Support

• If you like my work, you can support me through Ko-Fi

Beta 43 and beyond

From Beta 43 onwards, REFW will move to a verified callsign system. If I cannot verify you’re the legitimate owner of valid callsign, you will not get an unlock code and the firmware will not work. Beta 43 will also display your callsign at powerup every time and this cannot be overriden.

Unlock codes will be tied to your specific radio and only need to be used once. Multiple radios will be allowed, but more than 2 will require photographic evidence. If you don’t like it, you are free to use the official firmware. My source code, my rules. If you cannot login to your QRZ page and add a token, you won’t get an unlock code. I don’t need users, or care about my reputation. Besides shutting down completely, it is the only way I have left to deal with toxic people.

Forewarning

• If official firmware works fine for you, then go ahead and use it. I don’t know why my firmware upsets you.
• If you need an easy guide to setup this firmware, you are not my target audience and you should stick to Radtel firmware.
• This firmware is not for newbies to radios or DMR. Go visit somewhere else if you are a newbie.
  • Newbies are not welcome, you’re a giant burden of support on everyone and a general stain. Go play with Walmart radios instead..
• If you don’t know what this firmware is about, just use Radtel firmware.
• If you need a ready made codeplug to get started, just use Radtel firmware.
• If you need to tell everyone on github that you have 40 years of computer and radio experience, just use Radtel firmware.
• If you live on Facebook complaining all day, without writing detailed bug reports, go somewhere else.
• If you think I’m annoying, then don’t use my firmware! I never forced you to use my stuff. Go and use the official firmware.

If you fit in any of the above, stick to Official Radtel firmware as this firmware is not for you.

SPI Flash

Always back up your SPI flash before installing any beta! No support will be given to those losing the calibration settings who didn’t make a backup

Changelog

You can find more friendly documentation at wiki by Joel. Be aware that the documentation can sometimes lag behind the releases but will eventually get updated.

