San Antonio and the BCD436HP

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NC5267

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Finally getting my 436hp I haven't monitored the Provoice system in a long time and was wondering if if all of the talk groups from the Gold and Blue towers still show up on all of the other sites or is it only if an affiliated radio is on the other towers like Topperwein, Hallmark, etc... For example can you monitor UTSA PD or Helotes from the Topperwein tower?

Also, can you set up the 436 to site roam if you are driving around town so it can pick up the strongest tower? Thanks in advance.
 

nicknpd

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Best I can tell a radio on the TG still needs to be affiliated to a tower for you to pick it up. Your best bet is to use the simulcast sites.

You can site lock any particular site if you want, otherwise it will just lock in on whatever site it happened to be scanning when it saw the TG active. It doesn't appear to give a site preference based on signal strength.


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scrotumola

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FWIW my observations of Toepperwein are that its the best outlying site to monitor because it regularly'carries' the most TGs of any of the non-centralized sites. It also carries both BLUE and GOLD talkgroups which really benefits Unitrunker users who usually are stuck with 1 site at a time. As far as needing a subscriber to affiliate, in the few times I've been out there every TG I monitored was simulcast, meaning the wide area it covers usually had a user from each talkgroup within range.
 

NC5267

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Thanks for the replies. Any tips on the best way to program it for the Provoice system? I know you can use zip code, the software etc... I am old school and usually program systems manually, but this is a large system. Thanks in advance.
 

scrotumola

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The easiest way is to do zipcode; Turn on/off service types; put a hold on the tower you want to monitor ie Toepperwein, Blue, Gold, etc.... if you lock onto Toepperwein you will be able to listen to PD/FD/EMS and county..... its the only site that has a wide selection of TGs
You can then lock on to the agency then the talkgroup to get more specific.
 

NC5267

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Thanks for the info, does it have a site roam feature for driving around town? I know it's not like a Harris or Motorola that can seamlessly site roam but do you manually have to switch from each site when you move out of range of one? Thanks again for all the info.
 

scrotumola

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The only geographic roam feature I know of uses the gps puck, which automatically programs -adds/deletes systems and sites as you travel. I guess it technically could work if you set the range really tight, like 5 miles IF and only IF the tower sites area exact in their zipcodes.... but thats a little far fetched. It does warrant researching.
Otherwise I think it will include all sites in the county and you'll just have to run through them.
 

NC5267

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Since I have a Northside zip code should I use the downtown 78201 or will it load all sites from any zip code in the SA/Bexar area?
 
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