequencies to listen to particular Departments/Channels on a trunked radio system. The radio system picks from a pool of frequencies and there isn't a hard assignment of a particular frequency for a Channel/Department.

Let's build on a very simple system that that has 2 Departments:

Facilities Department
Channel 1: Janitor
Channel 2: Gatekeeper
Channel 3: Landscaper

Security Department
Channel 1: Security
Channel 2: Fire
Channel 3: Parking

If you want to listen to the Facilities Department and all their channels, you would hold on the Facilities Department. You will only listen to Facilities Department and not the Security Department.

If you want to listen only to Parking, you would hold on the Parking Channel. You won't hear anything but Parking.

About the RF Power Plot, a great resource is the Easier to Read Manual located here: Easier to Read BCD436/536HP Digital Scanner Manual (marksscanners.com) Basically, you can use the RF Power Plot/Analysis to help you to view signal strength, signal quality and activity on sites in trunked systems. You want a good mix of signal strength and quality so that you scanner can properly trunk track and decode the audio.