Harris XG-100P

[slobonmycob]

Why is this radio not more popular?
I’m doing some shopping and this radio seems almost too good to be true... ALL bands, FDMA, TDMA, Bluetooth and easy to program NAS scanning

RPM aside, what are the draw backs of this radio? How does it track on a smartzone system? How rugged would you say this radio is?

I must be missing something.

 

[Thunderknight]

Why is this radio not more popular?
I’m doing some shopping and this radio seems almost too good to be true... ALL bands, FDMA, TDMA, Bluetooth and easy to program NAS scanning

RPM aside, what are the draw backs of this radio? How does it track on a smartzone system? How rugged would you say this radio is?

It does not do SmartZone/SmartNet at all. That is a Motorola "thing".

It does NAS as long as the firmware is early enough to not require an RPM that uses AAC.
Getting RPM is more of a hurdle than Motorola CPS.

 

[prcguy]

The radio does NAS with the latest firmware and software. I think most hobby users are programming with hacked RPM and it allows you to do anything you want. I really love the XG-100P, its a sleeper that many people overlook and I must admit I did until someone enlightened me.

It does not do SmartZone/SmartNet at all. That is a Motorola "thing".

It does NAS as long as the firmware is early enough to not require an RPM that uses AAC.
Getting RPM is more of a hurdle than Motorola CPS.

 

[rescue161]

Coming from a guy that manages a system with several thousand of these radios, I would run far away. We have issues with the battery pogos breaking off, radios staying on the boot screen, users can wipe all of the programming with a couple of button presses, etc. Furthermore, L3Harris will not allow our maintenance shop to service the 100P. They are allowed to service all of the other Harris radios, but the 100P is considered a tactical radio, so we have to return them to NY for repair. We have several in our office that are desk queens and they suffer the same problems as the field units. L3Harris also stopped selling the intrinsically safe batteries that we use and they EOL'd the 100P. Just a POS in my book.

 

[prcguy]

Look at it from a hobby point of view. A reasonably loaded XP-100P runs about $1,200 and will do just about anything a police scanning hamster would ever need. With easy to get software you can program it to do non affiliate trunk scanning and much more.

Now look at its closest competitor the Motorola APX-8000. The cheapest legal used one I've seen is in the low $4k range and from what I know about it the radio is pretty much locked down and you can't NAS or go wide band for amateur or many other things the XP-100P can do at a fraction of the cost. I suppose if you buy a new APX you can probably get WB entitlement with some hassles but how much does that cost?

I can see the XP-100P is now old technology and no commercial users would be buying any new ones, but for us cheap hamsters its the best thing out there. Unless there is another radio that bridges the gap I'm not aware of.

Coming from a guy that manages a system with several thousand of these radios, I would run far away. We have issues with the battery pogos breaking off, radios staying on the boot screen, users can wipe all of the programming with a couple of button presses, etc. Furthermore, L3Harris will not allow our maintenance shop to service the 100P. They are allowed to service all of the other Harris radios, but the 100P is considered a tactical radio, so we have to return them to NY for repair. We have several in our office that are desk queens and they suffer the same problems as the field units. L3Harris also stopped selling the intrinsically safe batteries that we use and they EOL'd the 100P. Just a POS in my book.

 

[rescue161]

I get it and yes, it does do a lot for a lot less than Motorola and can actually be set to never affiliate, so I do like that. I have a P7300 and a couple of XG100Ms for that very purpose. I just see countless occurrences of the 100P just failing unexpectedly. There is no rhyme or reason as to why. Encryption keys drop, switches go bad, screens either get stuck in a boot loop or just never go past the boot screen. Sometimes, the boot screen will stay on even with the battery removed. Gently setting them down on a desk and they reboot. And these are our never-leave-the-office radios. The public safety radios are in a constant rotation back and forth from Rochester to us. I've seen problems with radios before, but nothing like I have seen with the 100P. When I worked in maintenance, I was on a tower at the 150 foot mark and my tool bag got wrapped around my fall-arrest and dumped the contents. Everything survived, even my Galaxy S4 (did not even crack the screen), but the 100P bit it hard. We picked up the pieces and saw the construction and were appalled. The shields inside the radio were like a Mylar balloon; as in not rigid. To me, it looks like the radio was designed and then they modified the design to fit the P7100/P7200 batteries, so I think that is why the battery pogos break so easily. I have some personal P7100 and P7200s and their construction is head and shoulders above the 100P. I never had the battery pogos break on them. Alignment procedures on these and other Harris radios is terrible too. The training that I attended in Lynchburg went over the 8-hour manual alignment procedure. I can do a full manual alignment on an XTS2500 in less than 30 minutes and that is taking my time. We went over the Motorola procedures for the instructors and they couldn't say anything, other than they would talk to their engineers to try and get the time down.

On the other hand, the 100M is awesome (other than alignment). We rarely have any issues with them, except for the CH100 control heads. We opted for the CH721, but one of the units here bought their own and went with the CH100 and they have nothing but problems. I will say that these are on boats that are in ocean waters, so that is on them for buying a touch screen control head for a boat.

 

[Thunderknight]

or go wide band for amateur or many other things the XP-100P can do at a fraction of the cost. I suppose if you buy a new APX you can probably get WB entitlement with some hassles but how much does that cost?

