XG-25P Vote Scan

[70cutlass442]

Has anyone here worked with Harris's Votescan feature? My local dealer is advising against it but I am seeing plenty of other departments implementing it.

The system will consist of two repeaters linked via microwave with a third RX only site (all voting).

My biggest fear is that the user would miss a call if the radio were to be stuck on a site in which the user had since moved away from. Is this a possibility with VS?

 

[mmckenna]

Has anyone here worked with Harris's Votescan feature? My local dealer is advising against it but I am seeing plenty of other departments implementing it.

The system will consist of two repeaters linked via microwave with a third RX only site (all voting).

My biggest fear is that the user would miss a call if the radio were to be stuck on a site in which the user had since moved away from. Is this a possibility with VS?

Not sure how Harris does it, but Kenwood has a feature like that it and I've heard it works well. You can set an RSSI level to tell it when to go hunting for a better site, and a way to keep it form hunting back and forth too frequently. Should be automatic and find the best site (if it can hear one). If your sites have good coverage over the operations area, it should work fine. Receiver voting should take care of the rest.

What is the vendor recommending you use? Are they trying to push you into a higher cost solution?

 

[70cutlass442]

Not sure how Harris does it, but Kenwood has a feature like that it and I've heard it works well. You can set an RSSI level to tell it when to go hunting for a better site, and a way to keep it form hunting back and forth too frequently. Should be automatic and find the best site (if it can hear one). If your sites have good coverage over the operations area, it should work fine. Receiver voting should take care of the rest.

What is the vendor recommending you use? Are they trying to push you into a higher cost solution?

The vendor is actually pretty hands off on this project. We are using them as a parts vendor and we are setting the system up ourself. They said their experience with the VS has been less than ideal and cited a long lag, up to 30 seconds, for the portable to select the stronger site. They used the example of entering a building in which the radio took longer to roam.

The vendor noted that was with a different manufacture and was analog.

We looked at NXDN as you and I discussed in other threads which would roam better as beacons are used system wide. We selected RF Technologies for repeaters and they do not have a beacon feature... I have actually been unable to find any P25 system that uses a beacon to help facilitate roaming.

Basically I want to know if the radio is always looking for TX signal, or, does it stay on one channel until it RX something, and from there it starts the vote process.

 

[mmckenna]

Basically I want to know if the radio is always looking for TX signal, or, does it stay on one channel until it RX something, and from there it starts the vote process.

If it works like the Kenwood system, the repeaters send out a beacon every few seconds, irregardless if there is active traffic or not, and the subscriber radio picks the one with the strongest RSSI. No reason that the radio should take 30 seconds to switch over unless someone had it programmed incorrectly.

 

[70cutlass442]

If it works like the Kenwood system, the repeaters send out a beacon every few seconds, irregardless if there is active traffic or not, and the subscriber radio picks the one with the strongest RSSI. No reason that the radio should take 30 seconds to switch over unless someone had it programmed incorrectly.

That was my thought. RFT recommended sending out CWID every X minutes to provide a reference for the radios. I may do this assuming the radio will let it sample the signal in FMN or a different NAC without the user hearing Morse code every 10 minutes.

I have to explain to the bosses that though P25 is the industry standard for public safety, it lacks alot of features compared to NXDN or DMR which would make this much easier and be more predictable.

 

[mmckenna]

P25 a nice, but NXDN/DMR has some nicer options, plus it's a hell of a lot cheaper.
I run an NXDN trunked system, chose it based on features and price. I'm getting ready to build out a P25 system for our PD, and it's stupid expensive, but it meets the interoperability requirements.

No reason at all P25 needs to be as expensive as it is. NXDN/DMR are perfectly good standards. Now if we can just get some reasonably priced multiband/multi standard radios on the market, we'll be set. Kenwood is supposed to be releasing a multband/P25/NXDN/DMR radio here next week, Tait probably isn't far behind.

 

[mmckenna]

Of course, other option is simulcast. Might be a cheaper solution if it comes down to replacing everything.

 

[70cutlass442]

Of course, other option is simulcast. Might be a cheaper solution if it comes down to replacing everything.

We demoed a NXDN system and loved it. We have some all band radios in the fleet which was the deciding factor (rest of the county is P25 800).

I would have preferred DMR or NXDN personally. A real world example is when the Waukesha Christmas parade suspect was caught by a member of our agency last year. He had a VHF unit while in a juris with 800 P25.

 

[mmckenna]

We demoed a NXDN system and loved it. We have some all band radios in the fleet which was the deciding factor (rest of the county is P25 800).

I would have preferred DMR or NXDN personally. A real world example is when the Waukesha Christmas parade suspect was caught by a member of our agency last year. He had a VHF unit while in a juris with 800 P25.

I have an NXDN trunked system and it's been a solid performer. 11 years now, still running strong.

Interoperability becomes the challenge, but there are options coming...