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#1
May 18th, 2009
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Passport 9500ix AutoLearn Lock & Unlock
Question:
First I am very happy with my ix, it’s a truly impressive peace of technology. I was particularly excited that ESCORT stated in there (sic) manual that AutoLearn will unlock a particular signal if it’s no longer present at a location that was previously locked out. When I first got my 9500ix I had an A&P false locked out … the store was later taken down so the lock out was gone … after a month or so they built a Walgreen's in the same spot. Then it got interesting – every day for days i passed that location with no alert or spinning icon (automatic doors weren't set up yet). A few days later the doors were back on and my 9500ix was still locking that location out with no alert. This brought up my main concern about AutoLearn – the ix should of unlocked that location according to the manual. Answer: In addition to the question above, there have been other questions and comments concerning various readers who have tried in various forms and formats to ‘test’ their 9500ix units for lock/unlock locations (including using K band sources inside their test vehicle, unrealistic test conditions, etc.). In a previous online conversation, we began with the following: “Rather than answer directly to the above (AutoLearn lock/unlock question) other than to comment on the testing by the writer (which I’ll get to in a brief moment), this answer will more generally address the Passport 9500ix AutoLearn lock/unlock artificial intelligence. (Note: if you came from another blog to the ESCORT forum, this entry is the in-depth, full detail answer that was offered at the off-site link). In commenting on the test as described in the thread – RD testing is always fun and when properly controlled (ie, known test conditions, absolute test parameters and knowledge of the product operation under test), is useful for revealing both expected/planned results and sometimes, testing uncovers surprising unexpected results. The excepted results confirm your knowledge of the test method and the product performance and therefore, the results add confidence to your design position (assumptions). Unexpected results are cause for more questions – did I perform the test correctly, accurately, and/or do I understand the designed operation of the product? In the case of this test, with the blogger’s unexpected results, there are issues concerning both of the above: 1) the test conditions across the whole test are not valid for testing the unlock capabilities of the Passport 9500ix – several (among more than a few) points: using a source mobile inside the test car, testing inside ¼ mile of travel termination (the tester’s home), and so on; - 2) the operation of the Passport 9500ix seems to be a bit misunderstood as shown by the expectations and interpretations of the ‘test’ results versus the actual engineering design expectations and performance of the 9500ix as we at ESCORT know it. Because there is misunderstanding (and not error or malfunction) of both the test and the operation of the 9500ix AutoLearn feature, this is where I will focus … The expectation of the Passport 9500ix (9500ix) AutoLearn feature to perform and do something is to be expected and is complimentary to your smart choice in the purchase and use of a GPS-based superior RD. The test and its results, along with certain details of AutoLearn being misunderstood, is not a fault of anyone – in fact, some misunderstanding or misinterpretation is to be expected. Here’s why: Let’s begin first by reassuring all 9500ix potential owners and readers that AutoLearn is truly amazing and that it works. Beyond our demanding and extensive testing (which is ongoing), there are literally tens of thousands of the 9500ix units in cars being used today and there is subsequently a huge volume of confirming calls, letters, email and text messages telling us of the operators’ witness to the proper locking and unlocking of the 9500ix AutoLearn feature. And there are dozens of nationally known independent third party publications and consumer testing houses that have tested and reviewed AutoLearn’s industry changing operation. AutoLearn is working in thousands of real-world test beds – actual owners’ vehicles in use in real urban environments. I might add that ESCORT engineers have logged thousands of hours of testing, all combined, under their knowing eyes using the most advanced signal monitoring engineering test equipment on the market today allowing them to see more than just the response of the 9500ix – they can ‘see’ the actual source (or not), the electrical and RF microwave characteristics of the environment in real time and finally, the digital waveforms from the detector indicating to the engineers exactly what the detector microprocessor and software are doing, again in real time. They truly can ‘see it all’ and know exactly what is taking place and how the 9500ix is operating in accordance with full engineering design specifications. If AutoLearn was not operating properly, it would be noticed – know that it is working with meticulous precision. Our engineers would suffer no less. With all eyes and scrutiny on the operation of AutoLearn and the knowledge that it truly works as designed (and