Trunkstar Pro questions

[wozz]

I'm thinking about purchasing Trunkstar Pro, mainly for unattended audio logging of talk groups on a local EDACS system using my BC245xlt. I'm testing out the demo and have run into a few issues and have a few questions that I was hoping users of the software might have some insight into.

First off, I'm attempting to monitor a particular fleet's talk group usage in the EDACS system and because the software doesn't seem to support the XPAND talk group wildcarding feature of the 245, I'm having to enter all sorts permutations of potential talk group's. This isn't a showstopper, but it would be nice if I could program in 12- for a talkgroup and have it pick up all the 12 fleet talkgroup traffic as I can with the radio by itself. I attempted programming the XPAND'd TGID's manually, but TrunkStar didn't seem to like having its scanlist not match up with whats in the radio. In any case, as I said, not really a showstopper

What is a showstopper, however, is that the audio/traffic logging is displaying some seriously annoying behavior. First off, on the history tab, the talk groups are being logged incorrectly. For example, 12-003 will be picked up on the scanner, TrunkStar displays and logs it as 00-003. Secondly, all the audio (and traffic history) is being logged into one entry in the History tab, only displaying the last used talk group (incorrectly as I mention above). The documentation mentions an option of creating a new entry on each squelch, but the option they mention doesn't appear to exist anywhere I can find it in the software.

Anyone have any thoughts? The software seems really nice, but these issues are making it less than useful for unattended logging.

 

[ka3jjz]

I have yet to hear anything good about Trunkstar Pro, unfortunately. Have you tried emailing Sam Dunham directly? He's usually pretty good about answering questions like this. It's my impression - and it may not be totally accurate - that the software seems to fit into the category of a popular TV series of the past - namely 'Not Quite Ready for Prime Time'

As an alternative (free), did you know that IDTracker (which now fully supports the 245) also does recording? It never worked on my pc with its crummy el cheapo soundcard, but hey, it's free. Dave Hitchner is generally pretty good about answering questions.

I was going to recommend Winscan 2.1 as an alternative, but the newly redesigned Scanner Master website doesn't seem to have it anymore. I'm not at all surprised, since the 245 and 895 are as old as the hills; the lack of software sales probably didn't warrant keeping it going.

The only other alternative I can think of off the top of my head is Spectrum Commander - that's a much more mature app from Signal Intelligence, and I know it does record, tho how well I'm not entirely sure.

The links for all of these can be found on the 245 Wiki at:

BC245XLT Wiki

73s and GL...Mike

 

[wozz]

I have yet to hear anything good about Trunkstar Pro, unfortunately. Have you tried emailing Sam Dunham directly? He's usually pretty good about answering questions like this. It's my impression - and it may not be totally accurate - that the software seems to fit into the category of a popular TV series of the past - namely 'Not Quite Ready for Prime Time'

As an alternative (free), did you know that IDTracker (which now fully supports the 245) also does recording? It never worked on my pc with its crummy el cheapo soundcard, but hey, it's free. Dave Hitchner is generally pretty good about answering questions.

I'll have to check out IDTracker, haven't looked at that yet.

I was going to recommend Winscan 2.1 as an alternative, but the newly redesigned Scanner Master website doesn't seem to have it anymore. I'm not at all surprised, since the 245 and 895 are as old as the hills; the lack of software sales probably didn't warrant keeping it going.

The only other alternative I can think of off the top of my head is Spectrum Commander - that's a much more mature app from Signal Intelligence, and I know it does record, tho how well I'm not entirely sure.

Hmm. I hadn't looked at Spectrum Commander. Given the price difference (only $30) what's the purpose of TrunkStar? It seems like there's complete feature overlap between two completely different software packages from the same folks?

Thanks for the suggestions!

