SDS100/SDS200: Sds100 to sds100e

[donc13]

The band limits in the FW are a look up table type of check.

if (frequency >= xxxxx || frequency <= yyyyy)
{
    inhibit/error as invalid frequency
}

As it has been said if you could decrypt the FW you could make the change. For obvious reasons Uniden is not going to release the decrypt method. Can you imagine the inrush of messed up units with "bad" customized FW in them. Or unscrupulous people stealing their code and using it themselves. Still Uniden could make the band limit change with no issues. The hardware is as Ubbe says just a high pass filter in the 700Mhz region.

There are a few other tweaks that Uniden could do. Change the step size to calculate from the lowest frequency in the search range. Try searching 26.965 -27.405 in 10 Khz steps you will see what I am referring to. The valid steps sizes needs to be updated to include 7.5 khz some new systems (VHF) are appearing that use the 7.5 khz steps instead of the 15.0khz steps. I would love to see the entry of custom tones like 150.0 allowed but i suspect they are using a existing pl/dpl decoder circuit so I doubt that will be a viable change.

Again IF Uniden used a jumper/efuse/whatever, that ALL firmware checked it wouldn't hit those frequencies.

The FCC would have to change the rules for any receiver to be sold in the US that covers those ranges. Digital or not.

Absolutely agree, they should... But what do I know.

 

[Ubbe]

And the SDS200E’s come with DMR, NXDN and Provoice already installed, so you don’t have to pay for the upgrades. But maybe Uniden EU has put the upgrades price in the MRRP. You don’t get nothing for free these days.

Yes, they don't include the upgrades for free as we will have to pay $1000 to get a SDS200E and probably no one will ever use the included Provoice option. For some reason you can get the SDS100E "naked" or some or all upgrades included and the EU distributor sells the upgrades that then are done from the Uniden Australian webpage.

/Ubbe

 

[sallen07]

I don't know why FCC persist with their ban in scanners when cellular anyhow are digital and encrypted

You're not from around here, are you?

It's not an FCC regulation. It's a federal law. Congress would have to pass a new law to revoke the ban, and no one cares enough to do so.

 

[JoeBearcat]

If Uniden chose to do so it should be possible and easy to do being that the SDS100 is a true SDR. It should not require any hardware changes or additions. That is why Whislter is able to offer this on both their hand-held and mobile/base scanners.

Actually, the FCC has some requirements that do not apply to the rest of the world, so there could be a hardware difference. I'm not saying there is, but it is possible. That said, I don't believe there is any way to swap the firmware.

 

[gary123]

Joe minor edit to the existing FW file to change the European 'e' version name to the NA version name and your done. That is the only check made between the models. As you have stated the FCC requirements eliminate this as a viable option.

On the other hand changing the 960 top end to 1100Mhz is an easy update and does not disturb anything else in the FW. The RF circuitry can handle it fine and there are no internally generated 'birdies' in that area.

The intent here for the 960-1100 upgrade is to make it as easy for Uniden to do as possible... if the desire is there. ADSB is at 1090 and there are many that may want to be able to tune to it. On the corporate side this would be a good thing for Uniden to do. It would show that Uniden does indeed listen to their customer base and is active in keeping their hardware current to the end users needs. Ideally the upgrade should apply to the SDS100/200 and BCD435/536 models. I am not sure of the internals on other hardware so cannot comment on them.