Another NXR-710 “hairbrained” task I’ve been approached with

[jcefd10]

So i was approached again this past week by our commissioners about a “project” they want me to figure out.
The other day when that 488 fiber got cut in Charlotte and took our entire states voice and data down, they got to freaking out. We have people that don’t want to carry a portable radio. They’ll respond to calls by being alerted via Active 911/SMS from dispatch, and can also use our zello interface I have set up. Which works flawlessly…..until there’s no internet.
So, I was asked about pagers. IF they were to get pagers for these ppl, would it work. Well, we run on NXDN, off of a single site at the moment. We are converting our backup site from analog to NXDN in the next week or so. That being said, I know the pagers would be fine to receive the initial page. But they also requested they be able to copy the radio traffic after said page.
That’s where I had to stop. I don’t know if any NXDN capable pagers. So my only thought was, “ well, one site would have to transmit analog and one digital” at all times to make that work.
Simulcast I guess. Correct me
If I’m wrong. I was going to hook the new
Up with the main site via kti3 like I have done for the others the sheriff office uses, and that’s easy.
But when mixing digital and analog I…. It makes sense in my head but I don’t know what all is involved.
I may be thinking about this totally wrong too, any information would be helpful.

Oh, last bit of info. We are paged on NXDN currently. But that can be changed easily. We used to be paged on analog then all traffic went to nxdn but the powers that be changed that a year or so back bc of another stupid rant I’ll go on later.

I spend more time programming portables for my FD than anything. They can’t leave well enough alone.

Anyway, thanks in advanc

 

[mmckenna]

There are no NXDN pagers that I've ever run across.

Unication was at one of the trade shows years ago, and they'd just rolled out a pager with DMR capability. I asked them if there were any plans to release an NXDN version. Their answer was "No, not enough demand".

Fiber cuts happen, and it usually gives carriers a bit of a black eye. When we had one years ago, there was an effort made to build out some redundant paths. Might be interesting to see if the carriers change after this event.

 

[jcefd10]

I didn’t think there were any nxdn pagers.
And running digital and analog simultaneously is t really a good path to venture down is it? One county over does it with their dmr /analog but I’m not sure if it’ll do what they want to accomplish here.

 

[mmckenna]

I didn’t think there were any nxdn pagers.
And running digital and analog simultaneously is t really a good path to venture down is it? One county over does it with their dmr /analog but I’m not sure if it’ll do what they want to accomplish here.

Seems like it's a lot of work to appease people that don't want to carry radios, don't want to rely on cell phones, and want to carry a pager. There's a point where the cost of keeping a few people happy gets to be too much.

 

[N5XPM]

My compromise proposal would be compact NXDN portables with some receive only and maybe some TAC simplex channels in place of analog pagers. Trying to build a system around each users demands is painful.

 

[buddrousa]

Do they work for the company or do they own the company.
1. This is the way our company works.
2. Do not like it go elsewhere.
3. The company will replace you with people that want to work.

 

[R8000]

Seems like it's a lot of work to appease people that don't want to carry radios, don't want to rely on cell phones, and want to carry a pager. There's a point where the cost of keeping a few people happy gets to be too much.

YES!

 

[jcefd10]

I can’t agree more!!!!


I did my part and asked, like I said I would. 😂
I’d just as soon anyone that refuses to carry a radio be taken off my roster. We’ve done everything you can think of to appease this group of ppl. Hence why i set up the Zello interface with our repeater. I know everyone carries their phone. If they can’t commit enough to listen to the traffic, oh well.
There’s no telling how much we have wasted on radios in the last 3 years. Bought some simple 16 Chan radios for them (forgot model) , but they complained because those didn’t do mixed mode and once they got the page they had to press a button to swap to nxdn. Hence why we are paged over nxdn now. We arranged the setup at the center on the console to appease them. And these same ones are rhe ones griping now.

Man they threw like 5 things at me that same day. The pager thing, wanting to consider in-truck repeaters, wanting to split a repeater for multi dept use (not hard to do with multiple ran codes), just gobs of dumb requests.
I have a meeting set up with a radio company out of Atlanta Tuesday. Since they won’t listen to me, I’ll let someone else try.
There has always been a complaint of the coverage of our system when we swapped to nxdn, since we run automatic aid to the surrounding counties, and the 3 hospitals EMS transports to are out of range.
But it covers our county fine.
I’m fighting a losing battle 😐

 

[mmckenna]

Sounds like they have some unrealistic expectations of the radio system.
If they are trying to do all this on a low budget, there's no way it is going to happen.

There's no shortage of posts on this site about agencies that don't want to spend money on their radio system, but want it to do all the things a multi-million dollar system will do.
Problem is, sometimes the people with the money have no clue how radio systems work, but will assume they do.
For you, it is a no win situation.
Sometimes it takes an outside coming in and either having some fresh ideas, or proving to them that there is no way they'll get what they want with a completely unrealistic budget. It puts you in a difficult place.

Maybe having an outside shop come in will help.

 

[jcefd10]

The meeting today went awesome. The guy that I met with listened to the ones that have been throwing the suggestions at me, told them realistic expectations which pretty much nulled the idea of pagers, thank God!
But, he listened to all that, asked my opinion, and I only told him that I’m a programmer pretty much. I did make a couple of suggestions and he took those and added his expertise to them.
All in all, it just took an outside person to convince them of everything yall said 😂

 

[mmckenna]

That's good they listened. They must trust you.

All in all, it just took an outside person to convince them of everything yall said 😂

Yeah, sometimes that is what it takes.

 

[Echo4Thirty]

Often an employee saying it cant be done translates to "He just doesn't want to do it"

 

[buddrousa]

Often DO IT YOURSELF SYSTEMS are people too cheap to get the correct system from qualified people.

 

[jcefd10]

The night before, we had a pretty significant structure fire. When we got the times sheet from 911, we noticed that the times were WWAAAY off. So we had them pull the recording and we had a bigger problem arise. The audio is so distorted and hash sounding you can barely make out what’s said. There is also lots of traffic missing, so they aren’t even hearing everything we say. I only know this because I pulled the history from the
Zello to compare. I also used my portable to compare as it records all RX/TX for playback. All of our traffic is crystal clear locally so something is going on at 911. So a bigger issue kind of took priority over the lazy folks on the dept. My final input about them was, and the sheriff backed me on this, is that if they won’t carry a radio, they won’t carry a pager. And it’ll be money wasted.