Hidden features of the STi's new audio ramp-up firmware...

[MEM-TEK]

Hi everyone,

The following are only preliminary results of some tests I did today now that my STi has been updated with the public release of the new audio ramp-up firmware.

The following observations assume that the door opener frequencies are different enough so that the STi can "see" that there are two or more distant K band door openers. For those of you who are curious, it appears that the STi is capable of seeing different frequencies down to a resolution approximately 10MHz or the second digit after the decimal on the spec display. Thats pretty darned good, and it shows how much engineering went into the STi's M3 antenna design.

Highway Mode:

The STi now ignores extremely weakly detected K band door openers as long as two or more are being detected at the same time. This seems to be most effective for older K band door openers which used traditional Gunn oscillators which were manually tuned. Newer K band door openers use emitter plates (kind of like a phased array antenna) which tend to emit almost exactly on either 24.125 or 24.150 depending on the brand. Usually these newer K band door openers are "seen" as a single door opener by the radar detector.

Autoscan Mode:

Here is where the really neat new and undocumented changes in the firmware are. If the STi is detecting two or more K band door openers which have very similar intensities, then it will not alert to them until either their collective signal strength reaches 5 bars, or until one of their intensities is significantly stronger than the others.

If one detected K band door opener is very weak (signal strength of 1 bar) yet another detected door opener being detected which is somewhat stronger (maybe signal strength of 2 bars), then the STi usually will ignore them. Yet it seems that if the signal strength difference between the two exceeds a difference of 2 bars, then the STi will alert.

So, all in all a STi in Autoscan mode with the latest firmware code that features the new audio ramp-up is amazingly quiet around town. Yet you definitely want to switch to Highway mode once you hit the open road, especially if K band is still heavily used in your locale as is the case in my neck of the woods.

Well, what do you all think? Overall I was pleasantly pleased with the logic which Bel has chosen to implement in their latest firmware code.

[spider_55]

good to know.

I was worried that something else was up when i didn't get alerted to my usual shopping mall K band false alerts. I get horrible range on false alerts, but I guess I shouldn't be too worried as long as it detects the real thing.

Thanks for posting this info.

[MEM-TEK]

good to know.

I was worried that something else was up when i didn't get alerted to my usual shopping mall K band false alerts. I get horrible range on false alerts, but I guess I shouldn't be too worried as long as it detects the real thing.

Thanks for posting this info.

You're welcome.

Yep. Last September, a few of us beta testers for the new firmware code initially thought that there was something wrong with our STi's after they were flashed. We finally figured out that Bel had tweaked the filtering algorithms.

[KaPro]

Thanks MEM! I am chomping at the bit to get mine back!

[Whistler1]

Hi everyone,

The following are only preliminary results of some tests I did today now that my STi has been updated with the public release of the new audio ramp-up firmware.

The following observations assume that the door opener frequencies are different enough so that the STi can "see" that there are two or more distant K band door openers. For those of you who are curious, it appears that the STi is capable of seeing different frequencies down to a resolution approximately 10MHz or the second digit after the decimal on the spec display. Thats pretty darned good, and it shows how much engineering went into the STi's M3 antenna design.

Highway Mode:

The STi now ignores extremely weakly detected K band door openers as long as two or more are being detected at the same time. This seems to be most effective for older K band door openers which used traditional Gunn oscillators which were manually tuned. Newer K band door openers use emitter plates (kind of like a phased array antenna) which tend to emit almost exactly on either 24.125 or 24.150 depending on the brand. Usually these newer K band door openers are "seen" as a single door opener by the radar detector.

Autoscan Mode:

Here is where the really neat new and undocumented changes in the firmware are. If the STi is detecting two or more K band door openers which have very similar intensities, then it will not alert to them until either their collective signal strength reaches 5 bars, or until one of their intensities is significantly stronger than the others.

If one detected K band door opener is very weak (signal strength of 1 bar) yet another detected door opener being detected which is somewhat stronger (maybe signal strength of 2 bars), then the STi usually will ignore them. Yet it seems that if the signal strength difference between the two exceeds a difference of 2 bars, then the STi will alert.

So, all in all a STi in Autoscan mode with the latest firmware code that features the new audio ramp-up is amazingly quiet around town. Yet you definitely want to switch to Highway mode once you hit the open road, especially if K band is still heavily used in your locale as is the case in my neck of the woods.

Well, what do you all think? Overall I was pleasantly pleased with the logic which Bel has chosen to implement in their latest firmware code.

Memtek, Amazing information, thanks for providing it.

Whistler1

[Jon_Doh]

Mem, do you know if Escort uses similar software in their detectors?

[Cloaked Milan]

The following are only preliminary results of some tests I did today now that my STi has been updated with the public release of the new audio ramp-up firmware...

Great information in your post MEM-TEK! I always enjoy reading your post because they are so detailed and informative. I am so happy to learn that BEL has a resolution down to approximately 10MHz. Congratulations to their engineering team for doing such a fine job on this. IMO it's one of many reasons why they currently make the best radar detectors on the market. Hopefully Whistlers new line coming out next month will be equally as good BEL and Escort need a feature where the detector is speed sensitive, so that it can be in autoscan for the city, but switch to highway when you're on the highway. I would think that this would be rather easy for them to do.

[MarvC]

Many thanks for the information. I have been lallygagging around for months in sending my Wife's in.
It is less than a year old has worked extremely well. I kept telling her I needed to send the unit in for an update.
I have had the RA number for two months for the audio ramp fix as well as verifying the speaker is the updated hi temp unit.
It went off today after calling to make sure the RA number is still good I asked them to also check the band bug which was found on earlier units.

Will see how the personality changes when we put it back in her SUV the STI has been flawless in operation in its original configuration.



MY V1 keeps rocking on...Sweet...

[MEM-TEK]

Mem, do you know if Escort uses similar software in their detectors?

I suspect, based on user comments, that the X50 uses fairly similar types of algorithms. I believe that Bel/Escort patented the basic concepts years ago.

[partsfreak]

Grasshopper has handfull of gravel