Samuel
Member
Still having issues? I am copying traffic on the Independent Hill site without issue today.
STARS SYSTEM
- Thread starter Chris45
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Chris45
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- May 26, 2004
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STARS Follow up
Today I was mobile in Prince William County, Fairfax County, and Alexandria.
All local Police and Fire systems we operating with no problems.
STARS was not.
I know that VSP is using terminals but find it ridiculous and dangerous that personnel must communicate on a terminal while driving a motor vehicle. Having a "code of silence" except in exceptional emergencies takes more time to complete than verbal communications.
Does not make good sense, so I am inclined to believe it is true.
Today I was mobile in Prince William County, Fairfax County, and Alexandria.
All local Police and Fire systems we operating with no problems.
STARS was not.
I know that VSP is using terminals but find it ridiculous and dangerous that personnel must communicate on a terminal while driving a motor vehicle. Having a "code of silence" except in exceptional emergencies takes more time to complete than verbal communications.
Does not make good sense, so I am inclined to believe it is true.
Chris, I agree with you!
Chris45
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Hi Ben,
There is a lot that makes sense, such as STARS is a very functional system, and things that do not make sense. Others have indicated that they have heard voice communications and that certain sites may be out. But what about all the other STARS using agencies? If it is business as usual, should we still be hearing them, though we are not? The Fairfax/STARS patch is still working. I guess time will tell.
There is a lot that makes sense, such as STARS is a very functional system, and things that do not make sense. Others have indicated that they have heard voice communications and that certain sites may be out. But what about all the other STARS using agencies? If it is business as usual, should we still be hearing them, though we are not? The Fairfax/STARS patch is still working. I guess time will tell.
KI4SXZ
Member
I was still hearing D7 communications today off of arlington & fairfax sites. I'm in silver spring all day, so thats all the sites i can reach.
I beleive the system is working, but individual sites might have a maint issue or a nac change or something else.
Usually, if you go 20 minutes without hearing a D7 unit, something is wrong. I'm sure a site or two may need an update in the DB, its been a while since changes have been made according to the history. Heck, we still have a few sites without names and locations.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
I beleive the system is working, but individual sites might have a maint issue or a nac change or something else.
Usually, if you go 20 minutes without hearing a D7 unit, something is wrong. I'm sure a site or two may need an update in the DB, its been a while since changes have been made according to the history. Heck, we still have a few sites without names and locations.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Two things of note. Make sure you have ALL freqs programmed and not just the control channel. People will tell you that you don't need it but if a CC changes you'll be SOL as has happened many times.
Also anyone with newer GRE/Whistler scanners remember they don't scan all sites programmed in just the one they decide has the best signal that meets your threshold settings. You have to input each site you're interested in to its own system then tie them altogether into one bank.
PITA but it works and lets you scan all sites which you are interested in.
Just two ideas to throw out as as several people are using those scanners.
Also anyone with newer GRE/Whistler scanners remember they don't scan all sites programmed in just the one they decide has the best signal that meets your threshold settings. You have to input each site you're interested in to its own system then tie them altogether into one bank.
PITA but it works and lets you scan all sites which you are interested in.
Just two ideas to throw out as as several people are using those scanners.
Ben, were you referring to the pictures I uploaded? If so, those were screen captures from my iScan programming software for my PRO-18. Once the information is downloaded from RadioReference into the software, I don't believe there is a way to sort or filter on newly-added site data.
Yes, I was Mike.. LOL.. So much for that good idea of mine..
Today I need to find out why FIOS is going off link here and killing my feed..
Chris45
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- 144
I have also been told that the FCC has mandated that all newer radios get programmed with UCALL/UTAC frequencies. What that means . . . federal interoperability channels now required in all VA state radios, per VITA. So when the feds arrive on the scene, they can talk with the locals via UCALL/UTAC channels. Kind of like fire/rescue switching from dispatch channel to separate fire ground channels, like Alexandria’s 2 Bravo, etc. Instead of having to go to a mutual aid channel as fire/rescue did for decades. NVMHI radios at the state hospital, and the VPSTC radios here, both have UCALL and UTAC channels programmed on them.
I am not familiar with these aspects and do not know if it relates to the issue od discussion.
I am not familiar with these aspects and do not know if it relates to the issue od discussion.
Yes, I knew that was to happen but didn't know when
My 536 scanner feed has quit since a big window 10 update this morning. Weird.. Dammmm.
My 536 scanner feed has quit since a big window 10 update this morning. Weird.. Dammmm.
Listening to Hogback Mountain tower...
FWIW, I can hear Fairfax and Culpeper units just fine from Hampshire County in West Virginia. Hope all is well on the system.
FWIW, I can hear Fairfax and Culpeper units just fine from Hampshire County in West Virginia. Hope all is well on the system.
Samuel
Member
Since this thread started I have had no issue receiving VSP or VDOT highway trucks on the STARS Indepedent Hill site on both GRE and Uniden equipment. have you checked your programming?
Samuel, I am not showing anything from Independent Hill either. Dumfries appears to be the best site in that area now.
Samuel, I misread your msg, please disregard my last reply. I can't delete it.
Folks ... I just wanted to report back on what I discovered. I reloaded my PSR-800 with the latest data from RR. This time I loaded all the frequencies.. not just the CC. Last Friday I made a trip down to Richmond via Rt 301 from the Nice bridge to I-95 to Richmond. I was pleasantly surprised that I was hearing a lot of traffic. I had set the display on the scanner so that one of the lines was showing the Site name. I only had Richmond, Culpeper and Alexandria (Divisions 1,2 and 7) talkgroups activated. The whole time I continually was hearing call from all three divisions. The sites that showed up on the scanner were: Edgehill, Thormburg, Glen Allen, Rumford, Richmond, and Independence Hill. There may have been a few others that showed up but while driving I couldn't always stare at the scanner long enough to wait for the line to change since that line alternates between System Name and Site Name. The bottom line is that it is now working like it used to. I'm guessing that when I only loaded the control channels, I wasn't hearing hardly anything. I'm guessing that some of the sites may be using some of the other frequencies as the control channel other than those shown in RR. All is well.
Don't feel bad that has tripped up a lot of people for a very long time. It always frustrated me to see people foisting off that "Only put in the CC" concept on others. It leads to problems such as these.
PSR-800 Now Receiving Traffic
Lynn, I'm glad you are now picking up STARS traffic.
Lynn, I'm glad you are now picking up STARS traffic.
kb4cvn
Silent Key
The only use Control Channel concept is something Motorola started back in the 80's in their radio products after APCO's Project-16 trunking was being deployed. This dates from a time when memory chips were expensive, and all memory space in a user radio was at a premium price. By only loading one or two possible control channels saved space. This mindset got copied by the scanner manufacturers. When EDACS scanners appeared, it turned this schema on its ear! Under EDACS, any channel could be the control channel, and you had to program all of the system frequencies in the correct order. This is were the whole Logical Channel Number (LCN) concept came from.
Moto (and others) when making a working channel assignment to a user radio transmitted the [obsolete] FCC Frequency Pair number over the air to the radio. EDACS didn't. Just a different way to do the same function.
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