Morning: can someone point me in a direction on how to program this scanner? it is a sds200 if someone could point me in a direction video / book for beginners. This is way out of my league. I'm in the funeral business not nothing high tec like this. Thank you for your time.
SDS100/SDS200: Wanting to know if there is a SDS200 book for dummies.
- Thread starter kd8rod
- Start date
Hopefully those will get you going in the direction you want. Others will pop in through the day with more suggestions.
Welcome to the forums! There's plenty of very knowledgeable people here, so ask any questions you want answered (numerous times 😉).
Welcome to the forums! There's plenty of very knowledgeable people here, so ask any questions you want answered (numerous times 😉).
@kd8rod In case it's not obvious, that's a hyperlink by the way. Tap on it to go to the website.
That same info is also available as a smallish soft cover book. I have a copy I use for reference from time to time. I think the book is worth it, but for many the website will be sufficient. It's an amazing scanner. But this is more of a reference than a "how to".
I will say programming with Sentinel can seem like a black art sometimes. It's not extremely intuitive, IMHO.
This site (RR) is probably your best resource for help with Sentinel. As far as I know there's no 3rd party book I'm aware of to help with it. Sentinel "just is". Best advice is to make a soft copy of your out- of-box firmware, etc before you try programming it. Once you have a good backup you can try different methods of programming (front panel, Sentinel, ProScan, etc). I'd suggest doing a keyword search before posting a new query about Sentinel. Many others have probably asked similar questions in the past. I've learned a lot by reading others questions & answers here. Good luck!
Thank You
Welcome to the RR forums. You have a few options for programming an SDS200: Uniden Sentinel, Butel ARC536 or Proscan. First app is free but is rather limited to what it can do to customize favorites lists. For one thing it forces you to append every site & talkgroup on a system and remove the ones you don't need. Sentinel is the only app that updates scanner firmware (nothing fw related of any significance has been released lately) but the latter two apps allow for greater control of your favorites lists, mainly utilizing the RR import function to pick and choose only the objects you want to add without having to go back and delete what you don't need. You can also use these apps to control your scanner & with Proscan you can control and listen to your scanner from anywhere in the world via web browser if you configure it right. I (and many others here) highly recommend Proscan, it's jam packed with features and updates & feature enhancements are regularly released
ka3jjz
Wiki Admin Emeritus
Note that on page 2 of the SDS FAQ mentioned above (the link is both at the top and very bottom of the first page) we have a rather large lit of videos that can help
MIke
MIke
I purchased my scanners (desktop SDS200 and mobile SDS100) for my photojournalism work a few years ago. But after doing the basic programming for Dallas TX, I got tied up in some personal projects and just stopped trying to do any deep dives into the programming.
At the moment, all I can hear are Dallas TX Police comms. I have entered via ProScan dozens of other comms but never hear anything from them. Per the RR database, they are not encrypted (I mean, really, who encrypts dog catcher radios?).
Now that my schedule is clearing up, I went back to the scanner and re-upped for RadioReference. Updated a number of comms, but still - nothing.
That makes me wonder - Did I do it the programming correctly in the first place?
My biggest problem is understanding the order of programming. As in, Are the Control Channels listed up higher than the TGIDs, or vice versa?
Attached is a screen grab of my current ProScan list. All the different agencies are listed on the top, then the Control Channels are on the bottom. Is it possible that's the wrong order? The biggest issue is not hearing any comms on the non-police channels, like the OEM's shown here. I have also attached my set-up files.
Yes, this is a newbie question, and yes, I hit both the Uniden manual and the online short-version manual. All I got was a headache. Any suggestions are appreciated.
At the moment, all I can hear are Dallas TX Police comms. I have entered via ProScan dozens of other comms but never hear anything from them. Per the RR database, they are not encrypted (I mean, really, who encrypts dog catcher radios?).
Now that my schedule is clearing up, I went back to the scanner and re-upped for RadioReference. Updated a number of comms, but still - nothing.
That makes me wonder - Did I do it the programming correctly in the first place?
My biggest problem is understanding the order of programming. As in, Are the Control Channels listed up higher than the TGIDs, or vice versa?
Attached is a screen grab of my current ProScan list. All the different agencies are listed on the top, then the Control Channels are on the bottom. Is it possible that's the wrong order? The biggest issue is not hearing any comms on the non-police channels, like the OEM's shown here. I have also attached my set-up files.
Yes, this is a newbie question, and yes, I hit both the Uniden manual and the online short-version manual. All I got was a headache. Any suggestions are appreciated.
Attachments
In addition to the Easy Read SDS manual, there is also an Easier to read Sentinel manual.
From looking at what you posted, looks like most talkgroups are using a service type of Custom. A good amount are also set to Avoid. If you imported from the database using @ProScan, the proper service types would have been imported.
It would be best if you read the scanner into Sentinel or Proscan, than export the programming and post it here. I believe it would need to be zipped (compressed)
Question #1 - All my Service Types are CUSTOM by default since i never changed them to a specific category.
Question #2 - I have seven comms in the Dallas Fire Rescue on AVOID - I keep them loaded but ready to UNAvoid should stuff get crazy here in Dallas.
That file came out of my PROSCAN software.
So now I am back to the WTF am I doing wrong square.
This is an example:
Service type "Custom 1" is the initial default service type for channels and talkgroups entered manually. Had you created this by "appending from the main database, to your Favorites list, or used the "Radio Reference Web" import via ProScan, you would have had the service types listed in the RR online database.
These appear to be manual entries, or maybe you cut and pasted from an exported file from a different scanner. Had these been created via an append, or web import using ProScan, those DFD Biotel TGIDs would have had a service type of "EMS Talk"
I fixed my reply re CUSTOM too late for your review. They are CUSTOM because I did not tag them by subject (eg TAC).
But in the end, the CUSTOM flag has no impact that I can see on whether or not my structure of the different comms is correct (eg Do Control Channels go on top, the bottom, etc)?
But in the end, the CUSTOM flag has no impact that I can see on whether or not my structure of the different comms is correct (eg Do Control Channels go on top, the bottom, etc)?
Maybe you'll run across some lucky stiff that can help you figure it out.
I would read the scanner into proscan and then import the system from radio reference and build a new favorite list. That way every thing will import correctly. Then you can set those 7 to avoid. Very possible that when you pasted, the system was not set up as a trunked system.
The Custom 1 service type is the default entry when manually entering a conventional channel or talkgroup ID. If you are pasting from a file, and only filling in the actual TGID and the talkgroup's name (such as DFD Biotel 1, with the service type field not being populated by the entry (via paste or manually), the Custom 1 service type is used.If you use Custom 1 for everything, then you cannot enable specific categories of service types, such as "Law Dispatch", or "Fire Tac". You end up enabling all channels & talkgroups since all use 'Custom 1', or if the Custom 1 service type is not active, then you would not have anything active to scan.
You would be better off to just use the full import process via ProScan, getting the correct service types, instead of calling everything 'custom'.
All fixed, thanks to Lonnie/Enforcer52!
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