CS-F4TR driving me to drink

[Tejedor]

I am trying to program a F4TR and its not having any of it.

I have both the Icom Serial Port cable, and also got in yesterday the OPC-478UC USB cable with software. No matter what I do I cannot get the CS-F4TR to read from or wright to the radio.

I have tried the OPC-478 on a laptop with a real seriel port. No luck. I have tried the OPC-478UC on 3 computers with no luch.

Took the radio apart to make sure the speaker jack in the radio was OK. All of the contacts in the jack were good. I did find a solder point on the board that may have had a cold solder and re-soldered it.

Still does not work.

Anyone have any suggestions.

Oh, also the 3 computers I used all had 3 different versions of windowns. One was 98, one was XP the other windows 7. None of them worked with the CS software or the cables.

I'm going to go have that drink now and hope someone has an idea.

Thanks,

David

 

[grumps96]

Hi David, What is the error message you are receiving?

 

[Tejedor]

Error Message

The message I keep betting on both cables is something like: unable to read data from radio. make sure the cable is connected and the radio is on.

Well the cables are connected, the radio is on, etc... Makes me so mad that I had to put it all down and walk away.

I know its not the ports because I am able to program my Radio Shack Pro 97, 164, 163, Uniden 296XT and my Wouxun radios with the same computer as I am trying to program this darn Icom.

Anyway, sorry for the rant.

I think I am going to order another F4TR and try that. If that does not work then I am going to try to go with a F43TR.

If those dont work them I am going to drink some more whisky, tie them onto fishing line and use them as weights.

Thanks for your response.

David

 

[grumps96]

The Icom CS F4TR can be very finnicky. It needs to have the right Comport connected to it. It is to lazy to look
for your radio. you have to lead it by the hand. Do You know how to find out what comport a device is connected to? If so make sure the comport the radio is connected to is the same as what the software
is using. Even if you get the software to read your radio, it may not want to write to the radio, if that happens
just keep trying to write, sometimes it takes several tries before it takes.

 

[Tejedor]

Thanks for the help

Thanks for the reply.

I will try again to switch the com ports around to see which one works. I have tried but none have seemed to work. On the copy of the cloning software I have it only has com ports 1 thru 4 so it should not be to hard to work thru them all again.

I am sure hoping this works. If not I am about ready to put a bullet thru the radio just to be spitefull.

Thanks again.

David

 

[grumps96]

Dave, The software may only have 4 comports, but your computer has many more. You need to find out what comport your computer has assigned to your cable/radio and if needed change it to one that the software can access. Check your PM's

 

[Tejedor]

Got the Glock out and its locked, loaded

Got home today ready to try this again.

I looked at all the comports and made sure that one thru four were clear. Disabled the wireless, took off the USB mouse, hopeing that this would prevent anything from interfearing with the process of reading and wrighting to the radio.

Started with Com Port 1 and the Serial Port Cable. Tried reading over and over again. I think 5 or 6 times. No luck. Moved to wighting a file to the radio. Again multiple times. No luck. Went back a few more times to read the radio. Not happening.

Did this with all com ports 1,2, 3, 4. Nothing.

Switched to the USB adapted cable. Repeated the above process. About 45 minutes or so and now I have the gun out, loaded, and ready.

Now the issue is do I shoot the thing? Go out back and dig a hole, pour gas no it and burn it? Go out to a country road, get up to 100mph and through it out the window?

Anyone think I should set up a pole and see which wins out?

Thanks again Grumps for the advise but so far nothing is working.

I think what I am going to have to do is buy a Motorola HT1250+ and a cloning cable and just clone one of my work radios rather than try to program this to work with my work's system.

David.

 

[nevets10]

Dave, The software may only have 4 comports, but your computer has many more. You need to find out what comport your computer has assigned to your cable/radio and if needed change it to one that the software can access.

I would guess it an issue with your com ports.

To check, go to your control panel - system - hardware - devise manager - ports

At that point it will show you which port is being used with your cable. When i just looked at my computer it was up to port #28

 

[toddhawkins]

I am having the same issue. I know it's not my COM ports though because I can plug in a IC-F4S and it reads and writes perfectly. What software are you using because I could not find anything online for the IC-F4TR so I been trying to use my F4S software.

 

[nevets10]

The F4S and F4TR softwares are completely different. And it could still be a port issue. You might want to at least check it out. It's easy. Instructions are in my post above

 

[toddhawkins]

Trust me when I say it is not a port issue. As I stated previously I have other radios that read through fine. Does anyone have a download link to IC-F4TR software?

 

[grumps96]

David, Did you ever get the problem resolved?

 

[Tejedor]

Grumps,

Never got the thing to talk to the computer.

Gave up on it for now.

The strange thing is this afternoon I have been using the same laptop that I use for my other radios without a problem. Using com port 1 thru 4 and no problems.

Using the computer with UniTrunk and my BC396XT and no issues.

I am thinking about getting a F43TR with it's programming software to see if I have better luck.

The F4TR was a used radio and $80.00 for it, software charger and 1 cable. It's not a big loss since I cant get it to work.

I am thinking that with the F43TR I'll go with a new unit. If I cant get it to work maybe I'll have some kind of support from the vendor.

Thats my thinking anyway.

David

 

[gregwenn]

Reset Com port?

I just had the same problem - it used to work, then it did not.

In between I had however run DOS and a DOS/Kenwood TK860 progarmming setup.

I went into XP settings/system/COM port and disabled it then reenabled it.
Voila, success.

cheers