advertised), we will move on to perception and understanding. New technology, especially technology that is a true paradigm shift of a particular industry or product category such as AutoLearn and radar detector state of the art, as a new process and performance capability unseen before is to create that which opens up misunderstanding of the unknown – the current knowledge and standard has just been moved and so our understanding must increase with it. And it is no different with AutoLearn – the general misunderstanding of the operation of the 9500ix AutoLearn arises because it is a very technically advanced, complicated piece of extraordinary engineering. And beyond its originality, its very design is simply difficult to understand (outside of the geniuses behind its design). This performance has until now, never before been accomplished so in answering the call to a real world, very difficult design problem, the answer, though conceptually easy to understand, proves to be incredibly complex in its implementation, period. Or, another way to expand on the answer and help us to understand – if this were easy to do, that being the automatic elimination of false alerts without loss of detection protection performance, then it would have been done already (and most likely would have included designs from competitors who purchase from off-shore houses). But that is not the case – AutoLearn stands alone in its operation and performance. So it’s a difficult problem solved with an equally complex design – but even it we could understand the design, we still would hold it close. Notwithstanding the level of complexity of the design, the software algorithm and operation are a ‘first in kind’ and as such, are covered by patent protection. As a complex, but highly competitive, industry leading design, it is a proprietary (patent protected) and therefore, hopefully, confidential design – ie, we will never fully divulge its remarkable algorithm and operation. That’s just good competitive business modeling and a healthy business way of life. Our goal is to give our customers the absolute best radar detection protection performance in all driving situations, including not alerting needlessly when there is no real threat and not drive our customers crazy with annoying false alerts. And in serving innovative, complex systems that do more (in this case, less!) and outperform all competitive designs, there is a demanding engineering challenge to be overcome that includes capability, minds, time and great resources. This design is property of ESCORT and its customers who own ESCORT products. To further help readers and users better understand AutoLearn, here are some brief points that we have observed, including both accurate and inaccurate alike. So in a brief sense, this will be a short commentary on separating assumptions from fact, opinions from design, and partial understanding from true engineering understanding. Technically Advanced Engineering Systems The TrueLock and AutoLearn features of the Passport 9500ix are technically advanced engineering systems and therefore, are inherently difficult to fully understand. For example, it has been frequently discussed among internet bloggers here and elsewhere that AutoLearn ‘locks out a signal after 3 passes’ – this is a too simple understatement and is not completely accurate. AutoLearn does not simply count 3 passes and then lock out all false alert signals – there is much more analysis involved in a fasle alert pass and decision on when to index and lock out. There are numerous occurrences where more than and less than 3 is the actual lockout number. Similarly, it has been discussed that in the opposite mode, ie, unlocking, the 9500ix counts down 3 times and unlocks the signal – even more dramatically than in the previous example of locking, unlocking is much more involved and is far more removed than simply ‘counting down 3 passes …’ Because of proprietary concerns, I cannot tell you the count number for either up or down, lock or unlock, but I can tell you that the counting is not the same for both locking and unlocking and, more importantly, the number of passes for a lockout (or oppositely, an unlock situation), is not necessarily the same sequence of events for any 2 independently logged signals! There are factually counts of more than 3 for locking, and nearly always, more than 3, 4 or more for unlocking. Again, it is a very complicated analysis. More than ‘just counting’ To simply say ‘AutoLearn counts to 3’ is just not accurate – that’s because AutoLearn does far more than ‘just count’. Beyond indexing and cataloguing repeat passes for a same/repeat signal, some of the many parameters being analyzed include: location, frequency, same signal seen before on another pass (ie, is this a repeat event or a near but different event?), and a number of other parameters not publicly known beyond the engineers who designed the software. An analogy might be to think of a heart transplant – one could say that a heart transplant is simply ‘taking the bad heart out and putting the good heart in’. Multiple parametric analysis takes place in both AutoLearn and heart surgery – in the surgery, and by analogy for AutoLearn example, analysis includes heart rate, blood pressure, body temperature, time under anesthesia, time in surgery and even a final count of all of