Another bites the dust & goes TRBO

[zzdiesel]

Blytheville. How much longer will scanners work for Arkansas? :roll:

 

[kruser]

Blytheville. How much longer will scanners work for Arkansas? :roll:

You ever mess with DSD? Providing you can get a halfway decent signal from the Blytheville tower.
I've had pretty good luck with it on a couple conventional single channel TRBO signals here a while back. It has been a while since I've messed with it though.
Of course you may go to all the trouble and find out they are also using encrypted TRBO

I should give DSD another go myself here. There have been a few new TRBO users come online here as well. I don't think we have any Public Safety TRBO users here though, all business as far as I know.
When I did mess with DSD, I tried it first on a P25 trunked system as well as a single channel convetional P25 signal and it worked pretty darn good. Those all offered pretty decent signals though but it at least proved to me that DSD was working.
Then I tried the few TRBO frequencies listed here a year or two back, neither of which had a very strong signal at my location. I was amamzed at how well it actually worked. I was even using DSD under Ubuntu 10.4 something on a fairly old and slow laptop. It had some errors which I figured were from the slow old laptop so I tried it on a very new laptop with dual core i5 processor and it really made no difference.

I've never tried the Windows port of DSD on anything other than a P25 signal so can't say how well, if at all, that it works on TRBO signals.

If you really enjoyed monitoring the systems you can get from AR, I think I'd give DSD a try.
I did have trouble with the Linux part not being a nix guy much but I managed to figure it out pretty easily and ended up having it going on four different laptops at one point.

I'm still waiting for something that decodes Nexedge. I don't think DSD handled that but I could be wrong as it has been a long time since messing with it plus I had no Nexedge signals to try. I still don't think there are any Nexedge signals here but I expect UP railroad to start using it at some point. I've always enjoyed railscanning so I guess that is when I'll try it if UP or BNSF switches over to Nexedge in this area.

 

[zzdiesel]

Thanks kruser. I need to bite the bullet and try DSD sometime. I have a leg amputation coming in a couple of week and it may be after that episode. I've got a lot of healing & rehab to go through.

 

[kruser]

Thanks kruser. I need to bite the bullet and try DSD sometime. I have a leg amputation coming in a couple of week and it may be after that episode. I've got a lot of healing & rehab to go through.

Wow, that's a tough one to swallow but I guess you need to do what you need to do. Very Sorry to hear that news.

Yep, give DSD a try after you feel up to it. It may help you keep your mind on some fun stuff or it may aggravate you too no end!

Good luck with your surgery.

 

[INDY72]

DSD will handle UNENCRYPTED MotoTRBO Conventional, and TRS, as well as NexEDGE.

 

[kruser]

DSD will handle UNENCRYPTED MotoTRBO Conventional, and TRS, as well as NexEDGE.

Thanks for the confirmation on NexEDGE. I knew it handled the other stuff but did not recall about NexEDGE.
That's good to know!

 

[zzdiesel]

Thanks for the confirmations

 

[btritch]

That's fine and Dandy except in Greene County where the entire county but just a few departments have gone to ENCRYTED NexEDGE and refuse to let the others that haven't gone to it have it and be able to contact them, Sad to hear Blytheville has made that choice as well.. Looks like that'll be two counties taken off the feed..

 

[oem3]

Arkansas Systems and Where we are headed

I'm starting to follow comments from users on the various systems in AR. I agree with you guys. I'm the county communications officer with OEM. As a lot of you know, the NB mandate has more than stirred the pot and I think there is a lot of hyper-reactivity to it. Also, I believe vendors are taking advantage of this and pushing sales for these systems. (It's always about $$$$) There is no mandate or date set for going digital or to go to certain systems. Ironically, a lot of these new "various" systems are pushing more away from interoperability. This keeps up and we amateur radio operators will once again be in more demand during disasters than in recent trends. How the cycle continues.

I can understand taking measures for secure comms for DTF ops, certain sensitive law ops...etc. but there is no need of taking everything there.

I try to have some influence (when I can) on our future county systems, but it is not much.

