Fav List - Conv. and Trunked

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whsbuss

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What is the best way to handle conventional freqs? My county has a Motorola P25 system but also uses fireground freqs not part of the system. They are just for mobile units.

I have a favorites list established for county FD which is the system P25. Is it best to include these frequencies as a system within that FL or create a separate one? Want the most efficient way to handle these.
 

kikito

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I basically use my Favorites list like the Virtual Folders on the GRE scanners, I have my main FL for my local day to day area. And in there I have a mixed of all trunked and conventional separated by Systems and Depts. Works great for me. Then I use other FLs for when traveling to other areas and things I rarely use like the nationwide assignments, etc.
 

SDavis90

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I listen to an analog trunked system, which is only fire and police coverage for my area. The ems agency is conventional. With that and a few other fire/ems freqs, I created a system with just those as they are affiliated with that city. They both use same system QK of 1. So when I activate that towns system, since the conventional freqs in that town have same quick key, it activates both. If I want to be more specific, then I assign service types to narrow it down. All within my primary "local" favorite list.

Hope that makes sense.
 

whsbuss

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Thanks guys. I'll add those conventional freq.'s to my trunked system FL. Just wanted to make sure it didn't affect the scan speed.
 

SDavis90

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I've not noticed anything discernibly negative about scan speed when listening to a singular favorite list. That's comparing it sitting beside my 396 scanning a duplicate set-up.
 

ofd8001

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We're in a similar situation - the "main" radio is P25 trunked, but there are some conventional VHF frequencies (paging, mutual aid, simplex in case a radio gets in a dead zone).

I created a "Fire" Favorites List. There are two systems in that Favorites List. One is the P25 System, the other is the "Conventional Fire Frequencies".
 

kikito

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Thanks guys. I'll add those conventional freq.'s to my trunked system FL. Just wanted to make sure it didn't affect the scan speed.

In my opinion and from the reports of other people in here, it seems the scanning slows down the more separate FLs you are scanning. I can't scientifically prove that yet but after UPMan's explanation of the order of how things are scanned with multiple Favorites Lists active, it does sounds like it'll slow down or in the least, not scan in the specific order you expect it.
 

phask

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In my opinion and from the reports of other people in here, it seems the scanning slows down the more separate FLs you are scanning. I can't scientifically prove that yet but after UPMan's explanation of the order of how things are scanned with multiple Favorites Lists active, it does sounds like it'll slow down or in the least, not scan in the specific order you expect it.

Nope - that is NOT what Paul said, he said multiple FL with the same sites.

ANY combination - FL, quickey, or even duplication within a single FL that increases the number of sites will slow the scan time.

In theory 50 fl with 2 conventional freqs = 100 items should scan the same as 1 fl with 100 freqs,

Us HP1 users have combined conv & trucked forever - the entire DB does it.
 

kikito

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OK. I was referring more to the part where he said it'll scan some things in one FL and move to the next one before scanning everything in that same FL and then do the same on the next FL. Let me see if I can find that post before I keep painting myself in the corner by going by memory. And yeah, like you said it might be only with multiple FLs with same sites.
 

whsbuss

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Nope - that is NOT what Paul said, he said multiple FL with the same sites.

ANY combination - FL, quickey, or even duplication within a single FL that increases the number of sites will slow the scan time.

In theory 50 fl with 2 conventional freqs = 100 items should scan the same as 1 fl with 100 freqs,

Us HP1 users have combined conv & trucked forever - the entire DB does it.

So if I have two separate FLs one for FD and one for PD that are within the same trunked system (same sites), its better to have just one FL with different departments?

From the Manual (pg 51):

Scanning is performed with a mixture of FLQK order and SQK order. The scanner will not scan all Systems in one Favorites List and then move to the next List.

For each Favorites List, starting with 0, the scanner will scan each 0 SQK in FLQK order and then move to the next set of SQKs for each list.

Example:

FLQK 0, SQK 0; FLQK 1, SQK 0.... FLQK 98, SQK 99; FLQK 99, SQK, 99.

Systems with the same quick key are scanned in order of creation.
The Database is scanned next, in order of creation. Then, Systems with no quick key (including created Quick Save Systems) are scanned and in order of creation.
Conventional Channels and Departments within Systems are also scanned in order of creation.
 

phask

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So if I have two separate FLs one for FD and one for PD that are within the same trunked system (same sites), its better to have just one FL with different departments?

From the Manual (pg 51):

Scanning is performed with a mixture of FLQK order and SQK order. The scanner will not scan all Systems in one Favorites List and then move to the next List.

For each Favorites List, starting with 0, the scanner will scan each 0 SQK in FLQK order and then move to the next set of SQKs for each list.

Example:

FLQK 0, SQK 0; FLQK 1, SQK 0.... FLQK 98, SQK 99; FLQK 99, SQK, 99.

Systems with the same quick key are scanned in order of creation.
The Database is scanned next, in order of creation. Then, Systems with no quick key (including created Quick Save Systems) are scanned and in order of creation.
Conventional Channels and Departments within Systems are also scanned in order of creation.
Yes - 1 scan of a site.
It will go through the site , lock on .etc and that takes a couple seconds, then it will just do it again.

