In-depth info about how TrueLock is supposed to work...
Hi everyone,Originally Posted by <<JAZZY>>
I thought that I would describe how the 9500i's TrueLock is supposed to work according to Escorts Patent. After reading the following, check out Escort's patent for the GPS and TrueLock technology used in the 9500i:
Radar warning receiver with position and velocity sensitive functions
The patent does describe how TrueLock will count the number of radars in a locked out location, examine if their frequencies all fall within the same chunks of the radar band which were locked out, and then offset the chunks so that all of the received frequencies, when placed into the shifted chunks, will match what was stored. In this way the 9500i is able to get around any frequency drift in between each auto-calibration cycle, and should allow the 9500i to be able to use lockout data from another 9500i for a given lockout location. At least in theory and according to the patent, this is how the 9500i is supposed to work in order to get around its lack of ability to record the exact frequency of each locked out radar source.
Here is an example of how it is supposed to work, showing how the 9500i gets around any frequency drift issues, or if and when Escort releases the software for users to be able to add lockout data from other 9500i radar detectors:
In the above figure, we show four red bars which represent the two pairs of K band emitters from two pairs of K band door openers. Lets assume that the 9500i user has previously locked out these false radar sources. His 9500i, after performing its auto-calibration sequence during power-up, automatically centered the eight K band 30MHz wide windows (chunks) onto the its perceived K band bandwidth. This is shown as the "default chunk placement". Note that the user's 9500i recorded that two radar signals were present in the chunk 4 and that two radar signals were present in chunk 5 when the user locked out these four false radar sources. The 9500i stored these two chunk numbers (shown in yellow) as chunk 4 and 5, and stored that chunk 4 contained two radar signals and that chunk 5 contained two radar signals. Note that the 9500i doesn't actually "lock out" these two chunks, but simply stores all chunk numbers along with the total number of radars present within each chunk.
Now lets assume that the 9500i user is passing by this lockout location a few days later, and that his 9500i's bandwidth and subsequent chunk placement for the overall bandwidth has drifted a little. This is shown as "chunk placement due to frequency drift". The 9500i compares the four false radar sources to its stored information about these four false radar sources. The 9500i sees that, at present, three of the four radar sources fall within chunk 5 and that only one radar source falls within chunk 4. The 9500i assumes that these four radar sources are the same four radar sources which were locked out since the 9500i is within the same original GPS lockout location. Thus the 9500i offsets or shifts all eight chunks so that once again two of the false radar sources fall within chunk 4 and so that the other two false radar sources fall within chunk 5, thus matching the stored information about these four false radar sources.
Once the 9500i has correctly counted and matched the received false radar signals with the correct chunks, then supposedly the 9500i is capable of generating an alert if the total number of radars being detected within a given chunk exceeds the total number of radars which were stored for that given chunk. Thus the 9500i, even after shifting the chunks to match the stored data for the number of false radars in each chunk, detected an additional radar in chunk 5 for example, then an alert should be generated. But note that whether or not an alert is displayed directly depends on what operating mode the 9500i is in! Depending on the operating mode, the 9500i may either display an alert, not display an alert and simply increment the stored radar count for a stored chunk by 1, or may decrement the radar count for a stored chunk by 1 if a pair of microwave door openers happened to be presently turned off. This is why it is important to lock out GPS locations only when the 9500i owner is passing as close as possible to the false radar sources on your normal driving route by the location, even though it is possible that one or more of the false radar sources may generate a very weak signal in an adjacent GPS cell.
Another option is to tell the 9500i to use the smallest possible GPS cell size, then initially lock out false radar sources when you are driving really close by the false radar sources, and then to subsequently lock out any of the false radar sources which happen to be strong enough to leak into adjacent cells. This latter option should greatly increase the 9500i's selectivity for what false radar signals are automatically suppressed when driving really close to or only fairly close to false radar sources.
Anyway, this is all based on the theory behind Escort's patent. I would love it if 9500i owners would give the above ideas a try -- particularly after reading Escort's patent so that you know what operating mode your 9500i should be in after you have locked out false radar locations.
Best Regards,
--Michael
P.S. Why am I posting this? Because I love my STi for rural/highway use, but am seriously considering selling my V995 and RX-65 to get a 9500i for city use.
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