Batboard

I'm reposting this under the System Infrastructure page on the off chance someone will see it here vs the focused Trbo sub group.

Has anyone out there interfaced an external repeater controller that was NOT specifically approved for use with the XPR Repeater series by Motorola and had any audio issues?

More specifically, I have several XPR-8300's that are running in analog mode. They are externally controlled by S-Com 7330 controllers (although I don't think that matters much). All the XPR's seem to have some strange audio glitch that causes the TX audio to distort for aprox 1 sec. This usually happens with nearly all key ups and mostly just once sometime while the carrier is up until the repeater drops and the cycle starts all over again.
It is not repeatable as far as at what point it starts doing it after first being keyed although it does seem to happen later and later with each subsequent key-up and there is more activity (as if something was "warming up" and changing the timing interval).

It is on the TX side of the repeater and not in the rx side. It happens whether using squelched/filtered audio or unsquelched/flat audio.
I have tried different gain & level settings with no change.

When using it as a stand alone repeater (internal/"in cabinet" repeat) it has no such problem.

Has anyone seen, heard of or come across any such issues? They are running slightly older firmware like 3.31 (or some combination of those digits).
I have not upgraded yet to see if anything was fixed.

Motorola was of no use with this matter and several other issues I raised with them (~6-8 months ago) regarding operation and tuning.
They basically look at this as a digital repeater and the analog side is essentialy a "freebie" so... I think you know.

Thanks in advance for any input.

Tom

what version of firmware do you have?

the earlier versions had all kinds of audio distortion problems, and some "fixes" ended up breaking other features.... it's taken them awhile to get it all ironed out

Hi,

Didn't know anything had to be "approved". Heck its just audio, PTT and GND.

I like the CAT-200. Pretty sure it didnt make the list.

Steve

/\/\y 2 cents wrote:Didn't know anything had to be "approved". Heck its just audio, PTT and GND.

Nothing has to be approved. Just don't whine to Motorola when you interface an unapproved controller and it doesn't work properly.

Chances are if you have a GOOD radio repeater station, and then you add any controller you know works an dis GOOD to thousands of others, and it does not, it is usually the wiring or setup.

I deal with a fair share of people everyday too who call in when the answer to their problem is right there in front of them - their work - the only thing that can fix it is them and taking time to INVESTIGATE and UNDERSTAND how thngs wok - but backwards.

A better way to say it is Motorola will subsidize support for what you THINK is the problem, help you come to your senses, and then take the TIME hit/expense to do it using the combined items of Motorola stations and X who we really own/subsidize indirectly.

Approved/disapproved means that they are saying/conveying in essence is that if not approved then they are against using it and it may not work so be careful (kills someone looking at innvative stuff to REALLY make things awesome who may have fear). This helps them steer people to return to them a 2nd, 3rd, 4th time, worse than they did for the radios, and sway decisions to mediocre solutions all greased up with other vendors like a Madoff ponzi. Motorola gets in/get the radio contract and the base of the pyramid feeds.

My next rant is in everybody wanting to make standards off everything to stop the creative process of arriving at the best solution and how the only relevant standard is electricity and everything else is just a derivative.

Just kidding.

Steve

There is new firmware out. I would upgrade the firmware of the repeater and the mobile/portables. Good chance that will fix it. There have been a lot of audio issues resolved with the more recent firmware releases.

Tom -

Just got off the phone with a systems engineer for Trbo, three hour call.

One of the things he pointed out, which is not covered in ANY documentation, is that ANY programmed pin on a mobile or repeater that is not in use, should be set to 'unassigned'. He said this could result in all kinds of unpredictable operations, since the input is looking for either a high or a low and nothing in between. If left to float, it could do unusual things to the rest of the radio.

Also, since the newest firmware, many things seem to be operating much more reliably.

Now, if only you could update repeaters without having to travel to the site....