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Difference between revisions of "BCD996T"

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== GPS Features ==
 
== GPS Features ==
  
'''The scanner ''will not'' include a GPS Receiver, an add-on GPS receiver will be required.'''  Users will be able to define a LAT/LONG centerpoint for any system (conventional or trunked) and a range (in miles) that specifies the radius of a circle that specifies where to turn the system on/off.
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'''The scanner ''does not'' include a GPS Receiver, an add-on GPS receiver is required.'''  You can define a LAT/LONG centerpoint for any site in a Motorola or EDACS system or an entire Conventional or LTR system  and a range (in miles) that specifies the radius of a circle that specifies where to turn the system/site on/off.
  
With the release of the scanner, the radioreference.com database (RRDB) will have the ability to store the Lat/Long/Range settings for conventional subcategories and trunked system sites.
+
The radioreference.com database (RRDB) will soon have the ability to store the Lat/Long/Range settings for conventional subcategories and trunked system sites.
  
 
GPS units known and tested to work with the scanner includes:
 
GPS units known and tested to work with the scanner includes:

Revision as of 10:06, 22 May 2006

BCD996T (Preliminary) - Click image to view in full

Overview

Will be Uniden's latest Base/Mobile Digital Trunktracker scanner with Dynamic Memory and GPS Support.

Expected Ship Date is late Spring 2006, and will probably retail for close to $550.00

Newer photos of the BCD996T can be found here, courtesy of Paul Opitz, Chris Gordon and the Scan Massachussetts wiki.

All information on this page is preliminary and subject to change. Nothing on this page should be construed as a warranty of performance for this or any Uniden product.

Feature Summary

  • Rebanding Supported? YES
  • Memory Architecture
    • Dynamic allocation.
    • Construction:
    • 500 Systems, 6000 Channels*
  • Creation of systems and channel groups use channel slots, so the actual total channel count will be less than 6000.
    • Maximum Systems: 500
    • Maximum Channel Groups per System: 20
    • Maximum Channels in a Trunked System: 250
    • Maximum Channels in a Conventional System: 1000
    • Maximum Frequencies in a Trunked System: 1000 - #Channels used
    • Maximum Sites per System: 256
    • Maximum Sites Total: 1000
  • Creation of Systems and Channel Groups use some channel slots, so the total number of channels could be less than 6000.
  • Search with Scan
  • Temporary Lockout
  • 100 System/Site Quick Keys + 10 Group Quick Keys per System
  • Startup Configuration – lets you set systems to be automatically locked or unlocked during power-up.
  • Single-Handed Function Operation
  • Priority Scan
  • Priority Plus
  • Channel Alert
  • Dropout Delay
  • Attenuator
  • Repeater Reverse
  • Quick Recall – quickly navigates to a specific Channel by choosing the System, Group, and Channel.
  • Weather and SAME Alert
  • 10 Custom Search Ranges
  • Service Search – Public Safety, News, HAM Radio, Marine, Railroad, Air, CB Radio, FRS/GMRS, Racing, TV Broadcast, FM Broadcast, Special, Military Air
  • Tone Search – Rapidly searches for the CTCSS/DCS used during a transmission.
  • Fire Tone-Out
  • Frequency Autostore
  • ID Autostore
  • Quick Search
  • “SOFT�? Search Keys – let you assign search ranges to front-panel keys.
  • 500 (250 Temporary + 250 Permanent) Search Lockouts
  • Alpha Tagging – For System, Group, Channel, Talkgroup ID, Custom Search Range and SAME Group. The scanner allows up to 16 characters for each name.
  • Duplicate Input Alert
  • Data Skip
  • Broadcast Screen – sets the scanner to ignore hits on Pager, FM, UHF TV, VHF TV, NOAA WX and custom band frequencies.
  • Trunk Tracking – supports the following systems:
    • Motorola: Type I 800 / Type II 800, 900, UHF, VHF, P25
    • EDACS: WIDE, NARROW, SCAT
    • LTR
  • APCO Project 25 Decoder – lets you listen to digitized voice data that is compliant with the APCO Project25 standard.
  • APCO Auto Adjust Threshold
  • Multi-Site Trunking – allows independent system sites to share common talk group channel lists.
  • Control Channel Only mode
  • Two-Color LCD and Keypad Backlight – select red or green backlighting.
  • Independent Alert Tone Volume – lets you set the volume level of the following tones: Key Beep, Emergency Alert, Channel Alert, and Close Call Alert.
  • Key Lock
  • Close Call RF Capture
  • Close Call Do-Not-Disturb – sets Close Call RF Capture to operate only when no transmission is being received.
  • Close Call Temporary Store – automatically saves and scans the last 10 Close Call hits.
  • PC Control
  • Wired Cloning
  • On-Air Programming
  • Scan Speed – 100 CH/Sec. in Scan Mode (max)
  • Search Speed / Turbo Search – 100 Steps/Sec. in Search Mode (max) - except for 5 kHz step. 300 Steps/Sec. in Search Mode (max) - (Turbo Search) - for 5 kHz step
  • Memory Back Up
  • Trunking Activity Indicators
  • Audio AGC
  • Location-Based Scanning – Each system can include latitude, longitude, and range information and can be automatically enabled/disabled when a GPS is connected and the unit is within the defined range of the system.
  • Non-Radio Location-Based Features – the scanner can include location alerts (that sound alert tones when the unit approaches a defined latitude/longitude) and speed-trap alerts (that sound alert tones if the unit is traveling at > than a set speed limit while it is within a grid area).
  • GPS Display Mode – displays location and travel information based on the GPS input.

