[time-nuts] Re: HP Z3801A GPS questions + Satstat

[paul swed]

Walter what you experienced is not at all correct. On a good unit turn it
on and after some time it all locks.
No muss or fuss. I seem to recall the protocol is 7 E 1 maybe 9600 baud.
Its not the normal 8 N 1.
The satstat did trigger responses.
Watch out. Some ports defaul to xon/xoff. Putty as an example. You want no
flow control.
Good luck the ole 3801 are nice units.
Regards
Paul.

On Fri, Jan 20, 2023 at 5:21 PM Walter Shawlee 2 via time-nuts <
time-nuts at lists.febo.com> wrote:

> I had one of these systems with a power supply parked on a shelf for a
> two years, as I got a much newer Efratom system
> with rubidium back up. I decided to run it to see if it was still working.
>
> When I powered it up with a good external amplified antenna, it would
> not lock (front LED indicator stayed dark), even after 8 hours.
> I found an old copy of Satstat and loaded it into my Toughbook, and
> hooked it to the serial output of the Z3801A,
> I got communication after getting the right protocol set up (Satstat
> does not appear to save these settings which is unfortunate
> as the defaults don't come close to working), but there was a large
> burst of traffic followed by an error message saying updates had been
> turned off.
>
> What?  Well, I turned updates back on, and ran the various system
> commands, confirmed it was an HP Z3801A, and then did the full status
> dump, this time it worked, AND the front locked LED came On. The manual
> specifically says no communication is needed to make the system lock, so
> I am puzzled by this, and the system now shows 6 satellites active and
> everything is working (except the calendar date is wrong, which I
> understand is a roll-over problem).  I have multiple 10MHz outputs, and
> all seems good.
>
> Is this start-up behavior normal?  Also, can it be updated to fix the
> wrong calendar data?  I am happy that all is working, but concerned it
> might stop again if II don't correctly understand what happened here.
>
> Also, I could not find Satstat anywhere on the web, but was surprised to
> find it in one of my old archives (the symmetricom version), I am happy
> to email a copy to anybody that needs it. I think it is version 5.02.
>
> All the best,
> walter
>
> --
> Walter Shawlee 2
> Sphere Research Corp. 3394 Sunnyside Rd.
> West Kelowna, BC, V1Z 2V4 CANADA
> Phone: +1 (250-769-1834 -:- http://www.sphere.bc.ca
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