- not technically correct - but as good an explanation as I can give.

Also - if you have sites you do not need - same issue.

It's been explained several times - I'm done with it.
 

kikito

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So if I have two separate FLs one for FD and one for PD that are within the same trunked system (same sites), its better to have just one FL with different departments?

MY opinion and MY preference: Yes.

That's kind of what I've been trying to say from my first post and I should've kept it simple and at just that.
 

ofd8001

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Lots of this goes to what works best for each user.

There's a trunked system I listen to quite a bit. In this system I have several departments: Fire, Police, EMS, Local Government, Event Channels and mutual aid channels. This is all in Favorites List 1.

If all I want to listen to is fire, I have to turn off the other 5 departments. So my key press sequence is something like this: 01.01.02 E, 01.01.03 E, 01.01.04 E, 01.01.05 E and 01.01.06 E for a total of 45 button presses, just to confine my scanning to only fire.

What I did was create a second Favorites List for this system copying only fire, giiving that Favorites List Quick Key 2.

So now if I want to listen to just fire, all I have to press is 01 E (turning off everything in that system) then press 02 E (which turns on only fire in that system).

This way I'm able to accomplish what I want with 39 less button presses. Seems to be an efficient way for me.
 

whsbuss

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Lots of this goes to what works best for each user.

There's a trunked system I listen to quite a bit. In this system I have several departments: Fire, Police, EMS, Local Government, Event Channels and mutual aid channels. This is all in Favorites List 1.

If all I want to listen to is fire, I have to turn off the other 5 departments. So my key press sequence is something like this: 01.01.02 E, 01.01.03 E, 01.01.04 E, 01.01.05 E and 01.01.06 E for a total of 45 button presses, just to confine my scanning to only fire.

What I did was create a second Favorites List for this system copying only fire, giiving that Favorites List Quick Key 2.

So now if I want to listen to just fire, all I have to press is 01 E (turning off everything in that system) then press 02 E (which turns on only fire in that system).

This way I'm able to accomplish what I want with 39 less button presses. Seems to be an efficient way for me.

WOW like that! That's what I want an easy to segregate depts.
 

kikito

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That's some good suggestions there 'ofd8001'.

Now here's my way of doing it, but it only works so far as I can tell, when the stuff you want to listen to is all within the same system.

I also listen to this trunked system that I have on an FL and then I segregate it by Depts.

If I want to listen to just Fire, I press the Dept. Hold button and once it shows is on Hold, then I use the scroll knob to switch the Dept. to Fire and just let go! Now I'm only listening to only Fire! When you're done just press the Dept. Hold button and it goes back to normal scanning of everything you might have enabled.

If you wanted to listen to only Police, press Dept. Hold, scroll to the Police tag and then let go.

Does that makes sense? It works great and I think is one of the big advantages this scanner has.
 

whsbuss

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That's some good suggestions there 'ofd8001'.

Now here's my way of doing it, but it only works so far as I can tell, when the stuff you want to listen to is all within the same system.

I also listen to this trunked system that I have on an FL and then I segregate it by Depts.

If I want to listen to just Fire, I press the Dept. Hold button and once it shows is on Hold, then I use the scroll knob to switch the Dept. to Fire and just let go! Now I'm only listening to only Fire! When you're done just press the Dept. Hold button and it goes back to normal scanning of everything you might have enabled.

If you wanted to listen to only Police, press Dept. Hold, scroll to the Police tag and then let go.

Does that makes sense? It works great and I think is one of the big advantages this scanner has.

Yeah that works too. And you can still use the keypad to enter F0/S0/D0.

Has anyone got the Emergency Alert for a system to work yet?
 

whsbuss

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Doesn't work for P25 systems, that I know. It hasn't for the past 3 Uniden radio models.

Really? That's a bummer. For our FD emergency TGID I set that for Alert on the channel. Don't know why its in the sentinel if it don't work.
 

kikito

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Oh, you're talking about the individual Radio ID alerts? Yeah, those should work.

I thought you were talking about the actual Emergency buttons that they can press on the radios.
 

kikito

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That's some good suggestions there 'ofd8001'.



Now here's my way of doing it, but it only works so far as I can tell, when the stuff you want to listen to is all within the same system.



I also listen to this trunked system that I have on an FL and then I segregate it by Depts.



If I want to listen to just Fire, I press the Dept. Hold button and once it shows is on Hold, then I use the scroll knob to switch the Dept. to Fire and just let go! Now I'm only listening to only Fire! When you're done just press the Dept. Hold button and it goes back to normal scanning of everything you might have enabled.



If you wanted to listen to only Police, press Dept. Hold, scroll to the Police tag and then let go.



Does that makes sense? It works great and I think is one of the big advantages this scanner has.


All this works even quicker when you're actively listening to the same Dept. you want to Hold. Just press the Dept. Hold button and that's it. Now you're listening to Only Fire.
 
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