Batboard

Alright, I have hit a few brick walls with this in talking with some radio tech's locally.. so here it comes:
I have recently purchased a UHF MTS2000 flashport radio. I have several versions of the mtsx for DOS. I have read in a forum that there is a CPS for the MTS2000. In asking some of the tech's about this, they were not too helpful. They suggested that I had a laptop that was too fast. This radio is, what I belive to be a newer of the series of radios??
I tried a friends laptop, that is a 386, and still get the same errors. In the config screen, testing the communications, i get a time out error. In trying to read the codeplug, I get a ACK error... I am truly puzzled at this point.. The radio is in working order, I do not have the 01/93 "toolproof" situation. This seems to be just a miss in correct software. Also, I have tried 2 RIB's and 2 Cables.. both haveing the same end results.. Any information and help would be greatly appreciated. Thank You for taking the time to read my inquiry.
-Motradiodude.

What version software are you using? NAme and revision numbers.
Have you been able to program any other MTS radios with that set-up?

tpg

Clean the contact field with a soft rubber.
If the radio will not work,look at the programming cable for a broken wire.
Use always real DOS not Win 3.1 or higher.

Andreas

I've had major trouble in the past with MTS2000's by using too SLOW of a computer. I have great results with a 166 MHz, but with my 25 MHz machine I get the errors that you're describing.

I have just cleaned the contacts of both the radio and cable this morning, and still get the error: >REQUEST NOT ACKed/NAKed ERROR <
The laptops I have tried are a 386, a 486 @33mhz, and a PII 233mhz. All 3 I have loaded real DOS 6.0, and have changed the config.sys as the RSS states to for FILE allocations...
All 3 laptops result the same errors. I am using the MTSX rss RVN4097P Ver. R06.06.00 from 30 sep 99.
I have not had any opertunities to program another MT or MTS 2000. I have just recently programmed a GP900, which is a VERY similar radio.
-Still stumped
-motradiodude

**A correction on the Version. It is R06.04.00, not R06.06.00 ....**
Also.. A side note.. I have a PII 333mhz laptop that I have windows 98 on, and have run the MCS2000 CPS software, being the sister radio, to try communications ONLY, and do have communications with the radio.
-Still Stumped..
-motradiodude

I would start to suspect the internal flex cable that leads to the side connector pins.

Were you ever able to program it yourself in the past?

Has any service been done that would have required the case to be opened?

I would probably check the flex cable for fractures and also how it's seated in the radio connector. Also, you might look at the slide in board behind the radio side pin contacts.


mancow

I have not ever programmed this radio before. It is a recent purchase. I do no know if any service has been done to it in the past. I will check out the internal cable tomorrow, and report back. Thank you
-Still stumped on this one..
-motradiodude

I know of people that have had radios do this before and there was no fix short of replacing the controller or sending back to Motorola. These people were known to play with lab to see what they could get to happen and eventually wound up at the same precipiece you are at.

In the labtool there is a field for SB9600 address. I think what happens is someone changes that number from 1 to something else and you lose the ability to fully communicate with the radio. The comm test in the rss may do a low level 'ping' type function where the MPU still responds, but the rss may be trying to only talk with device #1 and the radio was reprogrammed with another device number.

Of course, this is purely hypothetical.

Well,
Reading the reply from OX, I am hoping that is not the case. I have checked the internal flex cable, and have found that there is no damage what so ever. It actually appears that I am the first to have taken the radio apart. Still in search of finding out the answer to this mystery..
-motradiodude

my vote is to try a new front shield... i've seen this before




doug

Alright, here's a new addition to the radoblock I have come to..
I have a total of 3 uhf mts2000's, all having the same issue. I doubt that all 3 are corrupt?? I am not sure where to turn at this point... I guess I should maybe get a different model of radio all togeather and give up on the mts2000..... Anyone have any ideas??
-Motradiodude

sounds like an unstable programming setup. doubtful that 3 radios all are bad. first, take your radios to someone with a known good (preferabbly factory setup..no cheap clone cables or cheap rib and stable PC). Chances are they are 100 percent and the issue lies in the programming hardware or setup. If you are using pure DOS (not Wincrap shelled out to DOS) that rules out the O/S all that is left is the hardware (both PC and RIB/radio cable) to investigate.

Laptops can also be funny, BIOS level power saving can turn off serial ports just enough to interrupt programming. I would double check your cable, RIB with another JEDI series radio such as an HT1000, MTX8000/9000 etc. Betcha they won't read/write as well. Go into your laptop's BIOS, turn off ALL power saving features, make sure all your ports are enabled to begin with. your error says "I don't even see a RIB/RADIO on the com port"..

I was able to read my MTS2000's with the 25MHz machine once increased the RAM.

The 166MHz is using 64MB of RAM and 25 was only using 4MB.

How much RAM are you using? If it's a low amount, try increasing it.

I recently purchased an MTS2000 as well. I have sucessfully programmed it about 10 times with RSS R06.07, and with the RIB, and cable I bought from ixcessory.com Occasionally I see ">REQUEST NOT ACKed/NAKed ERROR <" but everytime I retry it seems to work. I know COM1 is bad on my computer but COM2 seems to work, unless it is going bad. The computer is a P1 90MHz with 16MB RAM. It is running MS-DOS 6.22. Maybe we are both having hardware issues. I am afraid to take apart anything I have here except the computer. Any ideas?

Also I saw something posted above about changing config.sys. What should it have in it to optimize it for RSS?

This may help:


There have been reports of problems using the RIB on different computers. It looks like one of the problems might be a lack of negative voltage swing on the Busy out and RX (data out) lines back to the computer. You might want to try and change the value of R14 to 1.5k and R11 to 1K.

Some research has been done with the original RIB, and some modifications have been make to some of the values to make the circuit more compatible with RS232. The modified schematic can be found here.

http\\batlabs.com

There is just one problem: I am afraid to take apart any of my radio equipment. As long as this can't toolproof the radio, I'm ok.

tank wrote:There is just one problem: I am afraid to take apart any of my radio equipment. As long as this can't toolproof the radio, I'm ok.

Toolproofing a MTS is almost impossible really. Don't screw around in LAB is the number 1 rule to not Toolproof a radio. I've only stumbled across 2 other ways to cause a Toolproof and it didn't always occur (although it occured more then not), one way being a low battery in the RIB while writing the first block or 2 of a codeplug, the second way being the radio battery dieing while writing again, the first block or 2 of a codeplug. (Either that or I have incredibly bad luck.)

And, its not difficult to take apart a JEDI series radio (MTS2000 included), its just not something I'd tell someone to do all the time.

Well I only program the radio while it is in the charger, and the RIB battery is still only 3 days old so I am good so far. I have LAB, but it isn't on my programming computer, and it probably never will be.