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POCSAG VHF pagers

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SCPD

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My department is looking to get away from their swissphone pagers. We have to send them in for repair so often that they finally have had enough. I carry a cheap hand programmable unication text pager but Im wondering what everyone recommends for text pagers currently. VHF 1200 baud rate.
 

a417

U+0000
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Mar 14, 2004
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4,650
What about Apollo pagers?

spend more time fixing them, than using them.

screens degrade VERY quickly, a year or less of lite to moderate use and the buttons are wearing thru...battery life is pretty dismal...they go deaf rather quickly, programmer is finicky with windows versions...
 

SCPD

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Sorry for not getting back to my own thread I didn't see that I had any replies. I guess in my opinion Swissphone probably makes the best pager even though they aren't that rugged. Battery life is great and bright screen with many user options available on the front of the pager. I'll keep looking.
 

sfd119

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spend more time fixing them, than using them.

screens degrade VERY quickly, a year or less of lite to moderate use and the buttons are wearing thru...battery life is pretty dismal...they go deaf rather quickly, programmer is finicky with windows versions...

+1

Apollos are the worst.
 

Project25_MASTR

Millennial Graying OBT Guy
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How about normal Cellphones?

I don't remeber if it is a NFPA requirement but in the US some jurisdictions require primaries to be pagers. Secondaries can be cellular or two-way portables but primaries must be pagers.

I had one of the Swissphone S.Quad's for a little while. Awesome pager until Swissphone recalled it for issues due to water ingression. Haven't tried one of the other pagers since.
 

SCPD

QRT
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How about normal Cellphones?

I think that your right.. cell phones have replaced paging for the most part. BUT for emergency services I do believe that a standalone pager is needed still... when the grid gets overloaded I still want to receive the page.
 

Your_account

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BUT for emergency services I do believe that a standalone pager is needed still... when the grid gets overloaded I still want to receive the page.
I believe the use Radios?
Normal Tetra Radios could also receive Text Messages.

Here in Austria run a Pager System for Hospital Transport.
 

Citywide173

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How about normal Cellphones?

More advanced technology isn't always the answer. After the bombs went off here in Boston in 2013, cell phones were useless in the active incident area. The department radio was non-stop. The only way that some information was able to be disseminated was via our proprietary POCSAG paging system.
 

Your_account

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The department radio was non-stop.
So there is the bottleneck.
The only way that some information was able to be disseminated was via our proprietary POCSAG paging system.
Where does the infos come from?
 

Citywide173

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For the OP, we're using Unication Alpha Legend+ pagers since Motorola stopped making the Advisor II and have had good luck with them.
 
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