WS1040: Newbie (Sort Of)

[hockeynut16]

Interested in getting this (WS1040) digital scanner to get back into the hobby. I have had a couple of scanners from RS in the past but they were not digital receptive.

My main question is in regards to the frequency list on RR. I am in Winnebago County, WI and mainly interested in listening to Winnebago/Outagamie County. They are both Project 25 Phase I systems. If for instance, I want to program Winnebago County, the red highlighted freq is 859.9875c. Is that the only freq I would need to program in order to receive all communications or do I need to program each feq?

Thanks for the help in advance.

 

[kmi8dy]

i'm not a whisler fan, but my unidens 996xt, 996p2, 396xt, and 325p2 can be programmed that way as well as putting in all the frequencies as i do. but i don't see any reason why the whisler should not make any difference.

 

[Spitfire8520]

If for instance, I want to program Winnebago County, the red highlighted freq is 859.9875c. Is that the only freq I would need to program in order to receive all communications or do I need to program each feq?

The primary control channel (red) is the only frequency that you need, assuming the database is correct. Alternate control channels (blue) are recommended for if the control channel decides to switch. Some users take it to the extreme and program every frequency, listed (just in case). This is usually not necessary unless you are specifically dealing with a system that uses all its frequencies as control channels in a rotation (eg. Harris systems).

For some reason the alternate control channels have not been identified for the system you want to program. I would think you would be okay with just the primary control channel, especially when dealing with Motorola systems.

 

[djeplett]

Interested in getting this (WS1040) digital scanner to get back into the hobby. I have had a couple of scanners from RS in the past but they were not digital receptive.

My main question is in regards to the frequency list on RR. I am in Winnebago County, WI and mainly interested in listening to Winnebago/Outagamie County. They are both Project 25 Phase I systems. If for instance, I want to program Winnebago County, the red highlighted freq is 859.9875c. Is that the only freq I would need to program in order to receive all communications or do I need to program each feq?

Thanks for the help in advance.

Hey hockeynut16,

I have tried to monitor that system from up in New London since it came on the air. (It's one simulcast system, by the way. With two "sites".) My PRO-106 was never able to decode it very well. I tried using a yagi and tried pointing it in just about every orientation, hoping to null out as many towers as I could. But where I am located, most towers in Outagamie county are east and south of me. I played around with the DSP settings and that didn't work. Some days I could pick up about 80% of the calls. Others it was so bad I might get 10%. Weather played a factor for sure. I bought a TRX-1, hoping to improve my reception. It did better, but I still could not get more than 80-90% of the transmissions. I finally gave up and bought a Motorola XTS3000 and programmed it and now I can monitor the system 100%.

I hope you have better luck. It sounds like you're down in Winnebago county somewhere. That's too far away for me to try the control channel listed so I can't help you there. I can say that PRO96Com reported the correct control channel for Outagamie but it did report four of the frequencies were alternate channels. I've been meaning to send in the update to get those listed as alternates but I was hoping sometime to listen in to Winnebago's site so I could see what are listed there as alternates also.

Feel free to PM me if you have questions. I'll try to help.