SDS100/SDS200: Favorites Site Issue

[werinshades]

For example:

Hard to know how bad the volume range changes without having one in your hand. Hard to know how bad the squelch increments are without trying it yourself...I could go on.

Just because I may not know the details in an out of this series yet doesn't make me a consumer without a valid complaint.

Have you created a Favorite List, edited the channel or talkgroups Volume Offset level for the troubled channel/talkgroup? Not sure what the issue is with Squelch increments is, because I have always left it at 2?

As far as consumer complaint goes, we here aren't employees of Uniden, or portray ourselves as one. I'm not sure how long you've owned the scanner, how much time you've dedicated to programming it etc. But what I can say here is, if you start a thread with an issue, you have a few of us make suggestions on how to arrive at that programming goal, then either take the advice and try it, or don't and remain frustrated.

 

[mc48]

Don't turn off the site until you have turned another site on first, problem solved. Q Key's work just fine if you know how to program and use them, they also give you the option of using site hold to select a site or GPS to do it automatically.

 

[a727469]

Have you created a Favorite List, edited the channel or talkgroups Volume Offset level for the troubled channel/talkgroup? Not sure what the issue is with Squelch increments is, because I have always left it at 2?

As far as consumer complaint goes, we here aren't employees of Uniden, or portray ourselves as one. I'm not sure how long you've owned the scanner, how much time you've dedicated to programming it etc. But what I can say here is, if you start a thread with an issue, you have a few of us make suggestions on how to arrive at that programming goal, then either take the advice and try it, or don't and remain frustrated.

Exactly correct…I believe when the operator said he had a valid complaint, I would like to think he really means a suggestion for improvement as he sees it…learn, make constructive suggestions and be positive and enjoy what we have! …there are other hobbies 😊

 

[Ubbe]

Again if you turn all off I haven't found a way to recover.

You can recover if you have assigned a QK to your Favorite List and the Department as well as the sites and then enter the whole sequence 1.2.3 E if the FL are QK 1 and department are QK 2 and a site are QK 3.

The firmware code are done in a way that could need improvement. If you unselect all sites then the firmware code "forgets" which FL and department you had selected. It is a flaw or a simple coding mistake. As you haven't changed FL or department it should still know what FL and dept you had running and then use that as the default when selecting sites. It's probably a change to the code that takes 5 minutes to do for a programming guy but the issue have probably not been reported to Uniden in a proper way for them to take enough notice to log it as a bug.

/Ubbe

 

[dave3825]

Seems like the SDS was an unfinished flawed product that lost support and routine updates after the one guy died

The one guy who died, has a name. His name is Paul Opitz aka UPMAN. He unfortunately lost a 2 year battle with Cancer.

Guess I was expecting something better than my PRO-106 and so far I'm not impressed. I feel like I just got a pretty color screen

The Pro 106 was released 2008. The SDS100 was released 2018, 10 years later.

So if you, do not use gps, or monitor any phase 2, Dmr, Nxdn or Provoice, then yeah, all you got was a pretty color screen.

 

[StoliRaz]

I think I found a flaw. If you assign a quick key to sites you can toggle them on and off no problem.

If you turn all sites off I have not found a way of turning them back on unless I hook it back up to Sentinel.

Somehow it doesn't recognize the QK when they are all off but long as you toggle them ON/OFF and leave one on you can recover.

Again if you turn all off I haven't found a way to recover.

Quick keys are a PITA, makes me miss the old easy channels/banks setup. It's a shame they couldn't have made a split memory with 10 banks of 100 channels for conventional use then have a separate dynamic memory for trunking systems only, to accomodate all trunked systems from massive to tiny without wasting space. The best of both worlds.

Anyways, I usually just lump things together by county, each being a "system", "groups" being police, fire,utilities, etc within each county and be done with it. I don't bother numbering anything other than systems, as I'm never going to remember what anything is numbered as anyways. I can turn each county on or off, which I typically do if one is out of range to speed up the scanning.

I think I'm going to attempt to reprogram it to clean it up and get it to resemble a banks/channel scanner as closely as possible in the future. Should be fun

 

[TexTAC]

I reported this and a similar issue on one of these forums a while back. The solution to this issue is to just re-toggle the favorite list quick key only. Once the favorite list is re-toggled you can toggle the system/dept quick keys.

The other issue I reported is that no matter if you toggle a dept quick key on or off, the screen always indicates you just toggled it on.

 

[werinshades]

The other issue I reported is that no matter if you toggle a dept quick key on or off, the screen always indicates you just toggled it on.

Can you explain this a little further?

 

[TexTAC]

Can you explain this a little further?

