Motorola XTS/APX for personal use??

[Twister_2]

I'm not talking about an MD-380 and a hotspot. I'm talking about DMR on a real radio. DMR absolutely blows P25 out of the water as far as audio quality. If you are trying to compare CCRs to APX radios, sure. But DMR absolutely sounds better than P25, as does NXDN. Sounds like you're trying to compare a ham radio DMR network to a professional P25 system, and I'm not really sure why. Try the two out, and you'll see the difference for yourself.



Apples to oranges. Nobody is talking about trunking...wasn't even brought up. Simplex P25 vs. DMR, there will be no difference in coverage.


Point being, they'd do just fine with DMR also. Many agencies are actually choosing DMR over P25. Of course a lot of it has to do with cost. I've used both as well, and DMR has far better voice quality than P25, IMO.

No, I am not talking about md-380s and hotspots exclusively. When I said XPR to XPR, I'm referring to commercial systems of XPR radios only, monitored by another XPR. I think NXDN sounds better than TRBO but the premiere digital mode is P25 on an APX.

 

[jonwienke]

Don't they all use the same AMBE codec?

 

[kayn1n32008]

Don't they all use the same AMBE codec?

P25 phase 2, DMR and NXDN all use AMBE+.
P25 phase 1 uses IMBE.

 

[kayn1n32008]

Absolutely! There are quite a few public safety agencies that are running MotoTRBO. Some are even using NXDN.

The first huge county-wide Mototrbo system I personally know of (good friend worked on the system) was put into service in Jackson County Georgia...7 or 8 years ago. Covers something like a dozen fire departments, sheriff and EMS, local PD for numerous cities, public schools, public works, and the county jail. It's a huge system, and they went DMR for the exact reasons I mentioned above, plus the cost. They found that coverage was basically 100%, intelligibility was far better than P25, especially in noisy environments with a ton of background noise, and the cost savings over P25 were astronomical. Now you also have AES-256 encryption for Mototrbo. It's a no brainer for a lot of municipalities.

There are a lot of hams here (Yes, I am also one myself) who get stuck in the mentality that DMR = Cheap Chinese Radios, hotspots, Brandmeister, etc. That's their only experience with DMR, and they write off the whole mode as being garbage based on what they hear on the air. Actually go use a real system and compare it for yourself.

Just stop. It’s clear you have no idea what you speak of.

 

[com501]

P25 and Trbo do use the same vocoder, the sample rates are the same between the two. The difference is the Trbo radio was intentionally crippled by Moto to make the P25 radios sound better. In recent firmware some of this disparity has been improved, but there are still un-approved tweaks that make the Trbo sound identical to P25 but NOT out of the box for a newbie. NOOB would be better off buying a Anytone dual band and using his/her ham call.

 

[alcahuete]

Just stop. It’s clear you have no idea what you speak of.

Uhhhhhhh.....say what? The only reason they are now switching to P25 is likely because there is federal grant money involved, and federal grant money usually doesn't go to anything but P25 systems. It's just the Moto good ol' boys club at it again.

 

[surfacemount]

As someone who uses the APX6000 in a dynamic of public safety (not going to specify which on an internet chat forum) I highly disagree. Analog voice is **** compared to digital.
P25 trunking coverage greatly out performs conventional systems in rural areas, especially inside buildings... which is huge because if police officers are at a domestic inside a building, how can they radio for help if they can't good enough signal to transmission clearly?
Point being, I've used both and would personally go with P25 digital no questions asked.

You are more than welcome to your opinion.

Please consider that your opinion *might* be based on going from an old, undermaintained, under served analog system using portables with busted antennas and crap batteries and haven't been aligned since the 80's to a new, correctly provisioned digital one with new portables fresh off an aeroflex... (shrugs)

 

[N4BSH]

Using a APX 8000 on the analog ham bands is such overkill. Now if it did DMR the Motorola fan boi in me would have to have one of course lol.

But

I think the cost associated with using commercial gear on the ham bands is prohibitive. Not to mention CPS programming, having to go through MOL and most Commercial radios are single band except the really expensive ones like the APX 8000.

 

[prc117f]

I never understood why someone would pay 3-5K for an APX8000. I guess to reach Whacker level 11 you need one.

 

[K2NEC]

I never understood why someone would pay 3-5K for an APX8000. I guess to reach Whacker level 11 you need one.

Beats paying $500 for 4 radios and having to carry all 4 with you on your hip. It's about convenience and luxury not necessarily a requirement. IMO an APX6000 or even a 4000 blows the XTS5000 out of the water but like with any radio YMMV. I have a use for all 4 bands in an APX8000 but for financial reasons, I can realistically only afford 1 or 2.