Physical Dimentions: Width 7.33 Height 2.21 Depth 5.94

GPS Features

The scanner does not include a GPS Receiver, an add-on GPS receiver is required. You can define a LAT/LONG centerpoint for any site in a Motorola or EDACS system or an entire Conventional or LTR system and a range (in miles) that specifies the radius of a circle that specifies where to turn the system/site on/off.

The radioreference.com database (RRDB) will soon have the ability to store the Lat/Long/Range settings for conventional subcategories and trunked system sites.

GPS units known and tested to work with the scanner includes:

  • GARMIN eTreX
  • GARMIN eTreX Legend
  • GARMIN Rino110
  • GARMIN GPS18PC
  • Lowrance iFinder GO2
  • MAGELLAN Meridian Marine
  • Uniden Mystic

The above list is not all-inclusive. Basically any GPS that outputs serial NMEA standard data should work with the scanner. As other units are used and confirmed to work, this section should be updated to include the other models. GPS units that only have a USB connection will not work with the scanner (well, it is possible that some units could be internally modified to work, but we're talking off-the-shelf, here).

The scanner understands the sentences GGA (Global Positioning System Fix Data) and RMC (Recommended Minimum Specific GNSS Data) based on “NMEA-0183 ver.3.01”.

There is extensive information about the various models available, as well as technical and mapping application info, at Joe Mehaffey's GPS Pages

Press Release

Uniden Announces Industry’s First GPS-Enabled Scanner

New Mobile Model Features Close Call™ Technology and APCO 25 Capability In a Desktop Design

Fort Worth, Texas, September 1, 2005 – Uniden America Corporation, a leading manufacturer of wireless consumer electronics, today announced a new mobile digital scanner, the Bearcat BCD996T. This model introduces the first-ever GPS-enabled scanner, allowing the product to automatically select nearby radio systems for scanning. The BCD996T also offers APCO 25 digital capability, allowing consumers to monitor the activities and signals of city and government service departments, and features advanced scanner technology in an in-dash or mobile mount design.

The GPS-enabled feature offered by the BCD996T provides automatic system selection, which permits the scanner to turn system reception on or off depending on the user’s location, and allows the user to define the scanner display to show location-based information.

In addition, when a GPS unit, not included with this scanner, is connected to the BCD996T, it will alert at areas of special interest, such as dangerous intersections, school zones, or general points of interest.

Featuring APCO 25 capability, Uniden’s BCD996T is poised to further enhance Uniden’s offerings to public safety and increase interoperability between agencies using different types of radio systems. Uniden’s BCD996T will not permit users to monitor sensitive, encrypted signals from national and local security services.

The Bearcat BCD996T also offers Close Call™ RF Capture Technology, Dynamic Memory Management, Fire Tone-Out, and Multi-site programming as well as 6,000 channels and a frequency range of 25 MHz to 1.3 GHz (excluding cellular and UHF TV frequencies). This new model is slated to hit retail shelves in spring 2006 and carries a MSRP of $849.99. “The BCD996T, the first GPS-


Advanced (and much requested) Features

<NOTE THAT THIS IS PRELIMINARY AND SUBJECT TO CHANGE>

Multi-Site Trunking

Some wide coverage systems use multiple system sites that are linked together to provide extended area coverage. Each site operates on its own set of frequencies, but share talk group channels with all other sites in the system.

Normally, a site will only carry traffic for talk groups that have at least one subscriber unit (mobile radio) affiliated with it.

With the initial implementation of dynamic memory, each site needed to be entered as its own system, and all talk group channels had to be duplicated. This resulted in more complexity in programming as well as more memory usage.

Multi-Site Trunking is available for Motorola and EDACS system. With this method, you define a system, one or more sites for the system, and then the channels for the system. All channels are shared among all sites.

