geary / anytone-d868uv Goto Github PK

Firmware 1.27

When the radio display is in any menu screen or list such as Contacts, the channel knob does nothing. (It doesn't change channel or frequency.) It would be great if twirling the knob were treated the same as the up and down buttons: clockwise for a down arrow; counterclockwise for an up arrow.

You can twirl the knob much faster than you can press the buttons, so this would allow more convenient scrolling through a long list.

As the AnyTone D868UV has inbuilt GPS receivers and functions on 2 Metres, it seems like the ideal candidate to use as an APRS transceiver for sending / receiving position reports and messages.

I appreciate that this probably won't benefit commercial users, but to have a < $200 radio with inbuilt APRS should help sell units to amateurs.

73

Hardware 1.10, firmware 2.27

There is an audible click once per second when receiving analog FM audio that is just below full quieting. It is not as noticeable on very strong signals, nor on very weak ones. It is worst on 2M FM and can also be heard on weak signals in the FM broadcast band. Less noticeable on 440 but can sometimes be heard a bit.

When the time display is enabled, the click is synchronized with the colon blinking on and off in the time display.

If you place another radio next to the AnyTone and turn down the AnyTone's audio, the click can be heard in the other radio's received audio in the same conditions.

Some owners have reported that turning off the time display fixes the problem, but I found no difference in my radio when I tried this.

A longer click - or more of a chop sound - can be heard when navigating through the radio menus under the same conditions.

It seems clear what is happening: the radio's CPU is emitting some EMI/RFI when it runs. Like most battery powered devices, the CPU spends most of its time in a low power sleep state. But it wakes up in response to any interrupt: any button press, knob rotation, or on a timer that fires once per second.

The ultimate fix for this will have to be a hardware revision. But it seems likely that a partial fix could be accomplished in firmware.

Does the CPU really need to wake up every second? No one cares if the ":" in the time display blinks, so there is no reason to wake up the CPU just for that. Are there other display updates that require an update every second?

It seems that a simple fix could be to just not wake up the CPU so often. For example, a click once every five seconds would be much less annoying than a click every second.

Firmware 2.27

In channel mode with an analog repeater tuned in, the display shows the repeater name with the zone name below it. It would be helpful to be able to see the repeater frequency as well, or instead of the zone name.

Firmware 2.27

When Sub Channel (SUB CH in the menu) is turned off, there is a bunch of unused screen space while tuned to an analog repeater. There should be something this space could be used for. As one example, the space could be used to display the frequency of the current repeater (also mentioned in #6).

The feature I would most like to see added or changed on the case is a larger ‘index’ on the volume knob that protrudes more than the current, barely detectable index line and that it continues over the top of the knob for a third or half of the knob’s diameter. Sometimes it is handy in low light situations to be able to adjust the volume by feel. Making the index bump line a little wider with a slight groove or depression to hold luminescent or white paint would make it even better.

(from Dan Sohn via Facebook)

It's going to the priority channels about once a second, so this makes the scan really slow as it's only getting one of the non-priority channels in about once every 3 seconds as if A&B are the priority channels, it's doing:
A,B,1,A,B,2,A,B,3,A,B,4..etc.

I thought this is what the look ahead time settings were for, but I increased them to 5.0 and it still does it every second.

Now is impossible to write VFO in a memory.
You are able to configure all in VFO but not the possibility of write this config in a memory.
This function is very useful.

Firmware 2.27

I had been using the radio for a little while on 2M analog and DMR, and then put it in channel scan mode. It scanned normally for a few minutes and then froze up completely. The display showed only a channel number without the other information it would usually display for that channel.

It did not respond to any key or knob input, including turning the power/volume knob to the off position. I took out the battery for a few minutes and replaced it, but then the radio would not power on at all.

The cure was to do an MCU Reset by holding down the PTT and PF1 buttons together while turning the radio on, then confirming the reset. The radio booted up normally after that, and I was able to reload my boot image and codeplug from the CPS software.

Firmware 2.27

The S-Meter is not working as it should in analog or digital.

