Batboard

The Radio in question:

XTS3000 UHF 403-470
H09RDF9PW7BN
Flash: 5000080000001
HOST R07.01.01
DSP N707.03.09

I have a UHF xts3k, specs above, that is exhibiting odd behavior on some P25 conventional repeater channels. These are Federal Govt. channels programmed for receive only.

1), The radio receives p25 voice normally as expected on these channels about 50 percent of the time. However, often the red LED will flash, indicating traffic and the squelch will break for a split second(without voice) then mute even though the LED continues to flash.

When the monitor button is pressed during these occurrences 50 percent of the time I hear garbled alien speak(I am assuming this is encryption being use and, since mine has none installed, why the radio does not un mute. someone please confirm this.) but the other half of the time when the monitor button is pressed there is just quiet p25 "carrier", if you, will as if someone is dead keying a radio with just a small chirp of noise every couple seconds.

Is the above the "muting on packet loss" that is listed as a fault of DSP 07.xx.xx firmware in the rOf "Guide to Astro Digital Radios"?

I am assuming it is only my radio having this issue as I can hear the other side of the conversation fine and they appear to have no trouble copying the transmitting. I have also had this same thing happen when trying to call P25 ham repeaters in a couple different cities. I call, and after unkeying see the LED flash but no audio, repeater ID courtesy tone, ect. when the monitor is held down, there is quiet during the LED flashing, then static when it stops......further, non of the above problems are had when the radio is trunking, or simplex but ONLY on Conventional Repeater channels.....(all RX personalities set to Digital CSQ and RX NAC's set to F7E. TX NAC's for Ham repeaters set correctly to best of my knowledge. Squelch set to 3)

...would getting the firmware lifted to the current release solve this issue. and is the firmware bump from what's in the radio now worth the $$ in general?


2) Also, in the FED. conventional repeater channels IDs are not displayed even tho the feature is enabled. ID display does work normally in simplex ops and when trunking...what gives?

Thanks in advance for any help,
Tom

I think your radio is probably working just fine

The "alien speak" you speak of, if accompanied by a "double flash" of the red RX LED is indicative of encryption. Motorola radios mute this out because obviously it can't be deciphered without a key.

Second, the flashing of the LED on ham channels, but no audio would probably be the repeater hang-time, which in digital modes is silent.

The packet loss aspects of DSP 7 that r0f was speaking of just made the audio lower in volume during weak signal/broken up signal situations. It isn't too apparent though.

-Josh

Josh,

Thanks for the reply. The encryption is as I suspected. Still puzzled by the "dead air" transmissions when the monitor is held down.

also, answered my own question about the ID's. Changed the RX NAC's from F7E to the correct RX NAC and the ID's now show as normal.


...anyone with thoughts if the firmware lift from 7.x to 8.x is worth it in general for audio quality?

Tom

immelmen28 wrote:Josh,

Thanks for the reply. The encryption is as I suspected. Still puzzled by the "dead air" transmissions when the monitor is held down.

also, answered my own question about the ID's. Changed the RX NAC's from F7E to the correct RX NAC and the ID's now show as normal.


...anyone with thoughts if the firmware lift from 7.x to 8.x is worth it in general for audio quality?

Tom

For the "dead air". If you have the RX set to analog, you'd hear a data stream, and it gets muted when either mixed-mode or astro RX options are enabled. When the time-out occurs, then a white-noise static signal can be heard. The purpose of the silence is so the channel can be monitored for traffic (silence when the monitor key is pressed) so you don't talk over people. It's not something that the radio will/can decode like a dead carrier on an analog machine.

For RX quality, I haven't noticed a difference. It does make a difference with digital TX quality on other radios, but it's not a super big difference like DSP6 to 7 is.