• Beta 42
  • Update to Joel CPS v0.5.4 or higher is required.
  • New features
    • Expanded hotkey support. Added a new “Extra Hotkey” menu in “Key Define”.
      • Enable additional shortcuts when combining “side X” with 0..9.
    • New hotkey: “Last Call Info”. This is DMR only.
    • Enhanced Secondary PTT: can now be configured to “Opposite VFO” instead of “always VFO B” (previously named “On”).
    • Zones now use A/B storage to prevent corruption.
    • Zones now have their own scan list setting.
      • Access via Menu -> Zone -> Edit Scan List
      • The existing channel “Scan Skip” setting is now restricted to channel mode only.
    • DTMF strings can now have custom names. Can only be edited with Joel’s CPS.
  • Improvements
    • Renamed “Send DTMF” and “DTMF Select” to “DTMF List”.
    • DMR TX Busy Lock is back.
    • While in the zone list (Menu -> Zone Setup), long press the green button to select a zone for the current VFO.
    • Scanning a zone with non-scannable channels will now display an error.
    • Where applicable, leading zeroes are now omitted from display while editing.
    • Maximum Single and Group hold times have increased to 60s.
    • DTMF Duration and DTMF Interval were expanded up to 400ms.
    • Zone spectrum updates
      • Now displays Live Sub Tone when enabled.
      • Press side 1 key in zone spectrum to temporarily block a busy channel. Block clears upon exit.
    • Misc updates/improvements.
  • Bug fixes
    • Fixed a bug with the Frequency Monitor.
    • Disable end tone when scanning to prevent audio issues.
    • Fixed multiple Radtel bugs with FM RX StandBy not working correctly.
      • To prevent hardware audio issues, dual watch of mixed modes with FM RX standby is not supported.
    • Fixed callsign display in the DMR RX screen. Was clipping at 6 characters, now clips at 8.
    • Fixed DTMF interval usage.
    • Fixed red light when using DMR remote commands via hotkey.
    • Fixed PTT block when DMR stunned.
• Beta 41
  • DMR Firmware 1.2.0.28 appears to fix the freeze/hang issues with RX and the RF chip. This is now the minimum version required.
  • Inherited the following from Official v3.19-v3.22 firmware:
    • New DMR, Dual Standby and Save Mode logics. Combined with 1.2.0.28, this improves Analogue <> DMR transitions.
    • Simultaneous Analogue and DMR settings, but the menus remain in the style of 3.16 and earlier.
    • RX/TX limits (RX+TX, RX only, TX only).
    • TX/RX denoise for DMR.
    • Support for the new UTF16 table for sending SMS.
    • Reduced storage space for each RX groups, and increased the maximum number of groups to 150.
      • This is different than what newer Radtel firmware does, and I will not break the entire CPS just to support this.
    • Removed holding 0 while powering on.
    • Removed holding * while powering on.
    • Removed color code scan.
    • Removed the State Timer and State screen.
    • Moved “Offset Dir” to “Offset Frequency”. Use the green button to toggle +/-.
    • Converged the 2 version options to “Radio Info” along with some calibration data.
  • Air Copy has been removed (holding Green/Red buttons on power up).
  • Apart from Channels and RX Groups, other CPS layout changes from Official v3.18+ were not inherited.
  • DMR can now be tuned between 70.000-79.999MHz.
  • Added “Set RX Freq” to “Channel Setup”. You can now edit RX frequencies when in Channel/Zone mode.
  • Added holding * while powering on to always enter PC programming mode.
  • Implemented settings corruption prevention different than Official v3.18+, which could make the 4D boot with only the lights on.
  • If Settings and Calibration ever get corrupted, the RT-4D will display such information and enter automatic programming mode.
  • All RX groups are now always present, but can be empty / unused.
    • This fixes bugs with Official firmware where deleting one group affected channels using groups after the deleted one.
    • Pressing PTT when promiscuous is disabled, from a channel using an empty RX group will display an error.
  • Pressing PTT when the current ID is 0 will display an error. This also applies to self ID (main Radio ID or per-channel ID).
  • Voice playback support has been removed entirely.
  • Renamed the display of “Dual Slot : On/Off” to “DC Direct M:” when using the DCDM switch hotkey.
  • Now SMS Prompt works properly, unlike on official firmware.
  • Invoking the spectrum from a Zone will scan the zone instead, with no capture/block features.
    • You can press the Side 2 key to skip the current received channel.
    • Switch to VFO or Channel mode if you want the regular spectrum.
  • Talker Alias is now supported:
    • Enable via Extra -> Talker Alias.
    • You can also toggle Talker Alias on and off with the * key during a DMR call, but this change is not automatically saved. It gets saved the next time any other setting is saved.
    • Talker Alias received with accents and fancy characters are untested and may not display properly. At the same time, you will see weird characters as the DMR firmware sometimes mangles Talker Alias frames.
  • As a result of Talker Alias, “Called Show” menu is gone. If you want the old behaviour, stick to Beta 40 or official firmware.
  • When DMR firmware produces invalid IDs, errors will now display on screen.
    • This is the new UX for the old ID=275 problem until Radtel/iRadio gets the DMR fixed.
    • If you have Talker Alias enabled, you may be able to see who’s calling if the data is available.
  • If you made it this far, I’m impressed, you get to know about the proper upgrade path from Beta 40 to Beta 41:
    • Your RT-4D must be either at either Beta 40 or Official v3.16 earlier firmwares. If you’re not, you’re your own and need to do a new codeplug from scratch.
    • Flash Beta 41.
    • Using Joel’s CPS, read the codeplug from the RT-4D.
    • Write the codeplug back, ensuring you ticked the “Beta 41” option in the write screen.
    • Enjoy

Screenshot tool

If you use the -screenshot.bin firmware, you can use the screenshot binary with Joel’s handy tool. Note that taking screenshots will affect the radio’s performance and may lead to eventually hangs or weird behaviours.

Flashing tools

• Flasher CLI - Windows CLI (and Linux if you have Mono and build yourself)
• rt890-flash-rs - Windows and Linux CLI
• RT-4D_Flasher - Linux GUI
• RT-4D Web Flasher - Web based