If the radio receives something, the S-Meter is all way up even if the received signal is below 1 uV, same business on Digital.

When scanning and it finds a signal, it keeps jumping backwards and forwards between the receiving signal and scanning the priority channels.

It shouldn't interrupt a transmission it's receiving, it should wait until the signal drops, then resume the scan.

Device freezes when switching between VFO A and VFO B if a QSO is running on VFO A
Device sometimes stopping Decoding giving no audio sometimes giving a loud digital noise at the end of of a received transmission (Bad error correction?) By a short press of the PTT decoding will start again! This started with software 2.29_beta ! Never had this problems with 2.27

Firmware 2.27

I assigned the LastCall Reply function to the PF2 key and have been using it to select the last talkgroup heard in Digi Mon mode.

Intermittently - perhaps one time out of every 10 or 20 - pressing this key locks up the radio display and key functions. The radio still receives but can't do anything else. The only cure is to turn it off and on.

When listening to a QSO or net, there can be a wide variation in volume level from station to station, due to the operators' microphone technique, radio, and audio settings.

In many cases I'm unable to leave the volume knob in one position. I have to keep turning the volume up and down, otherwise one station is too loud and another is too quiet to hear.

There is some variation in volume on analog, but on DMR it can be fairly extreme.

I would think that it shouldn't be too hard to implement automatic gain control (AGC) in the firmware. There could be a global user preference where you can enable AGC for analog, for digital, or both.

Once you have AGC, you can then do something awesome for DMR. Instead of a single AGC level that blindly follows the incoming audio as you would have to to in analog, the radio can remember the current AGC level separately for each station. So as each person in the QSO or net talks, the audio can instantly go to the same AGC level as when they last talked.

Even if it just remembered some small number of most recent stations' AGC levels, that would be good enough - a few dozen would take care of any typical net.

Firmware 2.27

With the radio in channel mode, I start a scan, and then I hear some traffic that I want to listen to or reply to. So I press any button to stop the scan.

When I do that, the radio jumps back to whatever channel it was tuned to before I started the scan.

This is not what I want. If I stop a scan, it's likely that I heard something interesting and either want to keep listening or reply. When I stop a scan, the radio should remain on the channel it is currently on, as my Baofeng does.

Firmware 2.27

If you program analog monitor to one of the buttons (short push) it works as a momentary contact type switch. Squelch stays open as long as you hold it. This means if you program a long press function on the same button you cant use it. I would like the ability to put analog monitor on a (long push) button or if it is on a (short push) button make it a toggle instead of a momentary push. This would allow having analog monitor programmed on a button without loosing the second function of that button.

(from Patrick Young via Facebook)

GPS format sent to network is not compatible with Brandmeister net so the data does not appear in APRS.fi.

When scanning and receiving a signal, pressing the scan button returns to the originally selected channel. There should be a way of stopping the scan and remaining on that channel.

The only way to get back to the channel you heard on a scan seems to be to remember it and manually change to it.

Hardware 1.10

The otherwise-solid feel of this radio is marred slightly by a bit of side-to-side looseness at the top of the battery. The movement is barely enough to be visible, but you can feel it in the hand, e.g. when pressing the transmit button.

Firmware 2.26 (have not verified in 2.27)

I had the radio in channel scan mode and heard someone on an analog repeater and started a conversation with them. We talked for a while, and then the radio suddenly went back into scan mode, so my next transmission was on the wrong repeater!

This led to some embarrassment, and I probably broke FCC rules by not identifying on my last transmission on the other repeater.

I think what happened was that there was a slightly long pause in our conversation, just long enough for the radio to start the scan again.

Any transmission should take the radio out of scan mode and leave it on the channel or frequency that was transmitted on.

CPS software 1.26-1.27

The CPS software installs the Microsoft Flex Grid Control, MSFLXGRD.OCX in the Windows 32-bit system directory (typically C:\Windows\System32 on a 32-bit version of Windows, or C:\Windows\SysWOW64 on a 64-bit system).