the operating instruments used in the surgery (so as not to leave something behind!). AutoLearn is much more involved than just counting passes. Like heart surgery, all imaginable and pertinent parameters are being analyzed, indexed and catalogued. Beyond location, general speed, frequency, and same signal identification, like heart surgery, there are additional parameters – some of these include approach speed, closing speed on original index, heading, other previous near lockouts, band, number of sources seen and more than this than cannot be mentioned due to proprietary concerns. The fact that some bloggers have observed several or more lockouts in different locations but by the same pattern (the assumed ‘3 passes) simply underscores the fact that there are many sources similar in nature and more easily indexed by AutoLearn than the very complicated and difficult 20 or 30% that are not similar (and locked out after 3 or more passes). Other Too-general Assumptions Additionally, there have been a few other assumptions that have been stated here and elsewhere that need additional clarification. One example is the idea of testing the 9500ix by using a radar gun in your vehicle while mobile – it doesn’t work that way. For one thing, automatic doors, a great example of a very common false alert source, don’t often drive down the road! For another example, some of the bloggers have discussed ‘testing’ their unit within a half mile or quarter of a mile from their residence – I cannot give the exact number but I can say that the 9500ix uses more than a half mile of travel for 1) separation of indexing and cataloging as pertains to creating independent lockouts and 2) determining the ‘depth of history’ for a previously noted signal still under software identification for continued analysis. A half mile test run boxes in the 9500ix and prevents AutoLearn from operating properly (of course all of this is in the manual). And so it goes. Brief Summary In the end, you should remember the following: AutoLearn is fully functional (as you can even read here from others who have observed its Artificial Intelligence in operation) and is working properly, successfully. Too many thousands of users, testers, reviewers and our engineers would notice if we were not so. And keep this thought – AutoLearn is so far ahead of any other competitor design it’s not even worth considering (anymore) the alternatives. AutoLearn is the future of detection protection – but many of you are driving with it today. If you already have a 9500ix, then you know as you have witnessed AutoLearn in operation (and you are probably nodding your head and smiling right now). If you do not yet have a 9500ix, it’s yours to try virtually for free – 30 days to decide and if you aren’t fully satisfied, simply call and ESCORT will take it back and give you a full refund with no harassing questions. This isn’t arrogance – this just is. Cutting edge. Simple. Cool. Advantage – 9500ix and ESCORT owners. As always, thanks for reading, RadarExpert Last edited by RadarExpert; May 18th, 2009 at 10:30 AM. 
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#2
May 18th, 2009
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Quote:
Perhaps we could delve into more detail about the question. First off, logically the 9500ix would continue to lock out that location if the radar fields from the new door openers were the same as the old door openers. But this doesn't address the main question of why the 9500ix didn't release the point from memory after passing so many times without any signal present. From personal experience I've not seen this situation, but I have seen something close. It took my personal 9500ix 5 passes of the an "empty" location to finally release it from memory once the original radar source was no longer present. My situation was a local construction site with one of the Safety alert signs that uses a K band radar device to measure traffice patterns and flow. The sign was locked out on the 3rd pass intially, but a week later once construction was finished, the sign was removed. That following week everyday the 9500ix was silent with no spinning icon either. The week after that the sign returned for more work in the area and my 9500ix was still locking the signal out the first day. However the second day, only the second pass of the area after the sign has been removed for 5 days, the 9500ix locked out the signal. So my situation was... 3 alerts from one location, 3rd alert STORED and locked out. 6 passes of same location without alert or spinning GPS lockout symbol. 2 alerts from same location, 2nd alert STORED and locked out. Now as I mentioned before, the radar signals on the door openers could have been the same and thus the 9500ix would cross reference that data and lockout the signal right away. Perhaps the sign that I passed was slightly different frequency and thus needed a second pass to lockout. I think we need to delve more into refining the autolearn feature, but as it stands, AutoLearn still served its purpose very well for me and as RadarEXpert noted, it's also working for thousands of our customers. I will continue to use my AutoLearn and it's Truelock features until I am shown a situation where it clearly misses a lockout, or lockouts the wrong source. I'm sure it could happen, but I have yet to see it happen.
