dirkvan
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Posts posted by dirkvan
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7 hours ago, WD8DK said:
Thanks for all the input, I've basically have to agree it is Windows 11. I used the recommended cable, software (GM30) and as one person stated, "it doesn't acknowledge the radio". Therefore, I'll just live with it as such. Thanks again. 73.
I'm programming my GM-30 with no issues on a Microsoft Surface running Windows 11. It can be done! I'm temporarily locked out of my amazon account but once I'm back in, I will post the exact cable i bought. I did have to return one cable because it had the wrong driver type. Once I got the right one, it worked fine. The CPS program will bring up a full list of comm ports but you need to select the one your computer assigns to the USB cable. I'm a functional idiot when it comes to this stuff, so I don't know how to tell you where to look for that. Also, I first plugged the cable into my USB hub and the computer refused to find it. When I plugged into the USB port on the Surface itself, it worked fine. Once I got the cable right, it was pretty much plug and play for me. Hang in there!
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24 minutes ago, MichaelLAX said:
No, that is NOT what you posted; but you are entitled to ask additional questions, just not in the misleading pretext that you had already asked them before:
The way I showed you to program your GM-30 allows you to talk to both CLUB members and non-Club members with the same "CLUB" settings in Channel 4.
Seriously dude, you're going to damage yourself if you keep getting this stressed over a forum chat. In the section you nicely bolded and underlined, I wasn't actually asking a question, just setting up a scenario. Since you apparently can't conceive beyond the explicit, I will lay it out further. The club uses the tones as they are intended, as a noise filter to restrict received transmissions to those sent with the appropriate code. By adding only a tx tone to a preset channel, yes my fellow club members would hear me. I would, however, still be receiving all traffic on ch 4. By editing the name on preset ch. 4, I now have to remember that ch 4 = "club" and that it has a tx tone enabled. While that works, it still doesn't do what I was hoping, which is to leave preset ch 4 as is and "clone" it somewhere else in my channel list with the name "club" and both tx and rx tones enabled. The VERY NEXT sentence in my original post says that from a practical perspective, I really don't care. My whole point was that most native radio programming schemes offer far fewer configurable TX/RX channels than their advertising leads one to believe. I don't care about brands, etc., I was seeking to understand if there was a technical limitation that causes this to be true for many radios. The more astute and altruistic responses on this thread confirmed my suspicion that in fact, there isn't necessarily a technical limitation, but rather an unwillingness by OEMs and VARs to spend money on bespoke GMRS firmware and software. I hope this helps you sleep better.
Thank you for granting me permission to ask additional questions. I have to say I didn't know it was up to you to bestow this entitlement.
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37 minutes ago, MichaelLAX said:
That's MR DUDE to you!
And when you ask me for advice about the Radioddity DB20-G, that I do own (the clone Anytone AT-779UV), my answer will be:
And here's an early Christmas gift to you:
I probably shouldn't respond, but can't help myself at times. Thank you for taking the time to open your software, edit the channel, take a screen shot and post it here. Had you read my earlier responses, you would have understood that I already know this can be done and how to do it. This is editing a preset channel. I'm looking for a way to ADD another channel to my list, lets just randomly say channel 70, that is set up to RX and TX on 462.63750, with a tone and named "Club." But thanks for playing dude.
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19 minutes ago, MichaelLAX said:
When I asked you to let us know which radios you are considering, you declined; but yet told another inquirer that you have the GM-30.
While I have a clone of the GM-30, the Pofung P15UV, I realized that I am not the best person to advise you about the GM-30 and deleted my responses.
Good luck to you with your GM-30.
Chill out dude! You asked me to list all the radios I've looked at, which I correctly foresaw would lead to a flame about brands. The other inquirer specifically asked what radio I'm using. He did not proceed to tell me I'm "using the wrong radio," you did. I never intended to pick a fight with you, but you decided to get all antagonistic anyway. I'm sorry you're having a bad day. I appreciate your insights, when given, and I learn from everyone on here. Just relax and breathe, its all ok.
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42 minutes ago, MichaelLAX said:
That is just not true with the currently offered GM-30. Maybe you need to upgrade its firmware.
@WyoJoeis one of the experts on the GM-30 on this forum; perhaps he will chime in again...
As far as I can tell, I'm running the most recent firmware. (ver 06.03.006). The GM-30 radio has 250 "programmable" channel slots. There are no rows in the CPS where you can add in a simplex channel with rx and tx. In the CPS software, channels 1-22 are the standard GMRS simplex freqs and the user can modify attributes but not freqs; channels 22-30 are the standard GMRS repeater pairs, and again the user can edit attributes but not freqs. Channels 30-54 are configurable repeater pairs. The user selects one of the 8 rptr rx freqs and the software automatically fills in the corresponding tx channel with 5MhZ separation. The remaining channels 55-250 only allow the user to enter an rx freq and desired attributes, the radio will not tx on these channels.
