The official "I want LSM to work properly in my scanner" thread

[kayn1n32008]

The official "I want LSM to work properly in my scanner" thread

I'm fairly sure the simulcast problems are predominately in one band.

The mainstay of simulcast systems are 700MHz and 800Mhz, but they can also appear on VHF, UHF and 900MHz as well.


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[APX8000]

I brought this up to Unication years ago...I saw an opportunity for them but they have their priorities. But they could have simply taken their G5, turned it into a DIN sized unit with a more robust speaker, moved the top volume and channel selector knobs to the front and added a separate antenna for VHF or UHF instead of the internal loop for those bands. Add in talkgroup hold, nuisance delete and encryption muting, and they would have flew out the door. I would have personally bought two...a VHF 7/800 and a UHF 7/800. I dubbed it the G6. All your LSM issues solved in a mobile environment and not much more R&D needed with a market that wants it. All they have to basically do is a move around components of an existing model.


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[kayn1n32008]

The official "I want LSM to work properly in my scanner" thread

I'm pretty sure that scanner buyers want to scan more than just two bands.

Actually, the only band missing is 900MHz. You just need 2 to cover 4 bands.

People want scanners that can decode CQPSK with out standing on one toe, facing exactly 215.5 decrees true north with their scanner antenna at 23 degrees from vertical while wearing a bandanna on their neck.

They have been asking for this since BEFORE the HP1 came out.

Quit looking for faults in the Unication pagers and quit trying to compare it to a scanner. Start(finish?) making a scanner that can properly decode CQPSK. Too bad you guys devoted all that time to develop a provoice upgrade as EDACS is riding off into the sunset, when you could have been devoting resources to designing a I/Q receiver to properly decode CQPSK.


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[KR7CQ]

Actually, the only band missing is 900MHz. You just need 2 to cover 4 bands.

People want scanners that can decode CQPSK with out standing on one toe, facing exactly 215.5 decrees true north with their scanner antenna at 23 degrees from vertical while wearing a bandanna on their neck.

They have been asking for this since BEFORE the HP1 came out.

Quit looking for faults in the Unication pagers and quit trying to compare it to a scanner. Start(finish?) making a scanner that can properly decode CQPSK. Too bad you guys devoted all that time to develop a provoice upgrade as EDACS is riding off into the sunset, when you could have been devoting resources to designing a I/Q receiver to properly decode CQPSK.


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Pretty much...this. I own a G4, and consider it simply awesome. I LOVE it. If I'm out driving around and want to hear simulcast, this is my ONLY choice. I use it all the time. At home, no scanner can hear my LOCAL, repeat LOCAL police department (Glendale PD). That's right, living inside of Glendale, no scanner will pick it up well. I have to use the G4. It's worth every penny for that one fact alone. Slamming Unication is just sour grapes! Don't be a hater, learn from them! If some bunch of Chinese guys working in a communist sweat shop can do it, so can Uniden!! Keep in mind, that I'm no Uniden hater, by any means! As far as I'm concerned, the only GRE designed scanner worth having is the PRO-2006 (which I own). Other than that, I'm Uniden, from the BC9000XLT, to the 780XLT, through the BCDx36HPs!

As far as 900MHz, that's a thing of the past here, everyone is moving to 700/800 P25 simulcast, but again, that's just here, just one place. Maybe 900 MHz is a big thing in enough places for it to be a "thing" worth doing. Most still have a place for at least either VHF or UHF analog, for now. Unication already does that. Really, they just lack lockout, hold, and multi-system scan...those are the big things. Other complaints are mostly due to them being pagers, not scanners.

 

[fredva]

The mainstay of simulcast systems are 700MHz and 800Mhz, but they can also appear on VHF, UHF and 900MHz as well.


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Yes, I wasn't trying to imply that they were all 700/800 mhz, but the vast majority appear to be.

 

[UPMan]

Quit looking for faults in the Unication pagers...<snip>

This seems to have been addressed to me. I've not faulted them at all. I said I was impressed with them.

 

[kayn1n32008]

This seems to have been addressed to me. I've not faulted them at all. I said I was impressed with them.

You appeared to have a derogatory impression with the way you wrote it.

 

[IAmSixNine]

Actually, the only band missing is 900MHz. You just need 2 to cover 4 bands.

People want scanners that can decode CQPSK with out standing on one toe, facing exactly 215.5 decrees true north with their scanner antenna at 23 degrees from vertical while wearing a bandanna on their neck.

They have been asking for this since BEFORE the HP1 came out.