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http://escortradarforum.com/pics/DSlogo.jpg Escort Radar customer service is available from 8am-6pm Eastern Time Mon-Fri at 1-800-543-1608 or by live chat Last edited by Pointman; May 18th, 2009 at 11:43 AM.
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#3
May 18th, 2009
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It sounds like you are having the same problem Pointman as the above with AutoLearn not Unlocking a signal. It should have been obvious when they took that Safety alert sign down for 5 days and you returned and got the spinning icon that it didn’t unlock. Unlocking to me implies the opposite of locking, therefore it should of needed to re-learn and lock/store the signal again.
Just because thousands of people think that by the satellite icon not spinning it means its unlocked doesn’t mean it works. The 9500I did this exact same thing and nothing was in the manual about it Unlocking signals. If a door is locked and you don’t try to open it does that mean its unlocked? Thanks for sharing your story. Last edited by CJR238; May 18th, 2009 at 04:33 PM.
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#4
May 18th, 2009
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CJR238, thank you for joining and participating in the Escort Radar forum!
The 9500ix and the 9500ci do unlock previously stored Truelock locations and will display an "Unlock" message along with a beep to notify when this happens, exactly as described in the owners manual. What RadarExpert explained is that the criteria for a location to unlock is rather involved and, due to the propietary nature, we are not willing to divulge the entire truelock algorithm nor all of the variables analyzed when locking and unlocking. I understand that it is difficult for the hardcore radar enthusiast such as yourself to have the detector itself decide what is and what isn't a threat. We have staked our reputation as a leader in the detector industry on Truelock with excellent results to date from thousands of happy customers. I have personally witnessed signal locations unlock in the following units: 9500i converted to ix (my current road testing unit), 9500ix, and 9500ci. It will happen when the conditions are right, your 9500ix just did not experience all of the criteria required for this to happen yet. We are happy that you enjoy the 9500ix and that you have spent the time and effort testing our products. RadarExpert mentioned some of the variables which may help you in future testing. Please feel free to share your experiences here.
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#5
May 18th, 2009
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Quote:
Now to my end concern, i truly believe my 9500ix isn't Unlearning, i completely understand there is a lot more going on than what i know, but all logic and testing i have done prove to me otherwise. Logical things the ix would do. 1- Use time of day. 2- Movement. 3- Location. 4- Frequency. 5- Signal strength. 6- Band... All logical parameters were present during full testing. should i send it in? Last edited by CJR238; May 18th, 2009 at 10:21 PM.
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#6
May 19th, 2009
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CJR238,
I apologize that your unlock question wasn't answered sooner. Both of the autolearn equipped Passports, the 9500ix and 9500ci, will display an "unlocked" message as mentioned in the owners manual when they automatically unlock stored locations. The youtube video of your unlocking test did not properly simulate a 9500ix equipped vehicle driving past signal locations which is why it did not automatically unlock that stored location. You can manually unlock that location by repeatedly pressing the mute button when receiving that radar source at the location where it was locked (when the satellite icon is spinning) and confirming to unlock the stored location. If your 9500ix is acquiring GPS, detecting radar, and blocking your stored false signal locations (spinning satellite icon), then autolearn is working. Error messages and/or extremely erratic behavior are signs that there is a problem with the unit. You are welcome to send your 9500ix in to us for a check-up, but from what I have seen from your videos it appears to be working properly, just not as you expected in your test. If you would like to set up a repair ticket for your 9500ix then please contact our customer service department at 1-800-543-1608 between 8am-6pm Mon-Fri. Thank you
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