I believe what others have said, that this is mostly a cost-saving function by Radiddiodty (in this case) to shortcut their firmware development efforts. I got what I paid for, no argument. For the n'th time, I wasn't trying to start a fight about bands or brands, I was just trying to understand if there were technical limitations I wasn't aware of.
Some radios have programmable buttons, and I've seen users program one or more of those buttons to automatically add a CTCSS tone to whatever channel the radio is on. That seems pretty handy and a potential work-around to the issue of limited rx/tx slots.
If there are secrets to the Radioddity CPS that I'm unaware of, I am all ears and eager to learn!
WROA465
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10 minutes ago, PartsMan said:
I posted a similar complaint recently and was told that the Wouxen radios allow more custom transmit channels.
More money but could be worth it.
Agreed. I don't feel like spending the money on a Wouxun at this stage, but they do seem to be the high-end of capability in GMRS for now. I'm intrigued by what some of the second-hand Moto's and Kenwoods have to offer, although it seems like programming them can be a rabbit hole of its own! I'd probably pull the trigger on a Moto CDM1250 or Kenwwod TK880 or the like, but I can't seem to find a definitive answer on what additional items are needed to program them and what version of software is needed. I've seen some of them on ebay that require DOS-based programming and I am not about to go find an ancient computer for that, nor am I savvy enough to run emulators or virtual boxes on my Windows11 laptop
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2 hours ago, WROZ250 said:
You didn't actually say what radio you have?
73Radioddity GM-30 right now, contemplating a DB-20G in near future. Also thinking about a used Moto or Kenwood to use as a base station, but reality is I just don't use GMRS that much. I enjoy it when I do and there seems to be a growing user base here in VA. Again, my point here was not to bash any particular radio or GMRS in general, just to try and understand whether there were specific technical or cost issues at play. I tend to agree with those who have noted its mostly a cost and speed to market issue for manufacturers not wanting to develop custom features for the GMRS world. Obviously at higher price points, the feature sets become richer.
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8 minutes ago, WyoJoe said:
Many of the radios I've seen do allow some programming of custom channels. Some do not. Are you looking specifically at mobile radios, handheld radios, or both?
Several manufacturers have updated the firmware of their radios to allow more customization to the programming than originally provided. Even though they were limited when they came out, they work much better now.
Both really. I tend to use the HT more and only use the mobile when in convoy or bored to death on the road
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8 minutes ago, Lscott said:
IMHO the cheap GMRS radios are using quickly modified firmware originally designed for the Ham version of the radios. It's probably easier to lock out whole banks of channels for TX programming rather than doing a major rewrite of the code to add in all of the necessary range checks to limit the frequencies to GMRS specific ones for the extra channels. The same goes with the radio's programming software too.
This makes sense. i wasn't trying to indict GMRS, just trying to understand why it is hard for a manufacturer to allow as many custom RX/TX channels as the on board memory will allow. If I can program in 32 custom repeater channels, why not 320 or 3,200? Why do I have to change a standard simplex channel rather than add a new one? I'm trying to understand what the cost and or technical limitations are?
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So I am curious as to why there are such limitations to programming GMRS radios. In the vast preponderance of brands and models, programming custom channels is limited to a SMALL defined block of repeater channels. Most allow you to change the name and CTCSS/DCS on a simplex channel but not to create a custom simplex channel. For instance, my club likes to use GMRS simplex channel 4 (462.63750) with CTCSS 85.3. I'd love to create a channel on my radio that is named "CLUB" and has those settings. For almost all the radios I've looked at, i'd need to go into the programming and rename CH 4 "CLUB" and add my CTCSS codes, thereby losing the generic CH 4. I'd have to keep entering and deleting the CTCSS codes anytime I wanted to use CH4 with non club members. From a practical perspective, I don't really care since I pretty much only use the radio for club functions and occasional other stuff, so no big deal. I'm just really curious why the programmable "slots" on GMRS radios are so limited. The same is largely true for repeater pairs. Many radios advertise they have 500 channels. When you go into the programming, you quickly find that only a very few allow transmit, the rest are receive only. WHY??? What is the limiting factor? Please, don't go on a rant about FCC type certs, i just want to understand the mechanics of it. I freely admit that I am not an engineer or technical guru
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Does anyone know of a battery eliminator that works for a GM-30? I do see one made for the TYT TH-UV88 clone of the GM-30 and wonder if that would work? I'm trying to fins a way to use my GM-30 as a mobile on an upcoming road trip. Please spare me the lectures on just buying a mobile unit
thanks!
