BCD436HP/BCD536HP: Manipulating Departments in Site Hold Mode

[Jay911]

Hey folks,
When I'm at work, stationary in one location, I put my radio in hold mode on a specific site on a specific system, because reception of the other sites is weak, scratchy, and results in poor decode. However, once I do that, any further uses of the Dept/Site button only affect the site, not the department. So if I want to do a temp avoid on a particular department, for example, I can't. I even tried waiting until that department was in use (being received) and trying Dept/Site then Avoid at that point, but it still just does an avoid on the site I'm holding on.

Has anyone else found a way to do department avoids or switching between departments while in site hold mode?

 

[AZScanner]

Hey folks,
Has anyone else found a way to do department avoids or switching between departments while in site hold mode?

There's really not a clean way to do this. The only way is to go out of site hold mode, make your changes and then go back into it. I've made a suggestion for a firmware update to change how this works. The dept and site hold functions really need to be independent of each other.

Until such an update materializes, I've found that the best way to deal with this is to create a specialized favorites list for each location. I've made one for when I do news chasing that only includes the departments and sites that apply to the area I generally do that in. You could set one up for work that would only include the one site that works well for you when you're there and then there's no need to hold on a particular site.

-AZ

 

[Jay911]

Thanks - that's what I figured. Maybe I need to investigate startup keys - I was wondering if that would do what I want, isolating me in one specific site with only particular departments enabled.

I'm still having a hard time wrapping my head around the new way of doing quick keys. I understand quick keys on the 396XT/996XT fine, and I understand departments on the HP1 fine, but marry the two together and things get really confusing to me.

 

[AZScanner]

Thanks - that's what I figured. Maybe I need to investigate startup keys - I was wondering if that would do what I want, isolating me in one specific site with only particular departments enabled.

I'm still having a hard time wrapping my head around the new way of doing quick keys. I understand quick keys on the 396XT/996XT fine, and I understand departments on the HP1 fine, but marry the two together and things get really confusing to me.

Same here. I've tried it a few times and the scanner always ends up giving me the three-beep salute and I find myself using the scroll knob to navigate around instead.

I haven't played around with the startup key feature yet. Gonna look into that as well. Right now though I just have a bunch of favorites lists that all contain the same things but each set up a little differently depending on where I plan to be.

-AZ

 

[RF23]

Thanks - that's what I figured. Maybe I need to investigate startup keys - I was wondering if that would do what I want, isolating me in one specific site with only particular departments enabled.

I'm still having a hard time wrapping my head around the new way of doing quick keys. I understand quick keys on the 396XT/996XT fine, and I understand departments on the HP1 fine, but marry the two together and things get really confusing to me.

Some changes to QKs may be in progress for the original PDF manual I think had info on QKs in boxes as examples, but the latest manual the boxes with the example uses of QKs are now blank. (page 53)

 

[ofd8001]

Jay - Have you thought about assigning the site at work to one Department/Site Quick Key with the remainder of the sites to another Department/Site Quick Key?

That way when you are work, you can "turn off" the quick key associated with the other sites, leaving only the "work" site quick key active.

For example, you have the system (we'll call it 00) contained within Favorites List 01. The work site has Quick Key 61 and the rest of the sites are assigned to Quick Key 62. So at work you'd press 01.00.62 E, which turns the other sites off. When you leave, you press 01.00.62 E to turn them back on.

 

[Jay911]

Yeah, that was on the edge of my mind; like I said, understanding turning the quick keys off & on was tripping me up. I think that'll be doable, now to just find time to make it happen.

 

[JoeyC]

I like assigning sites a quick key and turn them on/off by that method for just the reasons the OP stated. By turning off any site(s) that you don't want to monitor you can still utilize the DEPT button to manipulate department holds and avoids.