Did Manchester Police get new radios ?

[mbnv992]

Good day all,
I recently saw a Manchester officer the other day and noticed that he did not have their normal MTS2000 Model I radios that they've had since the late 90's. I saw he had an XTS2500 (no idea if it was a model I, II, etc.) anyone have any info on this ? Are they going to digital, and that's why they are upgrading to the XTS2500's ??

 

[HarryWilly]

Not necessarily... the MTS2000's are no longer made, and the XTS2500's will work on the existing system. The radios are "flashed" when they are purchased to have features based on the system they are being used on. You could buy XTS2500 that doesn't support digital voice in the programming (although you are unlikely to come across that)

Manchester doesn't use a trunking system either. It is possible that they could phase those radios in then switch over to a trunking system at some point (because they are just using conventional repeaters). I personally haven't heard anything about them moving to trunking yet.

 

[Corrigan45Unit]

They "could" go to the marcus UHF LTR system, They already have a narcotics survailance channel on that system, although their regular channels of 460.125 and 460.4 remain active.

 

[mbnv992]

Hmmm, interesting info!
I know thier main "MPD 1" frequency is 460.1250, and I would think they would NOT be going digital anytime soon, since their analog UHF system seems to be working fairly well.
I think they are just phasing out the MTS2000's with the newer XTS2500's.
Just wondering why they didn't go with something cheaper like a pr1500 or something.
Oh well, one can always wonder.
Thanks for the responces guys !

 

[HarryWilly]

My thoughts:

As far as I know the Astro series Motorola radios do not support LTR. I don't know if they will (or they already do), but I can tell you if they drop the Waris stuff (CDM/HTs), the PM/PR400's will be the only LTR radios, and those would probably drop soon after. Also no offense to Marcus, but it would be stupid to put a government organization on a private company's LTR system. That's always been a topic of controversy, even though they would likely hire them to build a new system. I know they use it for tactical, but that seems like a short term solution to making a channel that can't easily be followed with scanner. It is a different story for a private company such as Aetna/ASM to be using the Marcus system.

Why the XTS over the PR? Feature capabilities likely. There is a better chance for future system support, more memory and future accessories may work with the XTSs and not the PRs (i.e. an XTVA for the 1500/2500). Also the big deal is the 2500's can come with displays. The MTS2000s could as well so it may be from a channel capacity and end user experience stand point too.

 

[Corrigan45Unit]

My thoughts:

but that seems like a short term solution to making a channel that can't easily be followed with scanner.

I disagree with that, Simply because manchester's narcotics survailance channel is actually on an LTR standard portion of the mucus system ( Marcus Communications (Manchester) Trunking System, Manchester, Connecticut - Scanner Frequencies ) , Which is extremely easy to follow on most newer scanners.

Their best bet would have been to go with ADP or something similar, That they're MTS's could have possibly supported. To me this seems highly illogical being just used for 1 measley channel, But then again, I don't doubt for a second that this is the situation.