I wonder if there will ever be a day when the public can have a deciding factor in how our tax $$ are used. Of course, that could apply to everything now. We simply have no control or say about anything anymore. If anyone has any ideas on how we might one day make changes. Remember the power is in numbers of people and there are a lot of you out there with this interest.

I have never posted much on forums before, but feel compelled to do so now. I think this is a very useful site for information.

 

[zzdiesel]

Thanks for the input oem3

 

[03msc]

I'm starting to follow comments from users on the various systems in AR. I agree with you guys. I'm the county communications officer with OEM. As a lot of you know, the NB mandate has more than stirred the pot and I think there is a lot of hyper-reactivity to it. Also, I believe vendors are taking advantage of this and pushing sales for these systems. (It's always about $$$$) There is no mandate or date set for going digital or to go to certain systems. Ironically, a lot of these new "various" systems are pushing more away from interoperability. This keeps up and we amateur radio operators will once again be in more demand during disasters than in recent trends. How the cycle continues.

I can understand taking measures for secure comms for DTF ops, certain sensitive law ops...etc. but there is no need of taking everything there.

I try to have some influence (when I can) on our future county systems, but it is not much.

I wonder if there will ever be a day when the public can have a deciding factor in how our tax $$ are used. Of course, that could apply to everything now. We simply have no control or say about anything anymore. If anyone has any ideas on how we might one day make changes. Remember the power is in numbers of people and there are a lot of you out there with this interest.

I have never posted much on forums before, but feel compelled to do so now. I think this is a very useful site for information.

I think doing exactly what you just did here - giving your input and opinion without being worried about what someone might say - is key. Do you OEM guys have a statewide database where you could email each and every one of them with a short, to the point email like you just posted here? Maybe try to get the discussion going at a meeting or something that you might have? (I don't know what meetings you all might have.)

I think the key is getting the word out so they don't get suckered into something they don't need and don't want (or that we don't want, as the case may be).

I can't help but think that these guys in OEM positions, volunteer firefighters, police officers, firemen, etc., etc., do listen/monitor the radios on scanners when they are off duty. They need to realize that if they go to a system that can't be monitored on scanner then they won't be hearing it like they are now. I know some will say "but they will have radios they can listen on" and I know that's true BUT I still think many listen on scanners while in their homes and radios are on chargers or maybe the radio is a mobile in their vehicle and they like to listen while at home.

Just my two-cents'...

 

[btritch]

I think doing exactly what you just did here - giving your input and opinion without being worried about what someone might say - is key. Do you OEM guys have a statewide database where you could email each and every one of them with a short, to the point email like you just posted here? Maybe try to get the discussion going at a meeting or something that you might have? (I don't know what meetings you all might have.)

I think the key is getting the word out so they don't get suckered into something they don't need and don't want (or that we don't want, as the case may be).

I can't help but think that these guys in OEM positions, volunteer firefighters, police officers, firemen, etc., etc., do listen/monitor the radios on scanners when they are off duty. They need to realize that if they go to a system that can't be monitored on scanner then they won't be hearing it like they are now. I know some will say "but they will have radios they can listen on" and I know that's true BUT I still think many listen on scanners while in their homes and radios are on chargers or maybe the radio is a mobile in their vehicle and they like to listen while at home.

Just my two-cents'...

Here in our county they changed the city police, city fire dept, county rescue squad hospital ems and county sheriff's office all over to UHF Nexedge digital and left all us on county fire departments on VHF analog narrowband and won't even allow us any access at all to it, They refuse to let us hear any of it... I don't agree with that, I've voiced that, They know that, But it's going to take more than just one to say something, I'm all for going to it BUT they need to at least make it accessible for us, They have a habit of paging us out and then turning us off where we have to go to their channel and talk.. Well Now we can't.. I figure it's how it's going to be though, It's as OEM3 said.. It's all about the $$ and since the volunteer departments can't afford new equipment to switch over they just left us where we were and said the heck with it.. Not right I know but what can ya do... Just my 2 cents on the matter..

