Motorola Zeon Digital

[CrazyCessna]

Morning all,

Just curious to know whether anyone here has attempted working with Linux to potentially decode the City Council Buses + Ferries as well as SES, oil refineries ect. Since I don't have a laptop, many of the digital signals are pretty weak reaching my RTL-SDR setup inside on the desktop. I do however get TETRA signals 5/5 in the 800MHZ range, so I'd be keen to hear if anyone's had any attempts/success in listening in or if anyone has any advice if they have. Cheers.

[Phil]

Having done it successfully, i can say it is becoming relatively easy to decode, i personally use a VMWare image of Kali Linux

[CrazyCessna]

Ahh that's awesome to know, cheers mate. Are all the users in the clear or is there some air encryption for say, the TransLink Ticketies?

[Phil]

Everyone on the Motorola Zeon Digital network is Clear no TEA Encryption on that network, most of the Translink SNO's will use their phones to run checks on people

[CrazyCessna]

Sounds like good news to me, thanks mate.

I have run into a problem however that I can't really describe to find a solution to on the web. Everything works well until it comes time to launch the GNURadio, and it doesn't launch the spectrum analyzer. Not sure if you've encountered it or not, thought I may as well ask.

[CrazyCessna]

Ahhh, never mind. There was an issue with pre-installed DVB software in the OS already. I've blacklisted that and now it's running like a dream. Just have to wait for someone to have something to say at 11pm hahah

[Phil]

Hey can you toggle to the network information screen and take a screen shot

I would also suggest listening to Ocean View or even Mt Coot-tha is you can hear it





Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[CrazyCessna]

Yeah mate, no worries.
So this is with it tuned to the 865.737 channel from Ocean View. I've been getting a pretty strong signal from the Whiteside repeater also. I'll go though all the Ocean View freqs and see which is best. So does it matter which frequency/repeater I'm on for TETRA? My understanding is that I should be able to hear all the talkgroups regardless, but some freq's are busy as while others are silent...

[dags19]

Could we start a tutorial on this for example what software operating system etc we need for this links etc as i am interested in this as well getting scarce in SE QLD with the GWN kicking in

[CrazyCessna]

Yeah mate, sure thing. So while theoretically this software should work on any type of Linux, I've had the most success working with a variation by the name of Kali. At the start of this project I knew roughly as much about linux as the average dirtworm. So the first thing you have to do obviously is get it on the computer. I've been using a USB drive to "live boot" Linux so I don't destroy anything on my hard drive. https://www.kali.org/downloads/ - at this link is the ISO file for Kali, which has to be mounted on the USB with this --> https://sourceforge.net/projects/win32diskimager/ software. Once it's been loaded, Shift + Click on the restart button in windows, and when it restarts it should show a boot menu. Sometimes I have to restart twice with my computer before it sees the USB. Once that menu comes up, click on the USB option and Kali should open. You want to select the "Live AMD" fucntion, which is at the top of the list from memory.
Once in Kali, theres an "off/on" button at the top right of the screen, if you click on it you should see a profile that says "root" click on it again and it'll say "logout" or "account settings". If you choose account settings you can make your own profile by clicking on the "+" icon in the bottom left, doesn't matter what it's called but make sure you click on the "set password now" box and input your chosen password. After that, exit that screen, hit the on off button and the root button again and choose log off. Log back in with the account you've made. I'm running out of space here so I'll continue in another post in a sec

[CrazyCessna]

Right, so now that we have the system running, the fun can begin ahha. This link ----> http://www.rtl-sdr.com/rtl-sdr-tutorial ... -channels/
Will be our holy bible. There's a bit on the start of the page about what TETRA is and how to find it using SDR#, but rest assured, every TETRA signal in Brisbane will be between 865 and 900MHz. For exacts, see here ---> https://www.radioreference.com/apps/db/?sid=6980 this is just for the main groups that most people use, there are also a couple of oil refineries out by the Port that use TETRA as well, in the same frequency range. Keep in mind that your SDR dongle may not be exactly tuned to the frequency where the signal is listed, but don't worry, I'll explain that soon. The two main programs you'll use in Linux will be the top two on the task bar to the left. The top one is "iceweasle" which is the internet browser. The one under that will be a black square with "$_" in it. That's the terminal ( the linux Command Prompt if you will ) and that's where you'll be inputting the following scripts.

