Beta testers

[BigEvil]

this is not intended to be a flame threat, or accusatory in any way. I'm just wondering what the beta testing process was like for the 536HP. It seems there are more than a number of relatively noticeable issues that should have/could have been caught with even lackluster testing. Were those who were given test units asleep at the wheel or did manufacturing issues come into play after the test units?

Worth a thought, good learning experience for Uniden and also us early adopters who are really the ones it's causing headaches for.

 

[fxdscon]

this is not intended to be a flame threat, or accusatory in any way. I'm just wondering what the beta testing process was like for the 536HP. It seems there are more than a number of relatively noticeable issues that should have/could have been caught with even lackluster testing. Were those who were given test units asleep at the wheel or did manufacturing issues come into play after the test units?

Worth a thought, good learning experience for Uniden and also us early adopters who are really the ones it's causing headaches for.

At least the noisy headphone output was not in play when beta testing was going on..

I also want to totally clear any misconception that this was something our beta testers should have caught…they do a great job helping us find and fix bugs and in many ways shape the final product that you receive. But, the issue you are seeing with the headphone noise did not exist on any samples used for beta testing.

 

[signal500]

this is not intended to be a flame threat, or accusatory in any way. I'm just wondering what the beta testing process was like for the 536HP. It seems there are more than a number of relatively noticeable issues that should have/could have been caught with even lackluster testing. Were those who were given test units asleep at the wheel or did manufacturing issues come into play after the test units?

Worth a thought, good learning experience for Uniden and also us early adopters who are really the ones it's causing headaches for.

BigEvil, we are the Beta Testers. At least I feel that we are. We are the early adopters of these units and we are finding all of the issues that need to be address and corrected. There are many electronic products during the initial release that contain bugs, problems and issues that will only come to light after it's released to the market. Most companies just have a few beta testers, but once it's released to the resellers, the first end users become the much larger test group. Some products only have a few problems, while others have many.

Maybe Uniden should have given a few hundred of the new scanners to an agency much like Motorola and other radio manufactures do to test the overall operation. But, even that won't be able to find all of the inherent problems that will exist.

That is one reason why when a new radio system goes live on the air, the technicians who helped set it up are on standby 24/7. There are always issues that will need to be corrected, whether it's a $600 scanner or a $20 million dollar radio system.

Uniden will make this right and they will correct the software bugs and hardware issues. I guarantee they want their "flagship" scanners to be the best in the marketplace and they will make that happen, just give them some time to correct the issues.

Like everyone else, I too want my new scanners to perform better than any other scanner I have ever owned. That is what we paid for!

 

[cherubim]

Early adopters will always get burnt. This is one reason why I will never buy the first version of any product.

 

[ofd8001]

Also, early users be they beta testers or first purchasers, might have a greater potential of influencing firmware changes. When the bugs are found, firmware updates to address the bugs are made. That's an excellent time to incorporate additional features or revise existing features (as in "since we are doing X, we may as well do Y"). You may have noticed a number of folks asking if the indicator light can stay on for the full transmission. This is an example of a possible improvement.

As long as I'm confident a manufacturer will stand behind their product and I'm confident that Uniden does, I won't lose any sleep over getting a first production run scanner.

 

[W8RMH]

From what I have experienced and what I have read here there was no beta testing.

 

[n5ims]

You must remember that for hardware items, beta testing is done on pre-production versions of the product. They are very short and controlled production runs so they're generally quite close to being "as designed" products. Production runs, especially early ones, may not have quite the "quality" of those test runs since they are done at full speed so until the bugs are worked out, one can easily expect a few problems.

Perhaps the component reels are not in quite the correct order. Perhaps the timing and/or placement isn't quite 100% yet. Perhaps ...

Problems that all agree should be worked out prior to anything being shipped to customers, but still happen none the less. It's not just Uniden that has these problems. Most every company does. Remember the early issues with the Xbox 360? The iPhones? The Tesla Model S?

If you just have to buy a new product very early in the release cycle, you should expect a few issues. If you don't want to fight them you should wait until the product's been out for a few months and they've had a chance to work them out.

 

[dkf435]

Well at least my rule of not being one of the Beta testers by not buying the first couple batches is holding true, this is starting to look like one of Yaesus runs of ham radios.

Most manufacturers make it right after the new XXTT version comes out and then you have to pay to upgrade the XT firmware by sending it back to Japan for a 3 month trip. Yaesu did that on the VX-8 with a short time frame and was very secret about the details until program was over.

David Kb7uns

 

[LIScanner101]

What about all the other bugs that were discovered by the early adopters really quickly?

 

[LIScanner101]

Early adopters will always get burnt. This is one reason why I will never buy the first version of any product.

Amen to that.

 

[4482]

Amen to that.

I bought my BCD536HP from the first batch HRO had.
It does not appear I have the earphone noise problem.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

 

[E-Man]

With Unidens history of sub par models, I would have thought they would have gone the extra mile to insure they got it right this time. Seems like Uniden was more interested in beating Whistler to market than releasing a thoroughly tested product.

 

[JANFINE]

You are correct

You are right on.

this is not intended to be a flame threat, or accusatory in any way. I'm just wondering what the beta testing process was like for the 536HP. It seems there are more than a number of relatively noticeable issues that should have/could have been caught with even lackluster testing. Were those who were given test units asleep at the wheel or did manufacturing issues come into play after the test units?

Worth a thought, good learning experience for Uniden and also us early adopters who are really the ones it's causing headaches for.