When you uninstall the CPS, it unregisters and uninstalls this OCX file. However, this is a shared library that other applications may be using as well. When the CPS uninstaller removes this file, it breaks any other apps that depend on it.

An easy way to see the problem is to install two different versions of the CPS software and then uninstall one of them. For example, install 1.26, and later install 1.27 so they are both installed. Now uninstall 1.26, and then try to run 1.27. The 1.27 install is now broken, and you will have to reinstall 1.27 to fix it. The same will happen to any other program using this OCS.

The above would save a lot of time when adding channels, etc. to an existing code plug.

Hardware 1.10, firmware 2.27

The volume control does not change the volume smoothly, but instead works in discrete steps. This is much less nice that a continuous volume control like the one on a cheap Baofeng or practically any other radio. In particular, it can be hard to get a pleasant volume level in FM broadcast band reception. One step will be too quiet, and the next one too loud.

I can see that the radio is receiving the signal but no audio is coming thru. It appears the Restricted Access System of the DMR system is causing the receiver not to open up so the audio can be heard. Both Uniden and Whistler Scanners can decode the audio and allow the user to hear it. So why cant the Anytone AT-D868UV?

Firmware 2.27

Here's a scenario I have run into a few times: I have the radio in Digi Mon mode and hear people talking who I want to reply to. But how do I do that? I may see their talkgroup on the display, but I don't have it programmed into the radio. I quickly go to the menu, add and select it so I can transmit to that talkgroup. Or if I already have the talkgroup programmed, I still have to go to the menu to select it.

It would be great to have a more automated way to do this. Some way to say "Whoever I just heard, I want to now be transmitting on that talkgroup, whether I have it in the radio already or not."

CPS 1.27

1. Open the Channels list.
2. Double-click any digital channel to open its details.
3. Click the Contact button to open the contact selection dialog.
4. Type any key (other than cursor arrows which do not crash). Examples:
   • Hit Esc in an attempt to cancel the dialog.
   • Click a contact or navigate with the arrow keys, then hit Enter to select and close the dialog.
   • Or just about any other key input other than the arrow keys.

Result: Error message "Run-time error '13': Type mismatch". Click OK and the app forcibly exits.

User wish list and ideas from this Facebook list and discussion:

• List - Needs and option to jump or search (Press 6 key to bring up numbers starting with 6)
• Star Key - Lock in active Talk Group until I change channel.
• Password lock on settings section.
• User definable display and font colors.
• Ability to stay unmuted after 2 tone decode until reset by user (analog).
• Menu layout changed - ( Contacts, Messages, Zone, Settings )
• Loud alert on 2tone decode.
• Voice channel announce.
• Part 90 certification so we can use this in the Fire Service.
• Fix CTCSS delay.
• Long press # or ability to make one of the programmable buttons mute / unmute the sub-band
• Adjustable hang time for the user info on the screen instead of disappearing as soon as the transmission ends. (Default should be made 5 sec)(This will also fix random drop out off users info)
• Faster Scan
• Auto scan check box
• Battery voltage in the status bar, next to the battery symbol.
• This radio needs to have the ability to remove all audible alert tones before and after transmissions and carriers in anolog mode while all are still active in digital.
• Also better lower volume resolution. The radio goes from not low enough in quite environments to off
• Would like to be able to put multiple instances of TG ID numbers. We use both DMR MARC and Brandmeister here in Hawaii, and both use TG 3115 for Statewide comms. (BM and DMR MARC in our state are completely separate systems in which the systems doesn’t talk to each other). This will help describe 3115 as “BM Hawaii” (when using Brandmeister repeaters) and “Hawaii-1” (when using our DMR MARC repeaters), but current CPS only allows one instance of the TG ID. Not sure if others are in the same boat with this kind of issue.
• Would be nice to have a dropdown in the channel editor to select or enter the network type of each channel. The selection should become visible in normal operating mode with a small icon like the ANA or DIG icon or display a coloured near the channel name or whatever. The advantage would be that no characters are wasted if channels are named like "BM Repeater Paris southwest" etc. Network types would include:
  • DMRplus
  • Brandmeister
  • DMR MARC
  • user defined
• Better documentation in general and the tool tips in the CPS.
• Can you expand UHF T-Band Receive above 480 to 490 to receive for public safety in the NYC ?

