Going digital...

[melred]

Anyone in the Schenectady/Albany area that purchased a digital radio care to chime in on Colonie. I heard they went to digital, also that they havent changed. Has anyone verified the digital change up? Many forums on here with mixed info.

 

[DaveNF2G]

I guess I would be the authoritative source on this around this forum. Here's the scoop.

Colonie is planning to go partially digital on their trunked system "any day now" but apparently their radio shop has been unable to live up to any target date commitments made so far. Most recently, they were supposed to switch town government talkgroups in January. It has not happened. The first public safety entity planning to switch - after the LG stuff is proven out as working OK - is the police, followed by fire and EMS. Other users like TMC and the school buses might not change over anytime soon, if at all.

 

[lafd55]

Exact time

Colonie's new digital system is going into effect on February 15th at 10:00pm. They already tested the system with no problem on the 2nd and 3rd of February.

 

[928GTS]

Is this digital capable or is this a fully digital system? I'll be pretty disappointed if its all digital because I bought a BC246T no more than 2 months ago and there is NO way in my college budget that I can afford a 396.

 

[LathamScan]

All of the important stuff - like Fire, PD & EMS will be digital. Eventually everything will be. There may be an exception with the school buses in the North Colonie & South Colonie Central School Districts. Otherwise, everything will be P25 digital.

 

[Thunderknight]

But it's Motorola ASTRO trunking still right? I mean it's not a true P25 system, just P25 voice.

 

[DaveNF2G]

That's correct. Colonie's system will remain Motorola Type II, with P25 CAI talkgroups.

 

[lafd55]

Update

when i said 10:00 pm thats wrong 9:00 am.... The radios that Colonie will be using are XTS 1500s for portables and XTL 2500s for mobiles. There will be three repeaters in the town: Colonie Center, Corporate Woods, and the Public Safety. We already got our portables in and ready to switch, we have been using the mobiles just on analog though, but easy switch to digital.

 

[Thunderknight]

when i said 10:00 pm thats wrong 9:00 am.... The radios that Colonie will be using are XTS 1500s for portables and XTL 2500s for mobiles. There will be three repeaters in the town: Colonie Center, Corporate Woods, and the Public Safety. We already got our portables in and ready to switch, we have been using the mobiles just on analog though, but easy switch to digital.

By repeaters, do you mean for in-building coverage? I don't see a license for those locations with the system frequencies.

They are currently licensed at the WRPI tower and over off of Dennison Road, and it likely they would need to keep those sites to cover the town.

Interestingly, when I was looking just now in the ULS, I see they have another 800 MHz freqeuency licensed just at Dennison Road (860.2375).
Edit: Oops, I should have checked Dave's page first. I see that is their MDT frequency.

I did notice a bunch of UHF frequencies licensed to the town though, some only as mobiles.
453.250, 465.400 (CDERN input), 458.1875, 466.400 and 466.850 (listed on the license as bus trackers), 451.150, 451.250, and 461.475 (repeater in Clarksville. Judging by the address, it looks like it is licensed to the landfill).

 

[DaveNF2G]

I have been attempting to monitor the changeover with two scanners (PSR-
500 and BCD-396T) along with a laptop-based trunktracking program.

From my perspective, most communications on Colonie's system
disappeared this morning between 9 and 10 AM. I have heard no digital
traffic. A stream of public safety units unaffiliated with the analog
talkgroups, but have not been seen since on my computer.

I have also searched the FCC database to see whether any new 800 MHz
frequencies might have been added for the new system. There are none.
I also detect only one control channel among Colonie's existing
frequencies.

As of this moment, I am totally mystified.

 

[studgeman]

Dave I can only tell you what I heard yesterday as I was passing through the area, and it seemed to conrtadict most of what was posted here.

There were 2 control channels on the air. one P25 9600 on 859.2625 and a Mot 3600 CC on 860.2625.

Since i was seeing a 9600 control channel that would seem to indicate an non-mixed mode system, but two completely independant systems.

 

[DaveNF2G]

That would solve a big mystery, for sure.

Did you notice any difference in power? I'm getting constant static on one of the old system's voice channels, but it's very weak and doesn't sound like any kind of data. Trunker and Unitrunker treat it as "no signal."

 

[hummn]

I get no signal for trunker as well
the pro96 did decode another sys id
SY1D6 T0101 BEE00

 

[Thunderknight]

I'm getting constant static on one of the old system's voice channels, but it's very weak and doesn't sound like any kind of data. Trunker and Unitrunker treat it as "no signal."

I've got the old control channel on 860.2625 with no analog activity heard in the last hour.

Then on 857.2625 I have a steady digital stream, I'm guessing control channel. Also have a near steady stream on 856.2625...but that is not 100% continuous. They both sound much "weaker" than the old Type II control channel.

The 857.2625 sounds somewhat similar (but a little off to my ear) to the 9600 baud P25 Astro control channel reference sound at http://www.kb9ukd.com/digital/astro96k.wav

 

[Kevinbb]

I'm picking Colonie up from the Western End of Guilderland- The signal is not as strong as before but the voice is definately stronger --doesn't sound to bad actually


SYS ID 01D6h-0101


ID'S so far

Police 1933
Menands 31
Fire 25 ? maybe
EMS 4053
Unk Female 17

 

[DaveNF2G]

Mystery solved!

Contrary to information previously received and posted by myself and
others in various forums, Colonie's digital and analog trunked systems
are separate. The new trunked system uses some of the repeaters that
used to be part of their analog system. The new control channel is
Project 25 digital at 9600 bps.

Now we can gather talkgroup info!

 

[Thunderknight]

Since people are decoding it without a problem on a scanner, I wonder if they are still simulcast? And if so, are they using LSM?
(see thread at: http://www.radioreference.com/forums/showthread.php?p=661239#post661239 ) starting at post 31.

Also, I have heard a small amount of traffic on the analog system this morning. A radio test on Police Dispatch and a Pure Waters conversation and landfill traffic on Environmental Services.

 

[DaveNF2G]

No simulcasting between systems. All police/fire/ems traffic is carried exclusively on the digital system. The old analog talkgroups are silent.

 

[Thunderknight]

No simulcasting between systems. All police/fire/ems traffic is carried exclusively on the digital system. The old analog talkgroups are silent.

Not what I meant.

I was talking about RF simulcasting (http://wiki.radioreference.com/index.php/Simulcast). The old system was simulcast between Dennison Road and the WRPI tower.

But Motorola uses a quasi-standard called LSM (referenced in the link in my last posting) for P25 simulcast systems that apparantly are difficult to track with many scanners. Given that that people are tracking it successfully, and that I have noticed the P25 control channel seems weaker than the analog one, I am wondering if they are not simulcasting.

 

[DaveNF2G]

Ah. Sorry for misinterpreting your question. I don't know the answer to that.