Programming the MPDC in Digital Scanners

The Washington DC public safety system is fairly unique in our area in that it uses 2 separate ranges for its operations; UHF for the police, and 800 Mhz for fire. In order to trunk this system, only the scanners listed in our Digital Scanners article will work. Note that to use the BC250D and BC785, the optional BC25i card is required. This system is also unique because it requires 2 trunking tables for UHF to trunk correctly.
These images show how to enter the base and offset information (needed for UHF trunking) for various software packages that support the digital scanners. The 800 Mhz fire frequencies need no special settings. Click on the desired image to expand it.

[edit] Butel Software Products

Settings for ARC250

settings for ARC396

Screen 1 for ARC96

Screen 2 for ARC96

[edit] Freeware for Uniden DMA scanners

settings for BCTool

settings for Freescan

[edit] Scan Control settings

Note: Only 1 setting for the offset is shown. You must use the pulldown at the bottom of the screen to enter the 2nd set of offsets

For the 250, 296, 785 and 796

For the BCD396

For the BCD996

[edit] UASD settings

bandplan for UASD396

settings for UASD396

bandplan for UASD996

system freqs for UASD996

[edit] Win96 (For PRO-96/2096)

settings for Win96

[edit] Technical Notes

• The digital scanners are capable of Control Channel Only trunking; using this feature saves having to supply all the frequencies in the database. Program only those shown in red and blue, and make sure that option is checked in the desired software.
• This system is not Project 25 compliant, as it has some analog audio on it (MOSCAD data). Program it as a Motorola Type II system.
• For the BCD-396T and BCD-996, you must program the police and fire in seperate systems
• For PRO-96/2096 owners;
  • You cannot program both base/offsets manually. You must use Win96 or ARC96 (BuTel) to access the tables for programming. In addition, make sure that both the frequencies and bank are set to MOT
  • This system requires two tables including base frequency, offset and step to trunk correctly. In Win96, check Multi table bullet under MOT 3600 CC, then click Extended Tables bar. Enter data in # 00 and 01 as indicated - Identifiers 02 through 05 will be ignored by scanner.
  • Note: Do not check any Standard Plans Bullets.
• For the PSR-500, 600, and presumably the RS PRO-197 and 106, the values for the 400 Mhz custom table are as follows:
  • Lo 380 Hi 479 Offset 380 Base 453.450 Step 12.5
  • Lo 480 Hi 759 Offset 480 Base 460.025 Step 12.5