$0. No WB entitlement needed for Part 97, Part 80, WX. APX CPS is “smart“ and knows which frequencies are allowed.

Even for the radios that require WB entitlement keys, like CDMs, it’s still free.

 

[rescue161]

The 100P allows Part 80 and Part 97 VHF wideband without having wideband disabled. UHF ham needs to have wideband disabled.

Edit:
Also, all 10 weather channels can be programmed as wideband with wideband disabled.

 

[prcguy]

If your a typical ham that buys a used high end Motorola and "finds" software, can you still get WB entitlement keys? Or will it cost you as much as the used radio did to sign up for an account to get it? For the Harris it seems very easy and almost free if you find a friendly dealer.

$0. No WB entitlement needed for Part 97, Part 80, WX. APX CPS is “smart“ and knows which frequencies are allowed.

Even for the radios that require WB entitlement keys, like CDMs, it’s still free.

 

[Thunderknight]

If your a typical ham that buys a used high end Motorola and "finds" software, can you still get WB entitlement keys? Or will it cost you as much as the used radio did to sign up for an account to get it? For the Harris it seems very easy and almost free if you find a friendly dealer.

APX radios (which I would consider to be "high end") do not require you to get any wideband keys for Part 97. CPS (for at least 5-7 years worth of releases) knows what frequencies are normally (allowed) WB and it just "works". CPS itself is a purchase ($300 or so for 3 years) if you buy it legitimately...but there is no separate purchase for wideband.

XTL/XTS (at least VHF) work as WB on Part 97...although I think there is a wideband disable flash option that radios could have (I've never seen it).

CDM/HT series radios require a free WB entitlement key for CPS. The account on MOL is free (but you have to apply for it).

I do not know about XPR radios...although they are used for ham DMR by a lot of people.

I'm not knocking the XG100...I like it for certain tasks...just pointing out how Motorola does it to provide clarity in this thread.

 

[rescue161]

If L3Harris would offer a UHF wideband frequency list in their next firmware release, that would solve the wideband key issue. They would only need to add 420-450 and the few GMRS freqs. They already do it for WX, Part 80 and Part 97 (VHF only).

 

[prcguy]

So an APX will do 440 to 450MHz amateur in WB without a WB key? Seems like I've heard some hams complaining about that.

APX radios (which I would consider to be "high end") do not require you to get any wideband keys for Part 97. CPS (for at least 5-7 years worth of releases) knows what frequencies are normally (allowed) WB and it just "works". CPS itself is a purchase ($300 or so for 3 years) if you buy it legitimately...but there is no separate purchase for wideband.

XTL/XTS (at least VHF) work as WB on Part 97...although I think there is a wideband disable flash option that radios could have (I've never seen it).

CDM/HT series radios require a free WB entitlement key for CPS. The account on MOL is free (but you have to apply for it).

I do not know about XPR radios...although they are used for ham DMR by a lot of people.

I'm not knocking the XG100...I like it for certain tasks...just pointing out how Motorola does it to provide clarity in this thread.

 

[Thunderknight]

So an APX will do 440 to 450MHz amateur in WB without a WB key? Seems like I've heard some hams complaining about that.

The ones I have experience with do.

 

[K2NEC]

What's funny is that the XG100P were marketed to be military grade radios IIRC. From what @rescue161 is saying, it sounds like they are quite the contrary.

 

[TDR-94]

What's funny is that the XG100P were marketed to be military grade radios IIRC. From what @rescue161 is saying, it sounds like they are quite the contrary.

It actually "is" a commercial variant of the Military Multiband Tactical Handheld radios with a much more public safety centric UI,case design and features.The shielding, that rescue161 describes, is the same shielding that's utilized in it's Military Tactical Handheld cousins. HARRIS's RF Division at the time was trying to use essentially the same core hardware designs across multiple radio platforms.

 

[prcguy]

This is the series of radio the XG-100P is related to. I've read they deleted the VHF low band portion of the mil radio and replaced with 700/800MHz and different display/interface. The XG-100P is manufactured in the USA, where is the Motorola APX made?

It actually "is" a commercial variant of the Military Multiband Tactical Handheld radios with a much more public safety centric UI,case design and features.The shielding, that rescue161 describes, is the same shielding that's utilized in it's Military Tactical Handheld cousins. HARRIS's RF Division at the time was trying to use essentially the same core hardware designs across multiple radio platforms.

 

[K2NEC]

The XG-100P is manufactured in the USA, where is the Motorola APX made?

Hypothetical question?

 

[redbeard]

If L3Harris would offer a UHF wideband frequency list in their next firmware release, that would solve the wideband key issue. They would only need to add 420-450 and the few GMRS freqs. They already do it for WX, Part 80 and Part 97 (VHF only).

Does this apply to the 100M also?

 

[TDR-94]

This is the series of radio the XG-100P is related to. I've read they deleted the VHF low band portion of the mil radio and replaced with 700/800MHz and different display/interface.

Yep,that and the RF-310M-HH are much more durable (as rescue161 has pointed out) and tacticool looking The XG-100P, of course, doesn't have any of the military centric waveforms or CCI related components of the PRC-152. It's form factor also had to be changed and "lightened up" to be able to fit on a duty belt. You really can't do that with the PRC or RF.

The XG-100P is manufactured in the USA, where is the Motorola APX made?

Mexico

 

[K2NEC]

Mexico

Malaysia actually