The next area of the page is titled "Installing the software". Mercifully, this is an auto-installer so you can just run the script and wait. Linux is a very precise system when it comes to coding, so it's heavily advised that you just highlight that install script and copy it into the terminal by right clicking and pasting. It'll ask for a password, chuck that in, then copy and paste again and hit enter, and it'll do it's thing. On average with my computer it takes about 10 minutes to install, but that might be different for everyone.
A main issue I discovered was that the RTL card was being used by default software and wouldn't work. I found this script to fix it. Unplug the dongle and run it,

sudo rmmod dvb_usb_rtl28xxu

and after it's finished installing run the following script:

rtl_test

that should show you if your dongle is working correctly.

From here on out, it's a matter of following the numbers for running the software on the RTL-SDR webpage. Every time you get to a new step you'll have to open a new terminal to put the script in. This can be done by right clicking the terminal button and choosing "new window". The only time you might have to type something is when you input the code at step 2. That will open a new terminal that you can't paste into. Just type the command line character for character

cd ~/tetra/telive

followed by

./rxx

if the ./rxx code doesn't work (it's happened to me a couple of times) try

./rxx2

If you follow all the steps listed (even the ones about how to find and run the flow chart from GNU Radio) you should see the little screen like on the webpage there. Type "868M" into the frequency box down the bottom and you should see some signals pop up. Click on the ones with the highest peaks. One of the terminals you've opened before should be showing flowing data. Either click around or mess with the last 3 digits until the data flowing stops and is replaced by a fixed box of data like the one on the right in my above pictures.

If all goes right, and there's someone talking in a Talk Group, there should be voice coming through your speakers. (I just remembered, you'll have to turn on sound by going to the toolbar in the top right of the screen and clicking on the sound icon, then moving the slider)

If you run into any issues, feel free to either type the error codes into Google or just ask here (Y)

[CrazyCessna]

Oh, a couple more little things, to see all the programs or terminals you have open you can move your cursor to the top left corner without clicking and it'll show you everything on the overlay.

Also, the biggest issue with running Linux in it's live state off the USB is that none of your work will be saved, so you'll have to repeat this whole thing every time you turn the computer off. I've gotten pretty used to all the steps and commands, however the install process can be very time consuming. I've gone digging around the house and found an old shitty laptop that I'm going to completely format and replace with Linux, that way I can just run the program on startup without having to worry about making profiles and installing stuff.

[CrazyCessna]

So something I only just noticed myself, the SSI data showing in the bottom right area of the rxx screen is the DEC number corresponding to the company that owns that radio group. For instance, 900151 comes back to a trucking company chat group, if you just use Ctrl+F and enter "900151" on the radio reference Zeon Digital screen.

I've added a screenshot to as what it looks like when receiving voice calls below as well

[CrazyCessna]

So I've noticed something interesting, from here at Petrie (and indoors to boot) the "14" group signals from the Whiteside repeater are very strong however they only seem to be broadcasting the trucking channel, sometimes the Qantas staff at the airport, and QR station staff. I tried the Ocean View repeater but to my dismay the signal is too weak. I either get burst warnings, or else I'll see the traffic coming in with the SSI's and the indication for voice but it'll either be silent or extremely broken. Looking at the SSI's from this repeater it's almost exclusively from BCC.

Might have to get some sort of outdoor antenna going...

[dags19]

Thanks for the time and effort great stuff,a few questions do you need a sdr dongle and which one is the best,as i have a scanner with a discriminator output which i use for pdw and also do i need to download the full linux 64 bit version.

[CrazyCessna]

Yeah no worries, I've been at home sick with nothing to do anyway ahah

So yeah, I imagine the dongle may be needed for it. I'll find a link in a sec to the one I have that's been great for 6 months.
I guess you could always try using the disc tap if your scanner can go into the 800MHz band but I'm not sure it would work. Do let us know though!

I'm using the 64 bit version at the moment, so I would try that first. Also, I would use the direct ISO download link highlighted in blue, as the torrent one wasn't working.

[CrazyCessna]

https://www.ebay.com.au/ulk/itm/331779373869 This is the dongle I have that's been great. I'm pretty sure the gnuradio program is dependant on the SDR input though, so it may be needed.

[CrazyCessna]

Ah, I should mention now, when you first have the dongle Windows will try to help you and download drivers onto it that won't work for SDR. There's a program called Zadig that comes with the SDR# bundle that can help you change the drivers (y)

[CrazyCessna]

Might be good to first practice on Windows when it comes to finding signals and such, not to mention the ease of decoding unencrypted P25 (pretty much only the Aviation Firies unless you live in Sydney or Melbourne) DMR, NXDN, and Pagers through windows too ahah

http://www.rtl-sdr.com/rtl-sdr-radio-sc ... -with-dsd/

[CrazyCessna]

Finally heard some BCC off the Whiteside repeater (apologies for the vertical camera orientation)

http://youtu.be/8X0XpGIePgI