Here’s an outline of a Multi-Site System:

    System
         System Attributes
         Site
              Frequencies
              Other Attributes
         Site
              Frequencies
              Other Attributes
         Channel Group
              Channel Group Attributes
              Channel
                   Channel Attributes
              Channel
                   Channel Attributes
         Channel Group
              Channel Group Attributes
              Channel
                   Channel Attributes
              Channel
                   Channel Attributes

The only System attribute is the system name. This tag is never displayed, but makes the system easy to find for programming updates.

Site attributes include:

  • Site Quick Key: Equivalent to the System Quick Key; turns the site on/off for scanning.
  • Site Name
  • Site Location

Temporary Lockout

Pressing L/O one time while on a channel temporarily locks out that channel. Pressing F+L/O one time while on a system temporarily locks out that system.

Pressing L/O or F+L/O two times results in a permanent lockout. Pressing L/O for more than 3 seconds unlocks all channels in the current system (or all search lockouts if in a search). F+L/O for more than 3 seconds unlocks all systems.

Temporary lockouts are removed when power is cycled.

Startup Configuration

Pressing a number button while powering on the scanner automatically unlocks all systems assigned to that startup key and automatically locks all systems assigned to a different startup key (unassigned systems are not affected).

Location-Based Scanning (GPS)

If you connect a GPS unit to the scanner, it can automatically enable/disable systems based on the geographic information you provide:

  • Latitude (center of the range)
  • Longitude (center of the range)
  • Range (radius of a circle around the Latitude/Longitude) which can be selected from .5/1/3/5/10/20/30/50 miles

Rather than center the lat/lon on the antenna site for the system and set the range to the receivable range for the system, it makes more sense to center these settings on the geopolitical center of the system, and bound the range to encircle that entity. That is, while I can technically hear the Arlington TRS from west Fort Worth, I don’t really want to. Instead, I’d set the lat/lon/range values to approximate a circle around the Arlington city limits so that I would not hear Arlington until I approached/entered Arlington.

Also, not all geopolitical areas are perfect circles. You can modify the shape of the system by entering multiple sites for the system (even though the system might have only one site) and use different location settings for each site. For example, stack two circles to make a tall, narrow scan area for the system.

Non-Radio Location-Based Features (GPS)

There are non-radio type systems that hold other location based information:

  • Dangerous Xing: Stores location, range, direction of travel. If you are within range, traveling in the specified direction, you receive an alert.
  • Dangerous Road: Stores location, range, speed. If you are traveling at a speed greater than the one specified, and are within the range of the specified location, you receive an alert.
  • Points of Interest: Stores location and range. If you approach the specified location, you receive an alert.

In general, a location alert can have:

  • Latitude
  • Longitude
  • Speed (optional)
  • Alpha (optional)
  • Alert Type and Level (optional)
  • Vector (optional)
  • Heading

Alerts are based on:

  • Speed setting > 0 and no vector entered, non-directional speed alert
  • Speed setting > 0 and a vector is entered, directional speed alert
  • Speed = 0 and vector is entered, dangerous intersection alert
  • Speed = 0 and no vector entered, point-of-interest alert

The user can quickly save a location by pressing GPS. Scanner prompts for the type of location to store (Speed, Intersection, or POI).

Close Call Do-Not-Disturb

When set in this mode, the scanner will periodically make Close Call checks whenever the scanner is not receiving audio in another mode. This eliminates the annoying breaks in conversation while still allowing for the Close Call functionality.

===

Let you program the keypad’s secondary functions to turn on/off specified search ranges.

Two-Color Backlighting

Lets you choose either red or green backlighting for the display/keypad.

Single-Handed Function Operation

Tap Function to access F+ key presses. 5 seconds after your last key press, the scanner reverts to non F+ entry (or press Function again to revert sooner).

Close Call Temporary Store

GPS Display Mode

Lets you display extended GPS information like:

  • Distance to POI
  • Heading to POI
  • Time to POI
  • Speed
  • Position
  • And so on

Dual Serial Ports

Front-set serial port using the same connector as BC246T/BCD396T/BR330T/SC230. Rear DB9 Male connector (for convenient direct plug-in of GPS Serial cable).

Either port can be configured to be PC interface or GPS interface.

PC Programming and Control

Free UASD software (compatible with other versions of UASD):

Free Clone996 software will be available at BuTel Software website.

BuTel Software ARC996 Basic & ARC996 Pro software

BuTel 'Scanner Over Ip' client/server software will also support BCD996T

BCD996T Yahoo group

Strong Signals BCD996T forum

Help Create Location Data

Want to help create the location data? Well, go to BCD996T_Lat-Lon and give us a hand. Everyone who contributes at least 25 site locations gets a preview copy of the BCD996T UASD software!