Firmware 2.27

I assigned the LastCall Reply function to the PF2 key so I can easily select the last talkgroup heard in Digi Mon mode. When I press PF2 it correctly selects the last talkgroup, but in the display line below the current channel name, it displays the numeric talkgroup ID instead of the name I've assigned to the talkgroup.

When I select a talkgroup manually through the menu, it displays the talkgroup name on the main display as expected. In the CPS Digital Fun page, I have Last Caller set to Show Both.

It would be better if the LastCall Reply function looked up the talkgroup in my list of contacts and displayed its name instead of ID.

Using the CPS, you are able to enter the same Talkgroup number for both Group Call and Private Call. You can write to the radio fine. You can export the Talkgroups to CSV.

But you get a error “Number exists” when you do a import containing such data.

Firmware 2.27

There are too many places where the firmware uses popup windows that cover most of the screen and continue to cover it until a timeout.

For example, changing the volume results in a large popup that shows the current volume level. You can disable this popup in CPS, but it's not the only one like this. And if you disable the volume popup you lose useful information.

For example, if you change the volume and then someone talks on a DMR talkgroup, you may miss their station information on the display, because the volume popup is covering it.

There are several ways this could be improved. One possibility would be to use the bottom line of the display (where it has the Menu/Zone/List labels) for these popups instead of covering nearly the entire screen. For the volume display, you would just use the "bar" section of the popup here. The volume icon is not needed at all - obviously if I'm rotating the volume knob, I know I'm changing the volume, it's just helpful to see the current volume level - and a simple bar at the bottom would be plenty good for this.

Software 1.27

On a high DPI display using Windows 10 display scaling, the CPS software runs in "blurry" mode, making everything harder to read than it could be. The app should be updated to be "high DPI aware" so it can render crisp native high-DPI fonts.

In the meantime, here a partial workaround for recent versions of Windows 10: Right click D868UVE_1.27.exe (or whatever your CPS app is named) in File Explorer or the Start menu. Select Properties, go to the Compatibility tab, override the high DPI display scaling and set it to System (Enhanced).

On my ThinkPad Yoga 460, 14" WQHD at 225% scaling, the app looks like this with default settings (click for full size screenshots):

After overriding the scaling, it looks like this:

Here are the Properties panels for the new April update of Windows 10 (high-DPI screenshots, sorry). The Fall Creators update has the same "System (Enhanced)" option, although the property panel is slightly different. I didn't test it on that version.

Firmware 2.27

The volume knob steps don't allow fine enough adjustment. Even the lowest volume on the "indoor" setting can be too loud in some quieter environments, and there is too large a jump from the lowest volume to the next.

See also #21. Continuously variable volume would be the best solution, but that may require a hardware change. In the meantime, there ought to be a way to get finer volume steps for low volumes.

(from Scott Waggoner via Facebook)

Software 1.27

On a high-DPI display, the CPS software runs in "blurry scaling" mode. While it is reasonably usable in this mode, it would be more pleasant if the software could work natively on high-DPI displays.

Firmware 2.27

When listening to an FM broadcast station, if you change the volume it mutes the signal for a fraction of a second each time it changes to a new volume.

This does not happen when receiving a signal in the 2M or 440 ham bands. The volume just changes to the new setting without any momentary muting.

It seems that this could be fixed in a firmware update. Whatever the firmware is doing when you change volume in the ham or other VHF/UHF bands, it should be able to do the same thing in FM broadcast mode.

CPS software 1.27

If I have the radio disconnected when I start the CPS software, then connect it while CPS is running, and then use the Program / Write To Radio function, it fails with a Cannot Open Communication Port message, because the COM port is not selected. (It works OK if I connect the radio first and then start CPS.)

If I then go to Set / Set COM it has the correct COM port selected, so I click OK. Then I can sucessfully use the Write To Radio function.

It would make things easier if the Write To Radio function would check to see if any COM port has been selected, and if not, it should try to reconnect to the last COM port used.