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On 10/1/2021 at 12:54 PM, MichaelLAX said:
The TYT TH-UV 88 Ham Radio clone of the Radioddity GM-30, has keyboard codes that will open up the VFO to transmit and additionally both VFO and Channel mode can transmit on GMRS and MURS.
Do they work on the GM-30? Where can they be found? Asking for a friend....
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Define ch.19? On my radio (GM-30) ch.19 = 462.6500. That is also part of the standard GMRS repeater channel 5 pair (462.650/467.650). I'm not aware of any NoVa repeaters on that particular pair, but then again, I don't know much! I'd be interested to learn more, though! Were there any CTCSS codes on the channel you were montoring? When I kerchunk that pair using travel tone, I do get a response. Been monitoring for a while but no traffic. Happy New Year!
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13 hours ago, MichaelLAX said:
I guess you did instead of answering my questions.
But JFTHOI: I went to my grandson's to toy with my Radioddity GM-30 clone, the Pofung P15UV, which I upgraded with the Radioddity firmware 20210615 (tip courtesy of @WyoJoe) and the beep stays off once I turn it off with the keypad menu, even after I power it off and back on again.
It really is much more enjoyable WITHOUT that darn keypad beep!
Didn't see your questions. I'm running firmware version V06.03.006 (20210615). There is no controlling the beep! It comes and goes so randomly.
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I disabled it in the programming software, no change. Must just be a glitch in the firmware. I guess I'll live with it
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My GM-30 has an extremely annoying beep with every button press. Menu item 7 appears to disable it. I have it set to off and the beep goeas away, UNTIL I change channels or turn the radio off and on again. The menu setting still says OFF but the beep is back! Anyone have any luck gettting the stupid beep to go away once and for all?
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On 11/14/2021 at 1:50 PM, SkylinesSuck said:
I am about 30 miles SW of DC. I can easily hit Alexandria, Frederick, Warrenton, and another unlisted repeater about 30 W of DC that's on the same freq with the same tones as a repeater near by in Baltimore (which was confusing me for a while), all with a handheld. I think you could hit all the same ones from Alexandria.
I'm in western Loudoun county, about 20 miles from Frederick and can't hit that repeater or Alexandria at all. I can get Warrenton and Blue Mtn clear as day, as well as one of the MD repeaters in the Baltimore area. I also never seem to be able to reach the Winchester repeater. Signal propagation is a dark art!
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You're going to get alot of interesting answers. Here's my take: if you just want a good radio for car-to-car and not much else, something like a set of Midland GXT1000vp4's will probably do you just fine. They are pretty robust and so far get the best range of any of the so-called "blister pack" radios. They have both the GMRS and FRS channels built in. Keep in mind that to talk on the GMRS channels legally, you'd need to buy a license. If at some point you want to start exploring all that GMRS has to offer, like using repeaters, then I'd say a pair of "cheap chinese radios" would be a good starting point. The Baofeng UV-9g is pretty ubiquitous and is about $40 a piece. They usually come pre-programmed with the standard FRS/GMRS channels, plus repeater channels and NOAA weather channels. They will work right out of the box. There are dozens of clones, probably all made in the exact same chinese plant, that go by different names and numbers. I happen to have a Radioddity GM-30 that is one of those clones, and I like it just fine. Has better range than my myriads of blister pack radios. If you go down the rabbit hole of programmable GMRS radios, you'll probably want to upgrade the antenna (the Nagoya 771g is the most popular) and get the programming cable and download the software. All of the chinese radios have their own programming software and most of it is lousy but not hard to figure out. If you don't want to do that, look for a radio that can be programmed using CHIRP software. Its freeware that is a bit better than most of the chinese stuff. My last thought would be that inside a car, a handheld is never going to work as well as it can. Cars are big metal boxes that have lots of RF shielding built into them. If you don't need to use the radios outside the car, look at a mobile unit. The Midland MXT-115 is about as simple as a handheld and will perform much better on the road. Depending on sales and coupons, they go for around $100 so outside your stated budget, but more suited for purpose. Finally, don't get you're hopes up on range. My experience on the highway is that the blister pack radios only get about 1 - 1.5 miles on a good day. S pend alot time driving up and down I-81 which is very hilly, so maybe you'll get better results where you drive, but not much. Hope this helps you!