 

[UPMan]

We have about 20 beta testers across the US who have caught literally hundreds of bugs and contributed significantly to improving feature implementation, as well. I have absolutely no issues whatsoever with either our beta team or process. That said, there are an infinite number of different ways to use the scanners, and I expect as part of the early release process that some bugs will be found by early adopters. To that end, we are prepared to closely monitor and react to early reports. We will have a firmware update out soon that will address the 5 main issues reported here and elsewhere.

Improved Long squelch tail problem
Fixed backlight set to squelch problem.
Fixed "Conventional discovery hangs on a P25 control channel even with time-out timer set."
Fixed "Scanner Hangs with no audio in mobile install after start with some vehicles."
Fixed DAT icon problem.

 

[whsbuss]

We have about 20 beta testers across the US who have caught literally hundreds of bugs and contributed significantly to improving feature implementation, as well. I have absolutely no issues whatsoever with either our beta team or process. That said, there are an infinite number of different ways to use the scanners, and I expect as part of the early release process that some bugs will be found by early adopters. To that end, we are prepared to closely monitor and react to early reports. We will have a firmware update out soon that will address the 4 main issues reported here and elsewhere.

Well I hope soon is "Soon" because I am struggling with reception issues on our Motorola SmartZone II system. Decoding is < 65%, low volume, missed transmissions, bass audio quality. Watching videos of others users have great success on their systems (most P25 P1 and P2) leaves a bad taste for what I need. Maybe you can inform us of the 4 major issues being addressed in the next firmware.

EDIT: I see you posted the list of fixes. No mention of what I am seeing.

 

[wise871]

The above fixes are indeed good news but myself and many others are still awaiting word on The Analyzer. Correct me if I'm wrong but during the initial release video it was mentioned that new features would be released in March that would take advantage of the WIFI. Nothing was said about Analyzer not being available. As it stands right now I find the x36HP useless for searching and discovering new Control Channels. We had serious band openings last night and I had to use my 996XT Custom Search with CC Only to scan for new CC. We have no way of finding new CC and getting the SysID on the x36HP. I like the radios but it seems like they were released too early. Nothing was mentioned except for the app delay which is understandable.

 

[SquierStrat]

We have about 20 beta testers across the US who have caught literally hundreds of bugs and contributed significantly to improving feature implementation, as well. I have absolutely no issues whatsoever with either our beta team or process. That said, there are an infinite number of different ways to use the scanners, and I expect as part of the early release process that some bugs will be found by early adopters. To that end, we are prepared to closely monitor and react to early reports. We will have a firmware update out soon that will address the 5 main issues reported here and elsewhere.

Improved Long squelch tail problem
Fixed backlight set to squelch problem.
Fixed "Conventional discovery hangs on a P25 control channel even with time-out timer set."
Fixed "Scanner Hangs with no audio in mobile install after start with some vehicles."
Fixed DAT icon problem.

so will #3 be fixed on the HP-1 as well? (please, at least answer this..)

 

[emtLarmy15]

I assume the "DAT" icon problem would be the scanner displaying DAT instead of decoding voice on some transmissions?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[troymail]

We have about 20 beta testers across the US who have caught literally hundreds of bugs and contributed significantly to improving feature implementation, as well. I have absolutely no issues whatsoever with either our beta team or process. That said, there are an infinite number of different ways to use the scanners, and I expect as part of the early release process that some bugs will be found by early adopters. To that end, we are prepared to closely monitor and react to early reports. We will have a firmware update out soon that will address the 5 main issues reported here and elsewhere.

Improved Long squelch tail problem
Fixed backlight set to squelch problem.
Fixed "Conventional discovery hangs on a P25 control channel even with time-out timer set."
Fixed "Scanner Hangs with no audio in mobile install after start with some vehicles."
Fixed DAT icon problem.

It's good to hear there is an update coming but I'm concerned there is no indication that there is a fix coming for the poor performance we're seeing on older Motorola Type II systems and/or slow scan rates. .

EDIT: In addition to the Type II issue above - this one also appears to be a problem on P25 systems:
I think I or others have reported this already but another concern is the failure of the radio to stop on active talkgroups while scanning from one system to another. I saw this again recently (on a P25 Phase II system) where the PSR800 is actively talking and the 536 just scans right through the same system (several times) without so much as a blink. On the other hand, the radio performs much better if I'm holding on a single system (it seems more "confused" when going from system to system like it's looking for a "perfect" control channel frame to sync to and if not, nothing).

Are any of these issues on the list for fixes?

 

[whsbuss]

It's good to hear there is an update coming but I'm concerned there is no indication that there is a fix coming for the poor performance we're seeing on older Motorola Type II systems and/or slow scan rates. .

I think I or others have reported this already but another concern is the failure of the radio to stop on active talkgroups while scanning from one system to another. I saw this again recently where the PSR800 is actively talking and the 536 just scans right through the same system (several times) without so much as a blink. On the other hand, the radio performs much better if I'm holding on a single system (it seems more "confused" when going from system to system like it's looking for a "perfect" control channel frame to sync to and if not, nothing).

Are any of these issues on the list for fixes?

As I mentioned prior, these are some of the problems I see here on Motorola Type II system on digital TGIDs. On shorter transmissions, all you hear is a quick "blip" on nothing at all. In a 24 hour period I would say somewhere around a 60% decode success rate, where you can actually discern what was said. The proposed fixes coming are welcomed for sure. But the most important feature (and the reason we all monitor) is hearing and understanding transmissions.