Quit looking for faults in the Unication pagers and quit trying to compare it to a scanner. Start(finish?) making a scanner that can properly decode CQPSK. Too bad you guys devoted all that time to develop a provoice upgrade as EDACS is riding off into the sunset, when you could have been devoting resources to designing a I/Q receiver to properly decode CQPSK.


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OOOH thats what i have been missing. The Bandanna. This whole time i have been using a scarf because it was winter. Just be careful what color bandanna you use. Choose the color wisely to match the hood you live in. LOL

 

[UPMan]

My intent was to point out the likely true cost to get such features in a scanner. Their products are great pagers. I am impressed with them.

 

[WX4JCW]

$800 retail. Remember, their product is a professional tool not a consumer toy.

Scanner customers want reliable capability of receiving LSM, which is fast becoming a dominant implementation of P-25 (especially in trunked systems), and yet none of the consumer scanners are properly designed to decode linear simulcast CQPSK, which has been part of the P-25 TIA standard for years.

Fail.

Bravo to you sir i agree

 

[KR7CQ]

Bravo to you sir i agree

As a happy G4 owner, to be honest I would place the G4/5 about half way between a consumer toy and a Motorola handheld. Get near a a cell tower of the right frequency range, and it loses all systems (and I mean within 100'+ of one). Occasionally the audio of non-encrypted transmissions sounds like encryption (others have told me they experience the same thing). Odd / annoying / very loud sounds sometimes come out during a transmission. For the money they are amazing, but I'm just being 100% honest because I just don't see them as being on the level of a public safety radio...nor would I expect them to be for that price.

 

[WX4JCW]

As a happy G4 owner, to be honest I would place the G4/5 about half way between a consumer toy and a Motorola handheld. Get near a a cell tower of the right frequency range, and it loses all systems (and I mean within 100'+ of one). Occasionally the audio of non-encrypted transmissions sounds like encryption (others have told me they experience the same thing). Odd / annoying / very loud sounds sometimes come out during a transmission. For the money they are amazing, but I'm just being 100% honest because I just don't see them as being on the level of a public safety radio...nor would I expect them to be for that price.

I think they are a tool like any other, nothing will replace a $5500 radio, some of the issues are firmware related I’m pretty sure, I think they work well for volunteers and such, but again the hardware argument that the scanner manufacturers make doesn’t make sense when we have $20-$100 SDR’s that can receive just as well as anything, then open up OP25 and it rocks CQPSK, the only problem with a SDR is it has to be tied to a computer be it desktop , Laptop, or Raspberry PI, eventually Unication is coming out with a Multi Mode Portable which will be interesting


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Jason WX4JCW
Unication G4, BCD536HP

 

[WX4JCW]

Also my 536 is a useful tool, it works well as expected as I travel across the country, but when I get into simulcast country, well I switch to the G4


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Jason WX4JCW
Unication G4, BCD536HP

 

[KR7CQ]

Also my 536 is a useful tool, it works well as expected as I travel across the country, but when I get into simulcast country, well I switch to the G4


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Jason WX4JCW
Unication G4, BCD536HP

100% agree on both posts. My second BCD536HP is arriving Friday. I like the X36's that much. For everything but simulcast there's nothing like it. For simulcast my G4 is there....tools in the tool box.

 

[diskmonger]

If the Uniden spokesperson is on here pointing out how expensive designing a scanner that handles simulcast is, rest assured your not going to see a scanner from them that handles it.

 

[radio3353]

If the Uniden spokesperson is on here pointing out how expensive designing a scanner that handles simulcast is, rest assured your not going to see a scanner from them that handles it.

He is just showing his lack of technical knowledge of the subject. Hopefully he doesn't represent the real engineers of Uniden.

Same with Whistler. The only company representation we have here on the forum is a marketing person using a Wendy the hamburger girl for a profile picture. No technical input at all. Not much help.

 

[KA1RBI]

haha, this is perfect

Indeed it does. When Paul finally loosens up and tells us how difficult something (like DMR decoding, for example) is, it means most of the bugs have been stomped on and the product release date has firmed up.

If the Uniden spokesperson is on here pointing out how expensive designing a scanner that handles simulcast is, rest assured your not going to see a scanner from them that handles it.

Regardless of whether or not Uniden has actually got something in the pipeline, it is interesting to speculate about the implications supposing that they do. Would they go through contortions to avoid making an admission as to the true nature of the LSM problems plaguing all current scanners? Would they reveal that the FM demodulator design of current scanners isn't even compliant with the P25 phase 2 TDMA spec?