 

[JRayfield]

The move to digital systems by many public safety agencies is NOT "all about money". It's often about "coverage". I've now been involved in narrowbanding several agencies and I've also had feedback from other agencies who used someone else to reprogram their equipment for narrowband. The vast majority of these agencies have lost significant coverage, some as much as 25%. Most of those agencies were already dealing with systems that did not give them as much coverage as they really needed when using wideband. The most technically-effective, as well as most cost-effective, solution to these coverage problems has often been to switch to digital systems (MOTOTRBO or NexEdge).

John Rayfield, Jr. CETma

Here in our county they changed the city police, city fire dept, county rescue squad hospital ems and county sheriff's office all over to UHF Nexedge digital and left all us on county fire departments on VHF analog narrowband and won't even allow us any access at all to it, They refuse to let us hear any of it... I don't agree with that, I've voiced that, They know that, But it's going to take more than just one to say something, I'm all for going to it BUT they need to at least make it accessible for us, They have a habit of paging us out and then turning us off where we have to go to their channel and talk.. Well Now we can't.. I figure it's how it's going to be though, It's as OEM3 said.. It's all about the $$ and since the volunteer departments can't afford new equipment to switch over they just left us where we were and said the heck with it.. Not right I know but what can ya do... Just my 2 cents on the matter..

 

[03msc]

The move to digital systems by many public safety agencies is NOT "all about money". It's often about "coverage". I've now been involved in narrowbanding several agencies and I've also had feedback from other agencies who used someone else to reprogram their equipment for narrowband. The vast majority of these agencies have lost significant coverage, some as much as 25%. Most of those agencies were already dealing with systems that did not give them as much coverage as they really needed when using wideband. The most technically-effective, as well as most cost-effective, solution to these coverage problems has often been to switch to digital systems (MOTOTRBO or NexEdge).

John Rayfield, Jr. CETma

(Proving my ignorance regarding all these systems here) So either of those provide better coverage than the analog conventional vhf channels we have now? (This is not disputing you, this is asking). I guess I was under the impression that digital limited the coverage somewhat (based on other things I've read).

In our county, based on monitoring it for years now, I rarely hear them have coverage issues unless it's an officer trying to use a handheld while it's clipped to their belt and they're using the shoulder mic. So if we switched to one of these I don't think coverage would be the deciding factor. But maybe it would.

Guess I just keep seeing comments about the salesmen selling systems that aren't needed because they scare them into it. If that's the case then it seems like education of the facts is what's needed. Arkansas has the AWIN system that seems to work pretty well, at least around here. If they are stuck on going digital why not just go to AWIN? Then they have interop with ASP, AHP, AGFC, etc...

 

[JRayfield]

Years ago, when I first got into this industry, public safety agencies seemed to be content with 60% to 70% coverage, with mobiles. Anything that they could get with portables was acceptable (10%, 20%, was usually fine). But that was over 34 years ago and we didn't have school shootings in small to medium towns and meth labs out in the woods in low-population counties. Over time, these same agencies began to expect 90% or better coverage with mobiles. Now, they are seriously looking at how to achieve 90% or better coverage with portables. The initial cost of doing this with analog systems, especially narrowband analog, would be very prohibitive for many agencies, the performance and/or reliability of these 'wide area' analog systems can be very poor, and the ongoing costs for maintenance can be very high. But the new digital systems (such as MOTOTRBO) can provide that kind of coverage, or at least near it, at a cost point that makes these systems practical, at least over a fairly short period of time (if they can't achieve it all at once, due to financial restraints), with good performance and reliability, and very low ongoing maintenance costs.

When cellular switched to digital, years ago, coverage was less with digital so more cell sites were needed. When MOTOTRBO came out on the market, I fully expected that it, too, would provide less range as compared to analog FM. But just the opposite has usually been the case. I've done on-the-air comparison tests of analog FM (wideband) to MOTOTRBO and I've spoke with a lot of other dealers (technical people, not necessarily the sales people) and end users. I've also had lengthy discussions on this topic with one of the country's best RF engineers (his computer propagation modeling software company has 70% of that market in the U.S. and the FCC even uses his software).

