TRBO audio with newer firmware

[wavetar]

Has anyone experienced less intelligible audio in digital mode with the later firmware version which enables digital privacy mode? We have a system installed with the latest firmware in all radios and repeater. This customer demo'd a couple of portables & a mobile w/repeater a few months ago before the newer firmware was released & there does seem to be a sgnificant difference in the audio sound & intelligibility. Hard to describe...the audio is clear, but very 'bassy' sounding & sometimes the words almost seem to compress & warble...everyone sounds like they have marbles in their mouth. I plan on doing some testing in-shop with the service alignments on our demo repeater to see if I can emulate the issue, thinking the later unit may have it's alignment set-up differently at the factory for some reason. If need be I'll be swapping out their repeater with the demo unit (same unit they used for their demo) early in the week, but figured I'd ask here in the meantime.

For what it's worth, the customer used the entire system in analog mode for about a week while we were switching out all their old radios...never an issue with the analog audio. We are using their existing repeater pair which they've had in use for the past 25+ years with nary an interference issue.

[Vercomm]

Just wondering if you had found any updates with using the old firmware compared to the new stuff? I've got some Trbo stuff out and am curous if I should be upgrading all of the firmwre to the latest release.

[escomm]

Yes you definitely want the latest release, esp with Trbo, as each new firmware update corrects previously critical bugs. Some include not unmuting on PL, not unmuting on the correct color code, random reboots for no good reason, etc.

[maelv]

Hello wavetar

Have you come to any results in the testing of the audio quality with the newer firmwares ?
did you experience this quality degradation in cleare digital mode ? or only in (encrypted) mode ?

And maybee you can upload some audio samples of trbo audio with the newer firmware ?
so people with trbo equipment can compare the audio VS there the equipment they have

Maelv...

[wavetar]

This is still ongoing, although I thought it was solved until just last thursday. It turned out their existing multi-coupler (setup in a duplexer configuration) was slightly de-sensing the repeater, but it wasn't even noticeable in analog mode. In digital mode it resulted in the audio I described above. Once I swapped them into a properly tuned duplexer, the entire pitch of the audio changed, and at that point all I heard was clean TRBO digital audio. We checked weekly with the customer & always heard "no complaints" until last week...now all of a sudden the audio isn't good enough for them. We've been onsite & listened to logging files & live audio...it sounds like TRBO digital audio to me, no more no less. I think they might be too hard-core analog to make the switch. Mind you, the problems experienced at first might've jaded some of them against digital.

I had performed tests with older vs. newer firmware, clear vs. coded...there is no discernable difference. However, we have a case opened with Motorola & if anything of importance comes of this, I'll be sure to update everyone.

[wavetar]

Small update. I'm being told the next firmware revision to come out will give the ability to disable the mic AGC in digital mode. Currently, the option is there for analog mode only. In digital, it is enabled all the time. There have apparently been some complaints when using digital mode in high noise environments. I'm hopeful it will help my problems, as the audio really does sound 'over driven', and my experience has shown AGC generally does the opposite of what it's supposed to do...ie: it makes things sound worse, not better. It should be out within a couple of weeks.

Todd