Goodbye Uniden? Simulcast Issues

[greggk]

Maus92: Thanks. That was a very succinct and well thought out reply. It seems all four towers in York are simulcasting. What I know for sure is that my 436 is picking up nothing for days now. My stationery 536 is off then on again, but as you pointed out, a person never really knows what he may be missing. I know I suspect that same issue.
And so, not wasting any time, I just sold 2 of my 3 remaining remaining shotguns. I'm 65 and have not hunted since age 16 when I gave it up. So now I am well funded to buy the SDS 100. I still worry that it may not work even tho I trust everyone here.

I've looked into the SDS 100; many of the characteristics of the 436 have been migrated over. Then they threw a bunch of goodies in.

Have not bought anything yet; However, waiting to buy will not change anything the SDS can do, so why not buy.?

Thanks to all who helped here. Much appreciated. Greg

 

[maus92]

I've driven through York and surrounds with the SDS200, performs flawlessly. Just be sure to purchase your SDS100 from a retailer who accepts returns with no restocking fee, aka Walmart. Be sure to select "Sold and Shipped by Walmart" in the checkout, or if you prefer, they can ship it to your local Walmart store for pickup in person.

Robot or human?

BTW, that link shows the closest Walmart to me; obviously you would want your local store.

 

[greggk]

Thats a great idea. I'm just not a Walmart fan...I tried hard, even attended a WalMart support group, but nothing. Amazon possibly? I've done business with them almost exclusively for many years. Thank you for the advice. Greg

 

[GTR8000]

The Bearcat BCD-996P2 that I own is great on ALL analog and digital, even on New Rochelle, NY Police that is simulcasted. I'm about 3 miles from their North End tower on Wilmot Road and The Hutchinson River Parkway. I cannot justify spending $699.95 on a scanner with a color screen. It is an OVER-KILL in my mind.

Yes, we know, your 996P2 is the perfect scanner for every occasion as you've posted many times. Except that it's not. It may be perfect for what you're listening to, but it comes up short along with nearly all other scanners when it comes to linear simulcast modulation (LSM) and QPSK modulation used with digital simulcast trunked systems. New Rochelle's simulcast is conventional, and is not the same as the trunked modulations we're talking about that give scanners trouble. The SDS series was designed with LSM/QPSK specifically in mind.

 

[maus92]

Thats a great idea. I'm just not a Walmart fan...I tried hard, even attended a WalMart support group, but nothing. Amazon possibly? I've done business with them almost exclusively for many years. Thank you for the advice. Greg

Just make sure you are purchasing from Amazon directly, and not one of their third party sellers. I mainly use Amazon, but I'll use Walmart if necessary, lol. Only go to the stores if there's no other option.

 

[greggk]

I always look for that "sold AND shipped" from Amazon. Plus I'm a prime member so that may help with shipping.

 

[jonwienke]

The Bearcat BCD-996P2 that I own is great on ALL analog and digital, even on New Rochelle, NY Police that is simulcasted. I'm about 3 miles from their North End tower on Wilmot Road and The Hutchinson River Parkway. I cannot justify spending $699.95 on a scanner with a color screen. It is an OVER-KILL in my mind. I'm just curious if the Comet BNC-W100RX 4" swivel telescoping whip antenna for base/handheld will perform better then the supplied factory antenna? I cannot put up a roof antenna here.

That's great for you and your location. But it absolutely does not apply to many other scanner users. Also, it's quite possible you have no idea how much traffic you're actually missing until you have a simulcast-capable radio for comparison.

 

[jim202]

Let me change the focus of this topic just a little. You said the system is a simulcast system. OK, but have you tried to plot out the location of the different tower locations and your location? If your lucky, you may be closer to one tower than the rest. If your in the middle of 2 towers or more, then your probably screwed.

If your on the outside of the multiple towers, pick the direction of closest tower. See if you can try a corner reflector antenna and point it toward the closest tower location.

Where I live I am lucky. We have an 8 tower Simulcast system with some tall towers for coverage. Some of them run 400 to 500 feet where the antennas are located. The nearest tower is only about a mile from me. I also am on one outside corner of the system, so there is no simulcast problem at my house.

The truth lies in where you live compared the the rest of the towers in a simulcast system. Even with a corner reflector antenna, it may take the use of attenuation to clean up the signal from the closest tower in the system.

Good luck on your efforts.

 

[Bob1955]

That's great for you and your location. But it absolutely does not apply to many other scanner users. Also, it's quite possible you have no idea how much traffic you're actually missing until you have a simulcast-capable radio for comparison.

jonweinke,
I have been into this hobby and know it "PROBABLY" more then you for this area. If I leave this BCD-996P2(used to work for NRPD) on hold, I get "ALL" traffic and it is crystal CLEAR too. They just switched to digital this past April 2019 on 155.130/NAC100 and you being in VA, don't really know this area meaning Westchester County, NY. Most of this area is still analog. Our County trunking system is Motorola Smart Zone ll on UHF with about (70) TGID'S. Some of the larger cites have their own fire frequencies but go to the trunking system say like "Fire 18" if it is mutual aid. This entire system including Westchester County Police will be going P.25 700-800 Mhz in under 2 years. We use 46.26/46.06/33.960 for dispatch on Westchester County Fire since the 60's too. Only 46.06 has a PL of 167.9
Happy President's Day.

 

[Bob1955]

Yes, we know, your 996P2 is the perfect scanner for every occasion as you've posted many times. Except that it's not. It may be perfect for what you're listening to, but it comes up short along with nearly all other scanners when it comes to linear simulcast modulation (LSM) and QPSK modulation used with digital simulcast trunked systems. New Rochelle's simulcast is conventional, and is not the same as the trunked modulations we're talking about that give scanners trouble. The SDS series was designed with LSM/QPSK specifically in mind.

