Batboard

I hate to restart a somewhat old topic but I could use some creative thinking about HT1250 scan lists. We are trying to standardize on two HTs and two mobile/bases, with identical models programmed identically. This means the PD, the FD and Emergency Management are all carrying identical radios. I've programmed the radios with FD in Zone 1, Tactical frequencies in Zone 2, the PD in Zone 3 - - - you get the picture. What I'm trying to do is have a scan list for the PD and a different list for the FD, etc. That way police officers operate in the PD zone and listen to PD frequencies being scanned. In short I need the equivalent of a scan list per zone, rather than selected by the rotary knob. Any ideas will be appreciated.

that's real simple and strait forward, open up the current scan list and on the bottom section of that box click on the + icon and it will add another scan list, do that twice and you will have two new lists. just add your frequencies in the scan list and make it simple, zone 1 set all of those channels to scan list 1 and zone 2 to all the channels in zone 2 and so on

So, here is the crux of my lack of understanding of the HT 1250. The documentation SEEMS to say the radio selects a scan list per personality. Each of the eight zones can have up to 16 personalities and the active personality is selected by the channel selector, typically the rotary switch on top. I thought that meant that if I were I had eight scan lists, and was operating with Zone One selected but my rotary know in position 2, the radio would be scanning Scan List Two. If that is NOT true, and if the radio will scan Scan List 1 while in Zone 1, independent of the rotary know setting, I have just wasted everyone's time. I did set up eight scan lists, each corresponding to the purpose of the zone with the same number. And, to be honest, the radios appeared to be working correctly. I may have allowed the high quality Motorola documentation confuse me.

The operative term, using Motorola's language, is what they call "mode slaved scan." That means that when you put the radio on T/R zone 2 you're also on scanlist 2. Usually scanlist 2 will have frequencies that are on zone 2, but they don't have to be, but it's less confusing if you do it that way. We've been using this arrangement on Motorola radios for years, going all the way back to the standard Sabers (or maybe even before that) and it's a pretty simple concept.

Obviously if your #1 priority channel is zone 1 channel 1, as is sometimes the case, you can put that z1/c1 on every scanlist, so no matter what scanlist you're using you'll still always hear your #1 priority channel when it comes on the air. Different radios have slightly different capabilities for prioritizing channel setups so you have to dig into the specs of your particular unit to find out the priority setup method.

Once again you guys have proven the value of the Batboard! As to the last about priorities, for others who may have been reading this, that is one I know. The HT1250 has a built-in entry for the scan lists called Selected. If you can get away with only 15 personalities on a given scan list you can put Selected in the priority position and whatever you have chosen with the rotary knob becomes the priority channel. Or, as Tom said, you can pick one frequency pair from your entire suite and put it in the priority position of the scan lists that need the channel as priority.

if you want to email me the codeplug i'll set it up the way you described

HLA, I don't even know how to express my appreciation for the offer! I actually think I now have the codeplug right. There is one other slightly interesting issue I'm stumbling over. I developed what I wanted to be the standard plug but I have three HTs that when I try to download to them they come back with all kinds of error codes about not be capable of performing certain tasks. I can upload the CP from the unit, hand change the personalities and scan lists to what I want and then load it back into the radio. In fact, this second "version" can then be downloaded to the other two. Do you know of a microcode version issue between radios? Since I have the CPs standard and every radio programmed I think I will take two radios that would share before and just upload the plug from one, change nothing but the ID and download it to the other and try to narrow down this issue.