We've found that, if a digital system (MOTOTRBO, for example) is installed and set up correctly, then the users will find that the digital system typically has about a 3db advantage over a wideband analog system that is using the same antenna locations, power output, etc.. For those who aren't familiar with decibels, a gain of 3db is comparable to doubling your transmitter power and a loss of 3db (-3db) is comparable to cutting your transmitter power in half.

In comparing wideband analog to narrowband analog, the difference depends a lot upon the specific equipment being used. In some cases, the difference will be that narrowband is 3db 'down' from wideband (like cutting your transmitter power to 1/2 of what it was on wideband). In other cases, the difference may be as much as 6db (like cutting your transmitter power to 1/4 of what it was on wideband). So, for some, they may notice some drop in coverage when switching to narrowband FM and others may notice a huge drop in coverage.

So, the idea that everyone should just switch to narrowband and they'll do just fine, rather than switch to a digital system, is not based on accurate technical knowledge of this subject. While some may do just fine on narrowband, for others, it's a "disaster".

As to the stories (especially on these forums) of sales people scaring their customers into purchasing new digital systems, I'm sure that some of that has happened. I suspect that some sales people don't understand enough, themselves, about narrowband analog versus wideband analog versus digital systems. So, in some cases, the sales people may knowingly be 'misguiding' their customers in order to make the sale, and in other cases, they may think that they're guiding their customers correctly (and they are probably correct, in those cases where switching to narrowband FM would result in a drop in coverage that is not acceptable).

But I also have strong reason to believe that some of these 'stories' on internet forums are simply not true. For example, one individual posted a story on one of these forums, about a new MOTOTRBO system that was supposedly not working well at all. When I, and others on the forum, 'insisted' that he tell us the name of the agency with the 'supposedly' poor-performing MOTOTRBO system, he simply never answered. I would have at least expected him to give us some reason for not wanting to tell us who it was, but he just 'disappeared' from that thread. That made his story pretty 'suspicious'.

That doesn't mean that there aren't MOTOTRBO systems out there that are not performing as well as they should. I personally know of some MOTOTRBO systems that did not work as well as they could have worked, but it was not the technology at fault. These systems were installed and set up by someone who did not engineer and/or install them properly. In fact, I just worked on one of these 'types' of systems about a week ago. That system is now working as it should have worked in the first place.

I'm not familiar enough with the AWIN system to know what kind of portable coverage it provides throughout the state. If it doesn't provide the desired portable coverage for some agencies, then that may be why some might want to have their own digital systems. That's the case here in Missouri. The new statewide Missouri system is designed to provide 95% or better coverage with mobiles. Portable coverage will be completely non-existent in many areas of the state. So some counties are installing their own digital systems (MOTOTRBO). The cost of the equipment can also come into this picture (although that's usually only when the agency has to purchase their own infrastructure (repeaters, towers, etc.)). In some cases, the cost of digital systems like MOTOTRBO can actually be less than the cost of analog systems with the same number of 'talk channels' (due to the use of TDMA - thus 2 'talk channels' per repeater). And as compared to P25 systems, the MOTOTRBO infrastructure for a system can cost as little as 1/5 the cost of P25 infrastructure for a similarly-designed system. (For those who would insist that agencies should use P25 instead of MOTOTRBO or NexEdge, I'm sure that those agencies will be happy to accept large donations from you, to help build out P25 systems in their counties ).

John Rayfield, Jr. CETma

(Proving my ignorance regarding all these systems here) So either of those provide better coverage than the analog conventional vhf channels we have now? (This is not disputing you, this is asking). I guess I was under the impression that digital limited the coverage somewhat (based on other things I've read).

In our county, based on monitoring it for years now, I rarely hear them have coverage issues unless it's an officer trying to use a handheld while it's clipped to their belt and they're using the shoulder mic. So if we switched to one of these I don't think coverage would be the deciding factor. But maybe it would.

Guess I just keep seeing comments about the salesmen selling systems that aren't needed because they scare them into it. If that's the case then it seems like education of the facts is what's needed. Arkansas has the AWIN system that seems to work pretty well, at least around here. If they are stuck on going digital why not just go to AWIN? Then they have interop with ASP, AHP, AGFC, etc...

