NXDN Protocol

[Keith2]

My county department just switched to Kenwood NX 800 radios using the NXDN digital protocol. My old scanner does not pick it up. All I get is a humming noise. Are there scanners out now that will pick this up?

[AlabamaRS]

NO, not yet

[n1das]

NXDN usage needs to become widespread enough for the scanner market as a whole to demand a scanner that can decode NXDN digital. There's a slim chance we *might* see a NXDN scanner some time in the future once the scanner manufacturers acknowledge the market demand. Right now, you're SOL unless you get your own NXDN radio.

If you have a NXDN radio, you can easily monitor other NXDN traffic, provided it's not encrypted. NXDN supports clear and encrypted modes. The 16-bit basic encryption comes standard with NXDN radios. For users that need a higher level of encryption, AES and DES encryption are available as options.

[DPD1]

Maybe this or another thread could become a sticky for this subject, as I've actually been trying to follow along with what's happening... and I think it might be good to keep it up as an active topic, just to keep it in the public eye. The more attention it gets, the more chance of getting it implemented into scanning eventually. I'm kind of surprised it has started to take off with gov applications so fast, as it was primarily designed to be used for business/industrial apps. But not a huge surprise, since it's cheaper than P25.

David, I'm sure people would be interested in your audio samples: NXDN Information

[scannerfreak]

Moved to Kenwood forum..

[DPD1]

Just fyi... This isn't just a Kenwood thing. It's a digital protocol that will be used by multiple manufacturers and it will have a significant effect on scanning in general.

[bezking]

That's correct... NXDN is known to Icom users as iDAS (Icom Digital Advanced System)

[KI7WB]

NXDN sounds better to me than the 12.5 kHz OpenSky system, under both weak and strong signal conditions.

[millrad]

For the sake of interoperability, agencies using these relatively obscure systems are going against the grain. APCO Project 25 digital is now the de-facto national standard. Part of the problem is that city, county and state officials making purchase decisions aren't always educated on public safety radio systems.

[n1das]

Originally Posted by millrad

For the sake of interoperability, agencies using these relatively obscure systems are going against the grain. APCO Project 25 digital is now the de-facto national standard. Part of the problem is that city, county and state officials making purchase decisions aren't always educated on public safety radio systems.

I think they forgot to look up the definition of "interoperability."

[pachanga22]

Originally Posted by millrad

For the sake of interoperability, agencies using these relatively obscure systems are going against the grain. APCO Project 25 digital is now the de-facto national standard.

You didn't mention the other bonuses of sounding like crap and being horridly overpriced.

[N_Jay]

Originally Posted by pachanga22

You didn't mention the other bonuses of sounding like crap and being horridly overpriced.

Compared to?

[pachanga22]

Nexedge?

[jim202]

What you see going on here is that both the radio companies and the radio shops are going to the
end customers and laying a product on them to fatten their profit and not fit in to the requirements
of the national interoperability plans. This is going on all over the country and being driven by the
FCC mandate to narrow band the VHF and UHF frequencies.

With the January 2013 deadline to go narrow band, this has caused a flurry of sales calls on public
safety agencies that are either totally in the dark as to what is going on or just don't understand
what is being presented to them. Not being technically inclined and not being one that understands
how the radio electronics works, they just purchase what ever sounds good. Be that a tin can
and string or a radio with a non compatible format of digital modulation, they rely on the radio
shop people that have saved their but so many times when the radios have broke in the past.

I travel around the country working with radio interoperability systems and see this every day.
many of the managers of these radio systems haven't even heard of the "National Interoperability"
channels that the FCC has set aside. As hard as it is to believe it, this information have been
in the lime light now for well over 5 years. It is a topic at many of the trade shows and public
safety meetings. How can you still have managers out there that don't know about this?

Based on the people with the lack of knowledge of what is going on, it is easy to see why they
are so gullible to purchase radio equipment that doesn't match their operational requirements.
They let the radio companies and or the radio shops write any radio specs for new purchases.
This way these experts are able to steer the purchases to their offers. In many cases there is no
or limited word getting out for other comapnies to even know about a bid and as such never get
the chance to participate.

Jim

Originally Posted by millrad

For the sake of interoperability, agencies using these relatively obscure systems are going against the grain. APCO Project 25 digital is now the de-facto national standard. Part of the problem is that city, county and state officials making purchase decisions aren't always educated on public safety radio systems.

[pachanga22]

Motorola's SOP.

"This way these experts are able to steer the purchases to their offers. In many cases there is no
or limited word getting out for other comapnies to even know about a bid and as such never get
the chance to participate. "