Kirksville, MO - Scanners go silent as city flips switch on narrow-band radios

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KB1UAM

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That what's a poorly written article. It sounds to me that there saying you can't listen to narrowband frequencies and you will need 2 scanners listen to both wideband and narrowband along with a digital scanner which doesn't make sense when a digital scanner can do all 3.
 

Mtnrider

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I guess the radios dont have a "direct" feature................“In some places, I can literally be looking at another officer, within eyesight, and not be able to talk to them on the radio.”
 

KCoax

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That has to be an awkward conversation. Kinda like the movie version of "I need to borrow your car for official police business."
 

902

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I guess the radios dont have a "direct" feature................“In some places, I can literally be looking at another officer, within eyesight, and not be able to talk to them on the radio.”
That's what happens when you don't take the time to plan with the other kids playing in the sandbox around you. If you're on the same band, every single digital radio, whether it's P25, Mototrbo, or NXDN is retrocompatible to analog. Put the interoperability channels in. Problem solved. If you're on different bands, you wouldn't be able to talk regardless unless you had hardware in between.

I see a failure to plan!
 

bfperez

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It's truly sad what passes for journalism. Look at any story that involves anything technological and this happens.

The reporter can't think to go to one radio store and ask them about scanners? How about someone at the local FCC office? They could google the words "scanner" and "narrowband" and try learning the subject.

Nope, just talk to one person who uses the radio, draw some incorrect conclusions and write a story. It's so adorable to watch "professional" "journalists" get indignant when people criticize them or put them on the same level as bloggers.
 

Confuzzled

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First thought in my mind when I read the thread title, 'what does narrowbanding have to do with killing scanners?'

I could see it because of a frequency change, but some quick reprogramming would solve that.
 

MTS2000des

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It's truly sad what passes for journalism. Look at any story that involves anything technological and this happens.

The reporter can't think to go to one radio store and ask them about scanners? How about someone at the local FCC office? They could google the words "scanner" and "narrowband" and try learning the subject.

Nope, just talk to one person who uses the radio, draw some incorrect conclusions and write a story. It's so adorable to watch "professional" "journalists" get indignant when people criticize them or put them on the same level as bloggers.

with budgets being what they are and the typical fish wrapper/cat litter box liner starving for advertising revenue, reporters often cover multiple stories across sections, have insane deadlines to meet, and don't have the time or resources anymore.

not making excuses, it's just how it is. they use Google and Wikipedia for sources nowadays, beating the streets takes time, effort, resources and welll...$$$$. reporters don't make what they used to, and unless it's a big story, filler content like this is just that: fluff and hot air to fill space that isn't being used by advertisers.

the industry is dying a slow, certain death. these are the same people who think that paywalls on their website will make you want to pay to read this rubbish. where do I sign up!
 

JASII

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Kirksville, MO - Scanners Go Silent As City Flips Switch On Narrow-Band Radios

I guess the radios dont have a "direct" feature................“In some places, I can literally be looking at another officer, within eyesight, and not be able to talk to them on the radio.”


Believe it or not, there apparently ARE places that don't have simplex! I seem to recall reading some sort of after action report about the New Orleans Police Department response after Hurricane Katrina. One of the statements in the reports was that there repeaters were wiped out and they had NO simplex programmed in their radios!
 

mm

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No,

re-banding doesn't have to be digital it can be analog, the only digital P25 only band is at 700 MHz, no analog is allowed at 700 MHz and this is how shady salesmen are getting people to go and spend all of our tax ollars, your and mine BTW.

Notice how all of the big companies and congress and the FCC are only pushing 700/800 MHz systems these days (public safety LTE for instance) and this is where the requirement to go digital comes from, if the salesguys talks you into a 700 systems then it must be digital.

At 700 MHz it requires more than 10 times the number of sites for the same coverage as a good VHF system and when you add digital to the mix the dollars to be made are more than 10 times when going from say a VHF to a 700 MHz system.
 

wsykes41770

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I loved the line about their mobile radios being 100 times more powerful than their portables. What are they using for portables? FRS/GMRS radios? Even then they would have to be set to low power!! The media needs to get their facts straight before publishing something like that, but the last time I checked, hell is still burning up!!
 

mikepdx

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...At 700 MHz it requires more than 10 times the number of sites for the same coverage as a good VHF system
and when you add digital to the mix the dollars to be made are more than 10 times when going from say a VHF to a 700 MHz system.

Amen.
 
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902

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No,

re-banding doesn't have to be digital it can be analog, the only digital P25 only band is at 700 MHz, no analog is allowed at 700 MHz and this is how shady salesmen are getting people to go and spend all of our tax ollars, your and mine BTW.

Notice how all of the big companies and congress and the FCC are only pushing 700/800 MHz systems these days (public safety LTE for instance) and this is where the requirement to go digital comes from, if the salesguys talks you into a 700 systems then it must be digital.

At 700 MHz it requires more than 10 times the number of sites for the same coverage as a good VHF system and when you add digital to the mix the dollars to be made are more than 10 times when going from say a VHF to a 700 MHz system.
Actually, there are 12 channel pairs (3 are nationwide itinerant, the rest need RPC approval) on 700 MHz where analog narrowband (11K2F3E) is authorized. These were done to facilitate fireground operations. They may be used for simplex operations.

Agreed on your salesman and business/Congress (they're the same now) assessment.

Coverage is really hard to do without creating models. The trade-off is that VHF is an abomination in most places. What surprises me is that no one's brought up the viability of 450-470 for FB8/MO8 operation. Better characteristics than 7/800 and (for Missouri) not as congested as VHF.
 

mikepdx

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...just talk to one person who uses the radio,
draw some incorrect conclusions and write a story....

They call it easy profit.
Don't bother digging for facts.
That's expensive.

Merely parrot the government line or report opinion and gossip as fact,
then move on to the next kid or pet "feel good"story.

That's what the media has become IMHO.
 

joetnymedic

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well except for some of the newer stuff which luckily I own 700 isn't all that monitorable. Digital you have to invest the bucks to monitor which I lucked out and have a couple digital scanners. what I doin't like is some of the inaccurate info being givewn out there. if the writer is implying that the scanners went silent because of narrowbanding, he/she is wrong. If it's a digital issue, all one has to do is buy a digital scanner (granted you need to be able to afford one) if it's encrypted nobody is going to be listening o matter what. That said the other false thing out there are the sales people out there telling departments that the only way they can be narrowband compliant is to go digital and that is not only misleading but an outright lie and obviously being done just to sell higher priced radios and to be honest, the higher ups at said departments should be going after those that are lying to them or at least taking their business elsewhere but then again, i'm just a taxpayer so since when does my opinion count? BTW this is happening all over the U.S.
 
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