There are only 5 programmable function buttons, each with a short and long press - so a limited number.

There are more actions than buttons.

There should be another way to access/perform those actions when they are not programmed to a button (or if you can't remember off hand what's programmed where!).

For example - Nuisance Delete, in that scenario, i'd be happy to do a few menu presses to get to that and not waste a button on it.

Key functions 'Scan' and 'Program Scan' do the same thing.

Can one be made to scan the currently selected scan list (current behaviour) and the other scan through the current zone?

Also, when clicking scan, can it be made to flash up the name of the current scan list?

The signal readout isn't very good - it's really small and often shows several bars still with a weak signal.

Is it possible to have a bigger, better signal strength readout some how?

When trying to import a CSV file, if the end of line characters are not in windows format, the import fails, but gives no reason.
In my case, I found out that unix-style EOL where causing the CPS import function to fail.

Hardware 1.10, firmware 2.27

The volume control changes volume in 16 discrete steps ("off" plus 15 audible levels).

You can change the maximum volume level in the CPS or menu, but that just changes the size of these steps.

My cheap Baofeng radios have a continuously variable volume control. This is much more pleasant and versatile.

My guess is that this is something that can't be fixed in firmware - or can it? It would be something to consider for a future hardware model.

If a channel is causing interference and stopping my scan, i'd like to be able to disable it in a scan list.

I don't want to delete it as I want to turn it back on later.

Software 1.27

In a Windows application dialog box, the standard keyboard behavior is for Enter to confirm the dialog and Esc to cancel it. In other words, these two keys are shortcuts for the OK and Cancel buttons.

Some of the CPS dialogs work like this, but many others follow a different convention, where Alt+O is the shortcut for the OK button, Alt+C for cancel, and Enter or Esc do not work at all.

One particularly amusing case is the Write To Radio function. This first displays a "Write to radio" dialog with standard OK and Cancel buttons. Enter and Esc work on this dialog. Then a "Read or Write Objects" dialog is displayed with the nonstandard OK button that responds only to Alt+O. So two dialogs in the same workflow follow different conventions!

It would be better if every dialog with OK and Cancel buttons used the standard convention of Enter and Esc shortcuts.

When going in to a menu (such as settings), each of the options is numbered - could we have it so you could jump straight to a known item by pressing the number?

This would not only make navigating the menus much faster for regular combinations, but would make communicating options to other users much easier.

i.e: press menu 4 2 4
would be change TCDT.

As this radio has the GPS, please can we have the details on how to configure the radio to send position reports to the UK DMR networks Phoenix / DMR+ and BM.

How to set the time interval and how to enable and disable the feature.

The format of the data will need to be the same as the Hytera products.

configuration details for other products that work are available here

http://www.dmr-uk.net/index.php/aprs-to-gps/

This would make the radio much more useful to the HAM radio community.

Is it possible to have a menu option to copy the current channel memory to VFO mode?

Scan lists are limited to 50 channels - could this be increased please?

CPS software 1.27

The CPS software remembers its last window size and position: if you close the program and then open it again, it opens with the same size and position as before.

However, if you have the window maximized and close and re-open it, it no longer has the maximized state. It has the same size and position as a maximized window, but the window state is "normal" instead of "maximized". The window controls in the titlebar include the Maximize icon (single box) where it should show the Restore icon (stacked boxes).

A minor point to be sure, but just to be consistent with other Windows apps, if the window was closed in the maximized state, it should also be maximized after restarting the app.

Currently changing the scan list is a case of:

Menu, down, down, select, down, select, pick from list, select, up, select, back, back, back, back

Can we have an easier way?

Firmware 2.27

When I press the push to talk button in analog mode, there is about a half-second delay before the transmitter goes on. I estimated this by putting this radio and a second radio on a 2M simplex frequency, unsquelching the other radio, and then pressing the PTT button on the D868UV.

I'm told that there is a similar delay in DMR mode, but don't have an easy way to test it.

It would be better if the radio could transmit immediately after pressing the PTT button.