Help me with Decoding

[MEDIC313]

I recently purchased a BC898T. Before my purchase, i did a bit of research online, and found that its quite easy to set up a discrimator tap on this scanner. I did a bit of searching around online, yet still have a few questions.

The FAQ below states that you don't need a data slicer? Do you?:
http://wiki.radioreference.com/index.php/UniTrunker#What_are_the_Call_Types_available.3F

Does anyone have any experiance ordering from the following data slicer retailer?:
http://www.dataslicers.com

What are the advantages of decoding, other then gaining an alpha tag for each transmission?

 

[bpsmicro]

I'll take a stab at it.

Most of the trunking decoder packages do not require a data slicer. Instead you feed your discriminator tap into your PC's sound card line-in, and all the slicing is done by software.

For the average person, decoding trunked systems is mostly nerdy. It does give you a really good view of the "big picture", it can help you identify new IDs, and see if new frequencies come online on a site.
Some software packages also allow you to use one non-trunking receiver to control another non-trunking receiver to act as a trunking receiver. There are definitely people here doing just that.

The key thing is that you can't use the receiver as a normal scanner while it's feeding your trunking software. When it's doing that, you're locked on the control channel, and only listening to the digital control stuff. You need a second scanner to actually, well, scan.

Brad.

 

[MEDIC313]

See Below.

 

[MEDIC313]

Well, my plan is to monitor my area's EMS dispatch and hailing channels.
Through this id like to be able to view each trucks status, as well
as the feature to see when other users enter the channel (i.e. Medic Assists)
It looks like TrunkMon would provide support for that.
(http://members.cox.net/crazycalifornian/TrunkMon/images/UserStat.gif)
My main concerning is being able to have the audio from the channel while monitoring it from my PC.

Is this feasible through this system?

 

[SCPD]

The FAQ below states that you don't need a data slicer? Do you?

No, it isn't necessary.

What are the advantages of decoding, other then gaining an alpha tag for each transmission?

Decoding allows you to see call activity. It does not give you the "alpha tags" of each transmission. It gives you the numeric IDs and allows you to associate a text label or "tag" with each ID. You can apply your own labels or make use of others' labels - including those in the RR Database.

My main concerning is being able to have the audio from the channel while monitoring it from my PC. Is this feasible through this system?

Probably not - unless you use two radios; one dedicated to the control channel (so you don't miss any activity) and another to follow voice calls.

 

[slicerwizard]

Through this id like to be able to view each trucks status, as well as the feature to see when other users enter the channel (i.e. Medic Assists)
It looks like TrunkMon would provide support for that.

FYI, TRUNK88 also provides that information (see attached screen shot)

My main concerning is being able to have the audio from the channel while monitoring it from my PC.

You need to look for a dirt cheap non-trunking scanner to tap instead. Your 898 can then operate as a voice receiver, either standalone or PC controlled.