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On 10/13/2021 at 1:26 PM, Papatree said:
Hey now, this probably won't be too exciting for a lot of you, but I thought it was share-worthy, especially for us Noobies. Plus, I need to get more points towards my next badge..."badges, badges, we don't need no stinking badges"(gratuitous movie line).
So after watching a couple GMRS radio videos, I saw a some of things on expanding the range for HTs. The one thing that caught my eye was the Rat Tail, so I tried it on my Radioddity GM30. As some of of you know, I live in a canyon with very limited reception, so any addition mods are helpful.
I cut a nine inch piece of wire and first I connected it to the metal beltclip bracket, not sure if that made a difference. Next I unscrew the antenna (NA-771G) halfway, wrapped the wire around the post and screwed the antenna back down...then waited. It wasn't too much longer that I noticed it was picking up chatter. Some clearer than others, but definitely better reception than before.
Then came the the golden nugget. I tried my nearest repeater and was able to hear the wild (sometime heated) conversations, last night (those here that were listening too know what I mean
). I doubled checked via text with my GMRS mentor that I was actually hearing the repeater and not so random local traffic, and yep, confirmed and successful ground trailing wire experiment. Unfortunately, with the low power of the GM30 (5watt) I wasn't able to transmit to the repeater from my home. But hey, it was a free upgrade and win, in my book, knowing I can expand my range of reception if need be...WROA675 clear. 
What gauge wire and was it bare copper or shielded?
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1 hour ago, wayoverthere said:
If you're listening to the output from the repeater, what the scan will pick up is the tone coming out from the repeater, which may not be the same as what it wants to get IN. to scan for the tone to get into the repeater, you have to pick up some other traffic carrying that tone going into the repeater.
This is the reason listening on the same frequency (467.xxx) that the repeater is listening on....you want to hear the traffic TO the repeater, not coming FROM it.
OK, now I'm starting to get my thick head around it! Thank you guys so much for elmering me on this one!
- MichaelLAX, n4gix and wayoverthere
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43 minutes ago, MichaelLAX said:
You mean only if it is split tone, but even then what I do is:
He can drive up near the repeater with his GM-30, and listen on the input frequency (467.725) and scan the tone of those getting access to the repeater
I really do appreciate the help here! Not to be obtuse, but isn't what you suggest in essence what I am doing? I have my GM-30 on channel 22 (462.725) and the nactivate the SEEK CTC function (menu item 30) and it starts scanning for the CTCSS code as soon as it hears something on that channel. When it stops on a code and I can her the traffic, I'm assuming that's the code that individual is using. Maybe I'm misunderstanding this whole thing
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16 hours ago, MichaelLAX said:
Repeater is my guess; use Rptr-8
if you cannot scan the tones needed to trigger the repeater, it may be split tone . That is different output and input tones.
Can you scan for digital tones as well?
Maybe Menu 29 or 30?
Have you looked on this site’s repeater database?Channel 22 is the simplex channel that shares the same output frequency as Rptr-8. Rptr-8 transmits on 467.725
What city or zip are you in Loudin County VA?
I have scanned both DCS and CTCSS tones. I can hear both sides of their conversation, which is what confuses me. If they were using split tones, wouldn't I only hear one side of the conversation? I live in Lovettsville, VA 20180. I have both of those repeaters and their codes programmed into my unit, but I don't hear them on those channels. From what i can deduce from the conversation, it is some kind of business that installs radio infrastructure for the county and various other businesses. In addition to voice traffic, i hear them talking alot about carrying fire and alarm signals on a radio network. Whatever system they are on in their vehicles, it is the strongest and clearest signal I've heard so far on GMRS! They occasionally tell each other to switch over to the "shop channel" and then I lose them. I have not heard them use any GMRS call signs.
Thanks for helping me puzzle through this!
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I frequently scan using my GM-30 HT. Recently, I've been picking up the same traffic on Channel 22 and RPT-8. I can hear the exact same conversation on both channels. Looking at my freq chart for the GM-30, i see that both channels share 462.7250. I can hear them crystal clear on both channels. I've done a tone scan for both CTCSS and DCS tones while the traffic was ongoing and didn't get anything. I've tried raising them but they can't hear me. Based on the conversation I can hear, I know they are about 30-40 miles from my location. My question is, what am I picking up? Is this a repeater on GMRS or might I be hearing something from an adjacent band like HAM or MURS? I'm a newbie when it comes to all this, so trying to learn, please be patient! Thanks!
Radiodiddy GM 30 programming
in General Discussion
Posted
Here's the link to the cable I'm using, good luck!
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MQ7TB31/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o04_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1