GTR8000, Yes and it is PERFECT for my USE. And yes, it is simulcast/conventional and all they did is go P.25, and prior to this, they were analog on 155.130/100.0 and I worked for the City Of New Rochelle Police back from 1977-1979. We had garbage GE portables/mobiles and RCA too and the repeater system was poor . It is now located on top of Trumps building in downtown with (3) transmitters if you look it up on Google. If I had to do it again, I would STILL take this BCD-996P2 over the BCD-536HP any day of the week. I also received another $50.00 off the cost of this radio when purchased new too. So again, NO REGRETS.

 

[greggk]

Would it get everyone here to hold hands and sing Kumbaya if I just bought a SDS 100? Well, what the hell, I'm buying one anyhow. lol.
There may be many tricks I can test to see if I pick up Our Phase2 P25 simulcast system here in my back yard. I appreciate everyone's thoughts and ideas! But then again, it puts just enough doubt in my mind to justify a new SDS 100. Amazon stand back..I'm a coming. Take care all. Greg

 

[greggk]

Hi. I got a 3 messages saying 3 people responded to my above post. Where are they? I'm on the last page, page 2, and I refreshed several times, but I only see my last post; no one else.

Am I doing something wrong? Thanks guys. Greg

Disregard. I figured it out. I got 1 "like" and 2 "ha ha's" Cool.

 

[greggk]

I did the Deed. Wednesday arrival. I'm in the "nesting" mode. Mail gets here very late--4-5pm if it goes USPS. I'm sure it will.

I am really sincere when I say I appreciate everyone who took time to help out with this. I try to repay the favor when I can. I am, however, pretty nervous about this , as I see a scenario where it will not work here with the simulcast issues. (My 536 is stationary on my desk and seems to be working okay, but don't know if I missing anything as well) Then I'm not only out of a scanner, but out of scanning as well. Appreciate all the help. Greg.

 

[maus92]

I did the Deed. Wednesday arrival. I'm in the "nesting" mode. Mail gets here very late--4-5pm if it goes USPS. I'm sure it will.

I am really sincere when I say I appreciate everyone who took time to help out with this. I try to repay the favor when I can. I am, however, pretty nervous about this , as I see a scenario where it will not work here with the simulcast issues. (My 536 is stationary on my desk and seems to be working okay, but don't know if I missing anything as well) Then I'm not only out of a scanner, but out of scanning as well. Appreciate all the help. Greg.

The good thing is you can use your Sentinel programming to load into the SDS. Make sure you change the target model to SDS100 when you load it into the scanner, and you'll probably have to update the firmware and database, all done through Sentinel.

 

[greggk]

Thanks for that info. I was wondering if I can use my current Sentinel configuration. Thats good news.

 

[Hit_Factor]

Check your Sentinel version, you could get by fine with an older version with your 536, but the SDS will need the latest version. I don't have version numbers handy, sorry.

 

[buddrousa]

Also Gregg make sure you change the target type to the SDS type you bought.

 

[timbartell]

jonweinke,
I have been into this hobby and know it "PROBABLY" more then you for this area. If I leave this BCD-996P2(used to work for NRPD) on hold, I get "ALL" traffic and it is crystal CLEAR too. They just switched to digital this past April 2019 on 155.130/NAC100 and you being in VA, don't really know this area meaning Westchester County, NY. Most of this area is still analog. Our County trunking system is Motorola Smart Zone ll on UHF with about (70) TGID'S. Some of the larger cites have their own fire frequencies but go to the trunking system say like "Fire 18" if it is mutual aid. This entire system including Westchester County Police will be going P.25 700-800 Mhz in under 2 years. We use 46.26/46.06/33.960 for dispatch on Westchester County Fire since the 60's too. Only 46.06 has a PL of 167.9
Happy President's Day.

I'm glad you're not in a bad simulcast area. I would however bet you my life savings you could bring that perfect 996p2 to my house and it would struggle hard on the p25 phase2 simulcast here with good signal while my SDS100 and 200 lit up nice and decoded clearly next to it. It's all in your location within the simulcast and unfortunately my house is in a very tough area seeing 3 towers pretty evenly and a 4th weaker. Some get lucky, some don't. My 436 sits at my office now which it's more urban and very close to the city site and no others. It works great there so it's now a feed scanner.

Tim

 

[timbartell]

You'll be way better off with the 100 but do make sure you have the firmware up to date on the 436. It made huge differences for me though still far from perfect in simulcast prone areas but at least it wasn't completely silent any longer.

Tim

 

[jonwienke]

jonweinke,
I have been into this hobby and know it "PROBABLY" more then you for this area. If I leave this BCD-996P2(used to work for NRPD) on hold, I get "ALL" traffic and it is crystal CLEAR too. They just switched to digital this past April 2019 on 155.130/NAC100 and you being in VA, don't really know this area meaning Westchester County, NY.

And the same applies to you about receiving simulcast systems in Washington County, MD, Franklin County, PA, etc,. And on those systems, the 996, 436, 536, etc choke big time. Total silence in some places, and broken/garbled traffic elsewhere.

Here's a link to a comparison between the 436 and SDS100 on the Washington County simulcast system. Both scanners connected to the same antenna through a splitter, recording started and stopped at the same time, etc. Look at the total amount of traffic received, and listen to the quality difference. The 996 does no better than the 436 at that location on that system.

Washington County MD

Folder

1drv.ms