Broward County P25 (997.BEE00)

GTR8000

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From a VHF/UHF perspective - the (real) v3 RTL-SDR and AirSpy R2 are the only ones that are worth the $.
I wouldn't say that. You just need to order the correct dongle is the real issue here. The NooElec he bought, the one with the MCX connector, is junk. Any dongle ordered these days should be a TCXO variety with SMA connector. There are more choices than just the RTL-SDR.com ones. The FlightAware Pro Stick is great for weak signal work with the built in LNA, if used on normal/strong signals, the gain needs to be turned down much more than usual.

NooElec NESDR SMArt: https://www.nooelec.com/store/sdr/sdr-receivers/nesdr-smart-sdr.html
RTL-SDR.com: Buy RTL-SDR Dongles (RTL2832U)
FlightAware Pro Stick (the orange one, not the blue "Plus"): Pro Stick and Pro Stick Plus - FlightAware's USB ADS-B and MLAT receiver - FlightAware
 

batdude

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I am only offering my experience with various SDR dongles over the last few years, that's all -- I have a flightaware Pro Stick sitting here in the drawer - because AT MY QTH - it's garbage, so I can't recommend it as an alternative.

d
 

GTR8000

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I've been running all three of the dongles I listed for years on everything from VHF to 900 MHz, all sorts of trunked systems from EDACS to 3600 to P25, Motorola brand, Harris brand, Tait brand...no issues with any of them. I have never found the NooElec or FlightAware TCXO variants to be deficient in any band, including VHF and UHF. Fact is that all of those dongles are built on the exact same chip, so there is very little difference between them when it comes to performance. Only the FlightAware with the LNA is drastically different, and yes if you run it at the default gain used for non-LNA dongles, you're going to have major signal overload issues if you don't adjust the gain properly.
 

bweaver1985

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I'm thinking I might need a third tuner. I keep seeing tuner unavailable messages all i have monitored is Broward P25 but i set the number of Max Traffic channels to like 15 as i was seeing errors for max voice channels reached.
 

JimD56

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I run an SDS200 dedicated to just the NEW Broward P25, and the 2 dongles catch the overflow, mostly PD because I have the SDS200 scanning just Fire. There is "alot" on both the fire and police side. The dongles are constant;y receiving something that the SDS misses quite often.
 

batdude

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I run an SDS200 dedicated to just the NEW Broward P25, and the 2 dongles catch the overflow, mostly PD because I have the SDS200 scanning just Fire. There is "alot" on both the fire and police side. The dongles are constant;y receiving something that the SDS misses quite often.
you are making a good point here. I consider the SDR/DSD+ solution an absolute requirement when you really want to make sure you are hearing (mostly) everything. Even with my 536 and SDS200 running, DSD+ and the dongles will still find calls that the scanners miss.... whether it's a priority setting or activity on different TGs.

doug
 

Gmork

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I strongly recommend buying ferrite chokes and putting them on the usb cables. This is helped clean a lot of the noise which has helped my signal quality tremendously.
 

bweaver1985

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Ordered a 3rd tuner. I keep running getting no tuner available errors with current setup of 2 tuners monitoring system. I'm hoping a third tuner fixes the no tuner available issues.
 

APX8000

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I have the same NooElec's that GTR8000 recommended. Too many to count lol. Works great with the Unication stubby antennas. I track Broward, Palm Beach, Coral Springs, Plantation, Fort Lauderdale, Boca etc. without an issue. NooElec NESDR SMArt: https://www.nooelec.com/store/sdr/sdr-receivers/nesdr-smart-sdr.html I can easily throw them on the laptop and go for a drive....
 

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JimD56

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I have the same NooElec's that GTR8000 recommended. Too many to count lol. Works great with the Unication stubby antennas. I track Broward, Palm Beach, Coral Springs, Plantation, Fort Lauderdale, Boca etc. without an issue. NooElec NESDR SMArt: https://www.nooelec.com/store/sdr/sdr-receivers/nesdr-smart-sdr.html I can easily throw them on the laptop and go for a drive....
What are the specs/manufacture of the other 2 antennas, not the Uni's. Are they 700-800mhz? With a sma rt angle obviously as well?
Thanks
Jim
 

APX8000

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What are the specs/manufacture of the other 2 antennas, not the Uni's. Are they 700-800mhz? With a sma rt angle obviously as well? Thanks Jim

They are Motorola APX 7/800 GPS stubby's. If you are going to go that route, I'd grab some XTS 7/800 without the GPS. I used these as that's what I had at the time. I've since switched to all Unication with the blue band as I get a similar signal and I have OCD.
 

Bote

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11052 - new talkgroup (to me at least) heard just now with obvious fire training traffic.

This is 1 above 11051 which I had already identified as a training talkgroup, so that much checks out.

Kudos to whomever at communications assigned a training talkgroup for a training exercise.
 

Bote

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11053 - yet another training talkgroup. I'm hearing a drill right now, but with my scanner's mushmouth audio I can't tell if he's saying Engine-50 or Engine-52. I also heard Chief Bailey mentioned.

This makes the block 11051, 11052, and 11053 fire training talkgroups.
 

Bote

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10040 - I heard the tail end of a conversation this morning that sounded like real users, don't know who it was yet.

I applied a firmware update to this here BCD996P2 that covered quite a few revisions, including better digital audio decoding, plus I played with the P25 threshold so maybe I'll be able to understand what they're saying until I get my SDR situation figured out.
 

APX8000

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11053 - yet another training talkgroup. I'm hearing a drill right now, but with my scanner's mushmouth audio I can't tell if he's saying Engine-50 or Engine-52. I also heard Chief Bailey mentioned.

This makes the block 11051, 11052, and 11053 fire training talkgroups.

I can confirm these are:
11051 BCF TR-1
11052 BCF TR-2
11053 BCF TR-3
if you want to submit them to the database.
 

batdude

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Question for the group. The current listing for Broward Fire adds the word "Sheriff":

Broward Sheriff Fire-Rescue
and
Broward Sheriff Fire-Rescue Common

is the word "Sheriff" really in their department name?


doug
 
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