It looks like Frederick County is going digital

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cowboywildbill

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I had heard the rumor before so while I was in Frederick the other day picking up some equipment at the Motorola dealer. They maintain the Frederick County fleet as well as a lot of other Counties evenVirginia and some Federal systems also. I asked if Frederick County was going to go digital and he said yes in the very near future. I asked if they were going to reband, and he said he didn't think so. At least not for a while. He thought they were going to stay with the same basic Trunking system and control channels and freqs and just go from anolog to digital staying in the 800 mghz range. He said that the new system may run both annolog and digital ? I wasn't sure what he meant. He said something about supporting the digital with anolog when there is a problem with towers and range to or from a mobile, kind of like some cell systems do. He said he wasn't a radio tech but was involved with handleing the inventory. They are in the process of getting ready to install some of the new equipment. Some will be the Motorola MTS 5000 radios. They will go digital and anolog. They will also start using the phantom style antenas on the mobiles. They look something like the plastic lid on a spray paint can.
I have one on my car. I like it because I don't have to take it off to go in a car wash.
I think they will still do the simacast Fire Disp. on Low band and VHF annolog for the pagers. If I hear any more I'll let you know.
 

cowboywildbill

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Did I say MTS?, I think he might have said XTS 5000. It would be nice if they don't change anything except for going dig. That way we won't have to change any programming. if I understand it correctly. The newer scanners should just automaticaly convert it from anolog to digital. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
I hope?
 

ka3jjz

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Not precisely - at least with the Unidens (don't know about the GREs or RS models) you have to program the frequencies with certain settings that indicate the system is to be received using P25 audio (note that this isn't necessarily the same thing as programming a true P25 system, which requires a slightly different setting).

73 Mike
 

maus92

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It sounds like the system will be mixed mode, which basically means that if you have a Uniden 396/996, GRE 500/600, or a RS 2096/96 you will be good to go. The 396/996's will automatically detect and decode P25 audio without user intervention when programmed for a Motorola 800 type II standard system using their USAD software. I'm not sure about the other scanners.

CA
Annapolis
 
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cowboywildbill

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Thanks, Not that I can't figure it out if I have to make changes but, I just hate the repitition of some of the programming like all of the alpha tags. And with my fat little fingers it really gets to be a pain. Just like hitting the right keys on this laptop. "Ha Ha"
It would be nice not to have to do any updates. I have Vista and can't seem to get the computer programming to work with the cable. That would be easier than the keypads on the our RS 96's. Thanks for the replies.
 

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cowboywildbill said:
Thanks, Not that I can't figure it out if I have to make changes but, I just hate the repitition of some of the programming like all of the alpha tags. And with my fat little fingers it really gets to be a pain.

You could try what I do: use UASD software to put in 1 of each typical talkgroup, like 1 fire, 1 police, and so on. Then using a decent text editor like Notepad2 just copy, paste, and change necessary fields in the actual .usd file itself. Just be careful you don't mess up the structure of the file and you're good to go.

Then load it up in UASD and view each system to make sure that you didn't make subtle mistakes. UASD is great for viewing what's in each system file, but not so great for entering data easily and rapidly.

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