More interestingly, what would happen to the market for the BCD x36HP (and all other current models) as everyone rushes to upgrade? What if anything would Uniden do to massage the feelings of all the multitudes of disgruntled users of current scanners? Or is Paul calculating that users will forgive this (and all other sins) in the long-running x36HP saga? Or is he getting edgy about the state of the market, with SDRs eating away the low end bracketed by "professional radios" at the upper?

73

Max

 

[RFI-EMI-GUY]

haha, this is perfect





Regardless of whether or not Uniden has actually got something in the pipeline, it is interesting to speculate about the implications supposing that they do. Would they go through contortions to avoid making an admission as to the true nature of the LSM problems plaguing all current scanners? Would they reveal that the FM demodulator design of current scanners isn't even compliant with the P25 phase 2 TDMA spec?

More interestingly, what would happen to the market for the BCD x36HP (and all other current models) as everyone rushes to upgrade? What if anything would Uniden do to massage the feelings of all the multitudes of disgruntled users of current scanners? Or is Paul calculating that users will forgive this (and all other sins) in the long-running x36HP saga? Or is he getting edgy about the state of the market, with SDRs eating away the low end bracketed by "professional radios" at the upper?

73

Max

To be honest, my decision to buy the BCD536HP was due to assurances I read here and in various advertisements that the new model was both Simulcast and Phase 2 ready. From my experience, the Simulcast reception is dodgy, I had to twiddle the settings, never got any indication I was reducing BER. I am stuck on the default settings. I live within tbe footprint of the system and a tower just a couple miles away. I went to an external Motorola Spectra speaker to improve things, but frankly the reception is hit or miss. I don't know if any Phase 2 talkgroups are in use on my system, I will be pretty upset if those don't work.

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[KR7CQ]

To be honest, my decision to buy the BCD536HP was due to assurances I read here and in various advertisements that the new model was both Simulcast and Phase 2 ready. From my experience, the Simulcast reception is dodgy, I had to twiddle the settings, never got any indication I was reducing BER. I am stuck on the default settings. I live within tbe footprint of the system and a tower just a couple miles away. I went to an external Motorola Spectra speaker to improve things, but frankly the reception is hit or miss. I don't know if any Phase 2 talkgroups are in use on my system, I will be pretty upset if those don't work.

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No scanner properly handles CQPSK. I will agree that the x36 scanners are best for listening to simulcast. However from my experience that is because they simply don't stop on transmissions / produce audio if the digital packets are corrupted badly, where the audio would be a garbled mess. They simply skip the transmission. Whistlers stop on more transmissions, but many of them are garbled and annoying to listen to. I definitely prefer the Uniden approach, but the truth is you simply miss many transmissions, unless you are much closer to one tower than any other tower. Still, It's such a good scanner in every other way it's worth the money in my book.

Regarding UPman, he's a good guy that helps people whenever he can, and has the guts to come in here and discuss these things despite many stones being thrown and I think he deserves kudos for that..my two cents.

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[APX8000]

I agree. I give Uniden (and Whistler) crap and UpMan has the marbles to come here and lay in on the table, good or bad. Same thing goes for Unication...I’ve pointed out shortcomings slammed them after they release “tested” firmware filled with bugs myself and others on here find in a day of use and abuse. Unication David...same marbles...takes it and tries to get things done. The problem is both of them (I won’t include Whistler Wendy as I haven’t been too impressed with her) are only one person and one voice in a room of engineers, product developers, bean counters, marketing reps, etc., each with their own agenda. It’s a difficult position to be in.

Unication has found a way to do it and the cost is worth the result, especially when paying comparable prices for products that don’t work. But each has its own purpose. I own a G5 UHF-H 7/800. I use it strictly to monitor P25 trunked systems. Yes I could program it for conventional monitoring, but my scanners give me better flexibility, like scanning 100 channels at once if I want. As others have pointed out, each have its own purpose. But I don’t agree with marketing/advertising a product to work on “Phase II TDMA systems” when it was never designed to do that. That’s just misleading and based upon angry users posting on forums like this one, I think they are starting to feel the pain. From here they can either make something that works, or keep peddling to the uninformed. I for one will never buy another scanner for LSM reception until they fix the issue.

I had the opportunity to take a car ride across a few states using statewide P25 trunked systems. My friend was driving and his 536 and TRX-2 both are dash mounted with their own Larson 150/450/800 antenna drilled into the roof. My Unication G5 sat it the cup holder with its factory little stubby antenna. He couldn’t believe how much stuff he was missing and how far away I was getting reception when he was getting squat. Point proven.


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