Toggle a site/dept QK on or off by typing something like 0.0.1 & enter. No matter if you just toggled that quick key on or off, a note will appear on the screen saying:

“Quick Key 0.0.1 = On”

The QK will toggle on and off but the note always says “on”. Edited to add that the note only stays on the screen for about 1-2 seconds then disappears.

 

[werinshades]

Toggle a site/dept QK on or off by typing something like 0.0.1 & enter. No matter if you just toggled that quick key on or off, a note will appear on the screen saying:

“Quick Key 0.0.1 = On”

The QK will toggle on and off but the note always says “on”. Edited to add that the note only stays on the screen for about 1-2 seconds then disappears.

11.0.3..OFF (It's off, no traffic from ISP Troop 3)
11.0.3..ON (It's on, now receiving traffic from Troop 3)

Your symptom is usually as a result of duplicate programming or a department wasn't assigned a Quick Key and it will remain on until the Favorite List or System is turned off.

Open up Sentinel, review the Department(s), also confirm you don't have the Favorite List programmed twice.

Also to add: If you have both the Site and Department on the same Quick Key, you will also see this ON message even when trying to turn it off.

 

[dave3825]

Toggle a site/dept QK on or off by typing something like 0.0.1 & enter. No matter if you just toggled that quick key on or off, a note will appear on the screen saying:

“Quick Key 0.0.1 = On”

The QK will toggle on and off but the note always says “on”. Edited to add that the note only stays on the screen for about 1-2 seconds then disappears.

Had something similar happening on my 436 a year or two ago. Always said on and was not turning on. I redid the programming and it seems to have fixed it self. I have not had the issue since or on my 200 which have the same fav lists.

 

[werinshades]

Had something similar happening on my 436 a year or two ago. Always said on and was not turning on. I redid the programming and it seems to have fixed it self. I have not had the issue since or on my 200 which have the same fav lists.

You probably had a duplicate somewhere in there until you changed it up.

 

[TexTAC]

Maybe it is because for trunked systems I assigned Site QKs and for conventional systems i assigned Dept QKs. The radio does what I want it to do, the note that flashes is just wrong. I use the site/dept QKs to toggle various counties on/off even within trunked systems that contain sites in multiple counties.

 

[werinshades]

Maybe it is because for trunked systems I assigned Site QKs and for conventional systems i assigned Dept QKs. The radio does what I want it to do, the note that flashes is just wrong. I use the site/dept QKs to toggle various counties on/off even within trunked systems that contain sites in multiple counties.

Yes, it's more likely a programming issue as I described since I can't duplicate the issue utilizing the same keypress sequence.

 

[TexTAC]

Yes, it's more likely a programming issue as I described since I can't duplicate the issue utilizing the same keypress sequence.

Are you setting site/dept QKs at the site level, department level, or both? I have some systems like NTIRN and PAWM that have sites in various counties. I am programming QKs for those systems at the site level. I am not assigning QKs to all the departments (talkgroups). I am thinking that could be the issue. Either way though, the flash screen should say off when the radio turns the sites off (and it does turn the correct sites off cause I’ve spent hours watching it).

 

[werinshades]

Departments, Sites or Are you setting site/dept QKs at the site level, department level, or both? I have some systems like NTIRN and PAWM that have sites in various counties. I am programming QKs for those systems at the site level. I am not assigning QKs to all the departments (talkgroups). I am thinking that could be the issue. Either way though, the flash screen should say off when the radio turns the sites off (and it does turn the correct sites off cause I’ve spent hours watching it).

Everything has it's own Quick Key. Each Favorite List, System, Department and Site each have it's own Quick Key. I have some Favorite Lists with more than 1 system, and each System has it's own Quick Key. Each Department under each System under each Favorite List has it's own Quick Key. By doing this, I have more control over my programming.

 

[TexTAC]

Thank you. That helps and is probably what is causing my issue.

 

[werinshades]

Thank you. That helps and is probably what is causing my issue.

Your welcome and I'm sure it is. It just takes some thought and creativity and patience when it comes to setting up your own Favorite Lists, to get it just the way you'd like it. Then it's easier to make subtle changes if you don't like the way something is programmed or want to spread it out a little further. You can also utilize filters, Volume Offsets, Alert Tones, Alert Lights too. I've mastered it pretty well, but took me awhile to get it right, make mistakes and start all over. I also like text tagging radio ID's (UID's) on many of my trunk systems. This also falls under the "patience" category.

To wrap this up, the software is far from perfect, but it's also been around awhile and many of us have learned to work with the pluses and minuses with the goal to get these scanners programmed. Good luck, have a little fun with it.