 

[INDY72]

Point: It doesn't matter if your MotoTRBO, NexEDGE, or P-25 phase I, or II digital, or analog. If your using VHF or UHF after January, you are going to be on narrowband. If your system engineers have brain cells that work, they will push for whatever will optimize the system. Be it higher output wattage for the amplifier for most digital systems, and analog, adding additional repeater sites etc..... Point 2: TDMA digital is TDMA digital. Two slots per frequency for conventional for digital voice, or with trunking, two slots for voice chans on each freq, and on the Control Freq, both a VC, and CC on the one freq. Basically doubling capacity of the system. The issues being that NexEDGE, and MotoTRBO beat everyone else to the punch with usable narrowband TDMA digital capability. They were already able to sell cheaper systems which were meant for SMR's to Public Safety Agencies, and push encryption hard for security.... Then finally P-25 Phase II TDMA standardization occurs. OOPS too late we got a system for half what yours would cost us. Again I remind you, MotoTRBO, and NexEDGE do NOT have the interoperability and built in safety and enhancements that a P-25 system has. In fact, if your agency runs NexEDGE, and Joe Blow runs MotoTRBO, and the rest of us are running P-25... None of us can talk to Joe, or you, and you can't talk to Joe, or us. Oh well its the usual two steps backwards with every true step foward. Interop, sminterop, who cares, we can take care of anything ourselves. OK whatever.:roll:

Final point: The days of your government being truly accountable for what it does vanished with the change from Peace Officer to Law Enforcement Officer and Officer Friendly put on the intimidating colors, and got almost paramilitary training and gear. And oh no, your technology allows you to know whats happening... That can't be alowed. We must be able to raid the doughnut shop en masse at 2 am and you not know we did it. LOL. Back to the usual madness.

 

[03msc]

Years ago, when I first got into this industry, public safety agencies seemed to be content with 60% to 70% coverage, with mobiles. Anything that they could get with portables was acceptable (10%, 20%, was usually fine). But that was over 34 years ago and we didn't have school shootings in small to medium towns and meth labs out in the woods in low-population counties. Over time, these same agencies began to expect 90% or better coverage with mobiles. Now, they are seriously looking at how to achieve 90% or better coverage with portables. The initial cost of doing this with analog systems, especially narrowband analog, would be very prohibitive for many agencies, the performance and/or reliability of these 'wide area' analog systems can be very poor, and the ongoing costs for maintenance can be very high. But the new digital systems (such as MOTOTRBO) can provide that kind of coverage, or at least near it, at a cost point that makes these systems practical, at least over a fairly short period of time (if they can't achieve it all at once, due to financial restraints), with good performance and reliability, and very low ongoing maintenance costs.

When cellular switched to digital, years ago, coverage was less with digital so more cell sites were needed. When MOTOTRBO came out on the market, I fully expected that it, too, would provide less range as compared to analog FM. But just the opposite has usually been the case. I've done on-the-air comparison tests of analog FM (wideband) to MOTOTRBO and I've spoke with a lot of other dealers (technical people, not necessarily the sales people) and end users. I've also had lengthy discussions on this topic with one of the country's best RF engineers (his computer propagation modeling software company has 70% of that market in the U.S. and the FCC even uses his software).

We've found that, if a digital system (MOTOTRBO, for example) is installed and set up correctly, then the users will find that the digital system typically has about a 3db advantage over a wideband analog system that is using the same antenna locations, power output, etc.. For those who aren't familiar with decibels, a gain of 3db is comparable to doubling your transmitter power and a loss of 3db (-3db) is comparable to cutting your transmitter power in half.

In comparing wideband analog to narrowband analog, the difference depends a lot upon the specific equipment being used. In some cases, the difference will be that narrowband is 3db 'down' from wideband (like cutting your transmitter power to 1/2 of what it was on wideband). In other cases, the difference may be as much as 6db (like cutting your transmitter power to 1/4 of what it was on wideband). So, for some, they may notice some drop in coverage when switching to narrowband FM and others may notice a huge drop in coverage.

So, the idea that everyone should just switch to narrowband and they'll do just fine, rather than switch to a digital system, is not based on accurate technical knowledge of this subject. While some may do just fine on narrowband, for others, it's a "disaster".

