SDRtrunk; listening to any trunked chatter, at wits end!

[slicerwizard]

You're using "PATRIOTWAVES" garbage and a poor (indoor?) antenna to monitor a site that's 15 miles distant. You would've been far better served with a FlightAware orange dongle; they pull in weak 700 MHz signals. At this point, you definitely need to get a good antenna or two outside and up high.

 

[JavaValhalla]

Whew!!

Many props to everyone who chimed in. While I wasn't successful in hearing a complete transmission, I feel better knowing I had the instructions right...it's an antenna and signal issue.

I'll hear a burst every now and again. In conclusion, I found I was skipping a key component at times (import talk groups). This led to the loss of the label on the band. I was troubleshooting everything I could and a little too quickly.

Once I started to get a little hint, I began swapping out my antennas. I then realized, the house I'm in sits in the middle the woods. I have not really gone out to explore but I'll probably take my SDRs to a friends or other families house to try. I'm sure giant wooden structures that suck moisture and radio waves probably are the reason I can't just plop an antenna on my coffee table and listen to everything.

Now that I feel confident it's entirely a signal issue, and that I'm comfortable with troubleshooting the app, I'm going to assemble and mount my discone this week.

Thank you to everyone who helped!! Seeing anything besides 'idle' is great!!! now I know what to do. Thanks again!!

 

[chrismol1]

Whew!!

Many props to everyone who chimed in. While I wasn't successful in hearing a complete transmission, I feel better knowing I had the instructions right...it's an antenna and signal issue.

I'll hear a burst every now and again. In conclusion, I found I was skipping a key component at times (import talk groups). This led to the loss of the label on the band. I was troubleshooting everything I could and a little too quickly.

Once I started to get a little hint, I began swapping out my antennas. I then realized, the house I'm in sits in the middle the woods. I have not really gone out to explore but I'll probably take my SDRs to a friends or other families house to try. I'm sure giant wooden structures that suck moisture and radio waves probably are the reason I can't just plop an antenna on my coffee table and listen to everything.

Now that I feel confident it's entirely a signal issue, and that I'm comfortable with troubleshooting the app, I'm going to assemble and mount my discone this week.

Thank you to everyone who helped!! Seeing anything besides 'idle' is great!!! now I know what to do. Thanks again!!

Yea, In some situations yes. I can plop the short antenna on my table being I'm 5 miles & 8 miles from simulcast sites pumping out 250 wattage on decent terrain, you got to be "RF reasonable". You're talking about using a cheap wideband RTL-SDR dongle with no amplifier and not an ideal antenna trying to pull in a site 15 miles away indoors, if the site isn't on mountain, I mean not saying it's not doable in some areas but it isn't what I call an ideal setup to pull in those weak signals and with P25 you have to have the beginnings of a reliable/not so noisy signal for the error correction to start working/makeup for it

 

[dave3825]

I found I was skipping a key component at times (import talk groups). This led to the loss of the label on the band.

The program will decode whether or not you import those. Its like using id search on a true scanner.

Generally the antennas that come with sdr dongles are garbage. You should see a huge improvement with the discone. Get it up as high as you can. Just keep in mind that your rf gain will need to be readjusted when you connect the discone as in your pic, the noise floor is very high. Below is my noise floor using a discone.

 

[JavaValhalla]

Yea, In some situations yes. I can plop the short antenna on my table being I'm 5 miles & 8 miles from simulcast sites pumping out 250 wattage on decent terrain, you got to be "RF reasonable". You're talking about using a cheap wideband RTL-SDR dongle with no amplifier and not an ideal antenna trying to pull in a site 15 miles away indoors, if the site isn't on mountain, I mean not saying it's not doable in some areas but it isn't what I call an ideal setup to pull in those weak signals and with P25 you have to have the beginnings of a reliable/not so noisy signal for the error correction to start working/makeup for it

Thank you! This is exactly the area I don't know jack on but why I delved into this in the first place. I don't know jack squat of what is "RF reasonable." Watching endless youtube videos, you see these simple setups but I wondered where many of them are physically at to get so many signals with just basic dipoles or small antennas (at least ones I saw).

I went with this particular radio not only for the dual enclosure, but because it came with the discone in case this exact problem came up. Now knowing it's just a signal issue, I feel better knowing I should see a little improvement with the discone.

It wasn't knowing what my issue rooted in that was driving me nuts. Didn't know if sample rate, drivers, or other things were causing issue.

Thanks to you and everyone that helped!!! This was extremely helpful and beneficial for me in getting started here.

 

[dave3825]

I went with this particular radio not only for the dual enclosure, but because it came with the discone in case this exact problem came up.

The ebay link you posted did not have a discone listed with it. I looked at the other items he is selling but do not see any discones. What kind of discone did you get?

 

[chrismol1]

by the way, if this trunked site(s)/system is simulcast, set the button under the frequency you input, to LSM for simulcast