The original DSC radios followed a rule that forbid them to let the
customer enter the MMSI number, themselves. The various regulating
organizations headed by the ITU were afraid you'd just put in any old
number causing DSC to be useless trying to avoid the fees, license
fees and other bureaucratic money drains. Then, they changed their
minds and turned the MMSI distribution for pleasure boats over to
organizations like Boat/US who made it much easier to get an MMSI
number from one of their blocks of numbers. So, the new radios allow
you to enter MMSI just TWICE (got two new Icoms like this M602 VHF and
M802 HF SSB) in case you screw up the first time. More than twice it
has to go back to the factory to get the memory chips reset.

The radio you got is in the old, factory-only-programming set of
radios. They didn't include the MMSI/DSC unit because you had to send
the radio back to the manufacturer's shop to get it installed and
programmed, anyways, for an extra fee, of course....(c;

That's why you didn't get the unit in the first place.....



On Wed, 10 Sep 2003 11:17:49 -0700, "Steve" wrote:

I have the Omni model GX2340S VHF unit and it has just about every feature
(I thought) that I desired.. I finally got around to wiring up all the
connectors on the back and found it did have a NMEA connector..

But when I went to program in my SSID number, the menu wouldn't activate. I
opened the case and found that the "Optional" DSC Board (part number
CDS2300) was not installed.

This VHF was a gift from my kids when I was preparing to launched my boat a
couple years ago. (They ask me what features I wanted and one of my specific
requirements was DSC). Purchased too long ago to return it..

I suspect the West Moron represented this radio as having DSC.

The reality is, it is DSC capable but requires a factory upgrade.

Does anyone know how expensive it might be to have this option added to this
or similar model unit. Should I go to the local Marine Electronix shop or
should I contact the OEM??

Steve
s/v Good Intentions




Larry W4CSC

3600 planes with transponders are burning 8-10 million
gallons of kerosene per hour over the USA. R-12 car air
conditioners are responsible for the ozone hole, right?