As to the stories (especially on these forums) of sales people scaring their customers into purchasing new digital systems, I'm sure that some of that has happened. I suspect that some sales people don't understand enough, themselves, about narrowband analog versus wideband analog versus digital systems. So, in some cases, the sales people may knowingly be 'misguiding' their customers in order to make the sale, and in other cases, they may think that they're guiding their customers correctly (and they are probably correct, in those cases where switching to narrowband FM would result in a drop in coverage that is not acceptable).

But I also have strong reason to believe that some of these 'stories' on internet forums are simply not true. For example, one individual posted a story on one of these forums, about a new MOTOTRBO system that was supposedly not working well at all. When I, and others on the forum, 'insisted' that he tell us the name of the agency with the 'supposedly' poor-performing MOTOTRBO system, he simply never answered. I would have at least expected him to give us some reason for not wanting to tell us who it was, but he just 'disappeared' from that thread. That made his story pretty 'suspicious'.

That doesn't mean that there aren't MOTOTRBO systems out there that are not performing as well as they should. I personally know of some MOTOTRBO systems that did not work as well as they could have worked, but it was not the technology at fault. These systems were installed and set up by someone who did not engineer and/or install them properly. In fact, I just worked on one of these 'types' of systems about a week ago. That system is now working as it should have worked in the first place.

I'm not familiar enough with the AWIN system to know what kind of portable coverage it provides throughout the state. If it doesn't provide the desired portable coverage for some agencies, then that may be why some might want to have their own digital systems. That's the case here in Missouri. The new statewide Missouri system is designed to provide 95% or better coverage with mobiles. Portable coverage will be completely non-existent in many areas of the state. So some counties are installing their own digital systems (MOTOTRBO). The cost of the equipment can also come into this picture (although that's usually only when the agency has to purchase their own infrastructure (repeaters, towers, etc.)). In some cases, the cost of digital systems like MOTOTRBO can actually be less than the cost of analog systems with the same number of 'talk channels' (due to the use of TDMA - thus 2 'talk channels' per repeater). And as compared to P25 systems, the MOTOTRBO infrastructure for a system can cost as little as 1/5 the cost of P25 infrastructure for a similarly-designed system. (For those who would insist that agencies should use P25 instead of MOTOTRBO or NexEdge, I'm sure that those agencies will be happy to accept large donations from you, to help build out P25 systems in their counties ).

John Rayfield, Jr. CETma

Thanks for your lengthy post; that was helpful in several ways. As I said in my post, I know I was waving my ignorance flag but we never learn if we don't ask.

 

[JRayfield]

Sorry for the long post, but this isn't really a 'simple' subject, when you get into the details, so the posts can get a bit long. But, it's a fascinating subject, at least to me.

Always keep asking questions. "Know-It-Alls" don't ask questions to learn more, because they think they already know it all. So, then they actually quit learning. There are a lot of people on the internet that fit that category. They spout off information as if they're 'experts' on the subject, but they really don't know what they're talking about. No one can ever learn everything there is to learn about a subject. And with communications, it's changing so fast now, it becomes difficult to keep up with it, even when you're trying to keep up with it. So, the more questions you ask, and the more you learn, the more you learn that there are more questions to ask.

John Rayfield, Jr. CETma

Thanks for your lengthy post; that was helpful in several ways. As I said in my post, I know I was waving my ignorance flag but we never learn if we don't ask.

 

[zzdiesel]

I enjoy the posts like this. They're informative.

 

[btritch]

I'm understanding completely how the system works, What's confusing me is why the county would want to split, The put all the city and sheriff's office on NexEDGE which is fine.. BUT they left all the county fire departments behind on VHF Narrowband which in turn cut our signal in half and also are paged by the sheriff's department.. Well Problem there is they will send us on something and then turn our frequencies off, Before we could change to their channel, Now we can't, Can't hear them, Can't communicate with them, In the rural area phones don't work.. So what do we have to do? Without and HOPE somebody doesn't get hurt, It's not the fact they didn't change us over, It's the fact they don't let us have access to it incase of disaster, etc. and I don't understand what the issue there is..