I'm curious, were you able to hear the Miami-Dade county system while you were in Ft. Lauderdale? If not, how far north from Miami-Dade county did you go before you were unable to hear their system?
My SDS100 observations
- Thread starter W4KRR
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I'm just curious, maybe I missed it but did you and the other SDS100 users load the beta firmware in? I know many have reported improvements with troubled systems.
Not sure how far into Broward County that I could hear Miami-Dade because I switched to Broward County when I got to my hotel, The Sheraton Suites Ft. Lauderdale at Cypress Creek. But I could hear Miami-Dade in my vehicle well into Broward using a Laird 800MHz on a mag mount. While in my hotel I used the stock antenna's on both 436 & SDS100 and also the RS 800MHz antenna's. I listened to Broward County & Ft. Lauderdale Police mostly while up there but could pick up some Palm Beach County stuff. I was mostly up there for medical but still played with my scanners as always when I penetrate the mainland. I can get most of Miami-Dade here at my house in Tavernier, Monroe County with a discone on a 25' mast.
Did you ever use the antenna to receive Miami Dade site 102? OR were you always using an external antenna. I would be curious to see if it works using the built in antenna.
Too bad there are no other reports. so far One report of failure and one of success, (using car mount antenna? or also included HT Antenna?)
Hopefully a year from now things are much more clear in regards to performance and reliability. I will wait it out for 12 months, by then there should be plenty of time to fix bugs, and reports come back with regards to perfromance overall.
Too bad there are no other reports. so far One report of failure and one of success, (using car mount antenna? or also included HT Antenna?)
Hopefully a year from now things are much more clear in regards to performance and reliability. I will wait it out for 12 months, by then there should be plenty of time to fix bugs, and reports come back with regards to perfromance overall.
I just received my SDS100 a few days ago. All I have done so far is to program it with my FLs. I haven’t updated the beta firmware (yet). I’ve been using it mobile with several different external antennas (PCTEL - Wide Spectrum, Austin Spectra and a VHF 18” whip). I can say that the MDPD system reception is incredible, even with the VHF whip. Very consistent. I rarely miss any transmissions and the scanner locks onto the system almost immediately. The farthest I’ve driven out of county so far has been to Pembroke Pines and I could still hear MDPD with no problem. I will be updating the beta f/w this weekend and driving further out of county next week to see how that works out. So far I’m extremely happy with the radio. I’m glad to be able to hear MDPD again. The 436 is a good radio but the lack of LSM reception made it nearly impossible to monitor MDPD. Just my .02 cents.
I was just south of Ft. Lauderdale/Hollywood International airport last week. My SDS100 wouldn't lock onto the control channel for the Miami-Dade PD system. I tried the Radio Shack 800 MHz antenna, as well as an external mag mount whip. No go with the Miami-Dade system.
My Unication G4 was receiving the system with no issues.
What firmware were you running?
While in Miami-Dade, I used both the stock antenna and the RS 800MHz antenna when I was out of my vehicle in restaurants, Nissan and couple of other places with great success. When I'm in my vehicle I use a Laird 800MHz and a Laird Multi Band antenna on mag mounts which work even better. You should not be having any problems with site 102.
Yes; but not last week when I tested.
SDS100 works well for me
Had mine about 2 weeks, and noticed a vast improvement over my HP2 & 436 in being able to monitor the LWIN 700/800 multi site system here is the New Orleans, Louisiana area. The 2 above mentioned scanners would just miss over 50% of the conversations when placed on my table next to my recliner in my den. In fact my whole apartment is a dead zone, even my cell phone only shows 1 bar, & I'm in the city. Purchased a G5 which solved the monitoring issues, but it has limited scanner features. The SDS100 pretty much keeps up w/ the G5, with less than 5% missed conversations than the G5. I did change the stock antenna to a 800 model, which helped on the LWIN system, so I'm satisfied w/ the SDS100, It works well for my situation. Have not taken it out of town yet.
Had mine about 2 weeks, and noticed a vast improvement over my HP2 & 436 in being able to monitor the LWIN 700/800 multi site system here is the New Orleans, Louisiana area. The 2 above mentioned scanners would just miss over 50% of the conversations when placed on my table next to my recliner in my den. In fact my whole apartment is a dead zone, even my cell phone only shows 1 bar, & I'm in the city. Purchased a G5 which solved the monitoring issues, but it has limited scanner features. The SDS100 pretty much keeps up w/ the G5, with less than 5% missed conversations than the G5. I did change the stock antenna to a 800 model, which helped on the LWIN system, so I'm satisfied w/ the SDS100, It works well for my situation. Have not taken it out of town yet.
I updated to f/w 1.03.01 and really haven’t noticed much difference from the previous f/w as far as P25 range/coverage goes. But it’s not a bad thing because the reception outside of the county is very satisfactory IMHO.
Here are my observations so far. The MDPD system has coverage to the south (Monroe County/Key Largo) down to about mile marker 106 or roughly near the gas station when you first enter Key Largo. That’s about 25 miles south of MDPD’s southernmost site on Krome and 264 street. On a side note, I do know that the county radio techs ran some coverage testing a few weeks ago and were able to get coverage down to around mile marker 90. But to be fair, that was on commercial grade radios. I was able to get decent coverage to the north as well. I had reliable comms around Weston and as far west as mile marker 35 on I-75 or roughly 12 miles west of the US 27 intersection. This puts the coverage out to approximately 24 miles north of MDPD’s site at fire station #44 in Palm Springs North. BTW, this site was added around December of 2015 as an enhancement to the P25 system. Also added at the same time was the site near US1 and SW 184 street down near Cutler Bay. Interestingly both of these sites are licensed as having directional patterns roughly focused to the southeast.
Also, while speaking of monitoring P25 systems outside of county lines, the Monroe County system can be monitored as far north as Princeton. That’s roughly 25 miles north of the Key Largo site.
Overall I am very pleased with this scanner’s performance so far.
I live at MM 92 in Tavernier. With a discone on 25' mast I get Miami-Dade County Site 102 on all my x36 and SDS100 scanners very good. I can get up to Hialeah, Intercoastal waterways and North Miami Beach most of the time. I can get Site 102 on both my 436 and SDS100 with the stock antenna from PenneKamp Park at MM 104. Overall, I really like the SDS100 scanner and it has been working great for me. I've had mine nearly 3 weeks and want to do a lot more analysis in other areas when I travel again. Some of the more technically experienced on here can do more analysis in one day than I can do in a month. LOL. I go to Miami once or twice a month for medical so I always try to make time to play with scanner. Glad you are having good results with SDS100 Also..
Are you receiving Intracoastal and NMB on the 102 site or somewhere else? And Hialeah TRS all the way from Tavernier? That’s incredible. Consider yourself lucky as I’ve never been able to hear Hialeah south of Kendall.
Yes, I'm getting intracoastal and NMB with a discone at 25' here at my house. When it gets slow down here, I hold it on Site 102 and it's Always active there. I listen to other Miami Dade and get hospitals, businesses, transportation, etc from here. I like listening to Florida Forest and Dept of Environmental Protection in the Everglades also. Since Monroe County is a tourist destination, it gets real active down here on weekends and especially this two weekend 4th of July Celebration. Every LEO on duty and we have many varieties down here. I'll be up in Kendall again later on this month and going to experiment with a few antenna's. Might be up in Ft. Lauderdale again this month and want to try the latest SDS100 firmware updates out.
mike1988
Member
I'm in Tampa Florida. What antenna do you use? I've noticed static a lot. And the amount I hear on the Sds100 and the bcd436hp is different.
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