 

[ka3jjz]

I neglected to mention yet another package - if you already are a RecAll Pro user, Radio Manager 2004 (along with Trunk Manager) will send the necessary data over for recording. However, I'm not fond at all of the data editor that package uses - it's very cumbersome.
The link for Radio Manager 2004 is also on the 245 wiki.l
73s and GL with your search...Mike

 

[wozz]

I'm a fan of Radio Manager in general, but don't like their recording setup. ID Tracker looks to be exactly what I want, but I'm unable to edit the bank ID list's or get any id's logged in the list, even though it is tracking frequencies correctly. I fired off an email to the author, but no response yet.

 

[ka3jjz]

Since I did some of the 245 beta work, I may be able to help (remember, Dave is in Louisiana....). I also have a 245; it's a bit tricky getting everything set up, to be sure. Like I said in my original message, I never could get the recording functions to work, but I did get all the logging functions.

If Dave doesn't get back to you in the next few days, email me off list. I'm going to dust off my version of IDTracker and get reacquainted with it. Be sure to say whether you've done any of the setup such as loading data into the IDTracker banks, ect that's mentioned on the help page (which you should download and keep as a reference).

It's a great little utility once you get the hang of how it works. 73s Mike

 

[wozz]

Thanks for the offer. Dave has sent me a debug version to do some testing with, but no luck so far (thanks if you are reading this Dave!). It appears I have an odd situation.

 

[ka3jjz]

And that odd situation is....? Unfortunately I don't have an EDACS system in my area - only Motorola. That would make it rather difficult to replicate the problem if it's related to that.

73s Mike

 

[wozz]

Well, while it looks like ID Tracker see's the scanner attached (debug recognizes it's a 245xlt and it shows the control channel frequency and talk group frequencies when talk groups are active), it never shows or logs any talk group activity. In addition, I'm unable to import talk groups from CSV's or tab separated files into the bank editor. No error pops up, but no data does either. Dave mentioned that he wasn't seeing some debug messages he would expect.

 

[ka3jjz]

Hmmm..I'm doing a little better than that. I've got almost all the lookups working, logs are coming out just fine - but like you I have one file that IDTracker simply refuses to import. I generated it with Works spreadsheet
To activate logging, there's a couple of steps you need to take. You must turn on logging on the first setup screen, and indicate you want logging on EACH of the bank edit screens. In addition, you need to give your log a name, and state how many ms you want to have IDT wait before logging. I usually keep mine set to zero ms., which means IDT logs everything.
Hopefully Dave and you working together can get you running. 73s and GL..Mike

Edit I may have a workaround for that file import problem - at least it worked for me.
Instead of choosing either a tab delimited or csv file in the pulldown, select 'All Files' and manually select the desired file. Worked for me.

 

[wozz]

Hmm, the files I'm having problems with are also from Works spreadsheet. I wonder. I'll try your workaround or using another file. One other point is that my problem is not just with loggingg. I don't get any data in the list window, logging or not.

 

[ka3jjz]

Did you hit the 'List' button while IDTracker is reading the data from the scanner? A grid will pop up below. Press F1 for the help screens, and it shows this clearly. Other than that, I'm lost....

73s Mike

 

[wozz]

The list grid pops up but nothing gets logged.

 

[ka3jjz]

???Boy this is strange. Dumb question - did you download the full version (which I believe is just under 2 MB) or just the 300k or so of the updates? It almost sounds like some stuff didn't register properly.
As a new user, you probably should download the whole program, even if you have other VB apps running ok on your machine.
Very odd 73s Mike

 

[wozz]

Yep, went through all those hoops. No luck. I'm looking for another solution at this point.

 

[ka3jjz]

At this point, assuming you can't get the Signal Intelligence products to work, I'd fall back to what you have - get RecAll Pro and use Radio Manager/Trunk Manager to do the recording, as Ben has written on his website. I think you'll find that's just about all the options you have for a radio as old as the 245.

Sad to hear that you couldn't get IDT to work. Hopefully you'll find something that will suit your needs. Again, I'd check the 245 Wiki to see what else is available, but the offerings that do trunking and recording are mighty slim - unless you go for the very expensive Scancat Gold for Windows SE.

73s and GL with your search...Mike