MOTOTRBO an alternative to expensive cellular phones?

[APORATH]

Hello:

This might be an odd ball question, so please bear with me. Our family currently use cell phones for communication, and over the years, our monthly cell bill gets expensive, and the quality of service with our current cell service is deteriorating because of mergers, and other mumbo jumbo. I have been considering MOTOTRBO as a good alternative to monthly pricey cell phone service. The reason Mototrbo came to mind is because it is secure, because of the fact police scanners (even the newest BC396XT) can not decode or pick up what we are talking about. Sure, the radios are expensive and getting an approved frequency or 2 is expensive, but I think if I am not mistaken the radios cost around $500-$600 and the FCC Frequencies cost around $100-$400 every 5-10 years, radio techs or Motorola Techs, please correct me if I am wrong. So here is my question: Is MOTOTRBO a good choice to dodge these very expensive monthly cell bills? and I know I can NOT operate these digital radios on the FRS and GMRS band, is it possible to get at least 2 dedicated radio frequencies to operate the radios even if we are not in a business or a company?

Any input would be very helpful, and a money saver (especially in this economy).

Thanks all

 

[APORATH]

I must add that I am not going to buy a $1500 MOTOTRBO Repeater, just the mobile as a base and about 4 basic handheld radios. Can I program these radios to operate on the TDMA Repeater or do I need the repeater?

 

[KB9LIQ]

Not knowing much about the Mototrbo but if you are radio to radio range will only be about 3-5 miles depending on where you are at. You would only be able to talk to another family member with a radio, and they would have to be that close. Without a repeater and phone interconnect you would have no reg. phone service. Even then you would have to be in-range of the repeater for that to work.

 

[Astrak]

Seems like it would make more sense to have a cell phone than buy just a mobile/base and HT's that only will get you a range of a few miles, regardless of price. If you wanted to get radio's why not lease some radio's from a company that already has a network of repeater's set up and pay them a monthly fee.

 

[N4DES]

You might want to look into pre-pay wireless and limit your usage. No recurring monthly costs and no outrageous taxes to deal with.

 

[Bustergrn]

Cricket | Cell Phone Provider & Wireless Carrier | Official Site

$30 bucks a month. Ulimited minutes

Coverage area

 

[NeFire242]

Look over your cellular provider's plans. Many offer free mobile to mobile, even on the least of expensive plans.

 

[Hornhonker]

I must add that I am not going to buy a $1500 MOTOTRBO Repeater, just the mobile as a base and about 4 basic handheld radios. Can I program these radios to operate on the TDMA Repeater or do I need the repeater?

The TDMA is not encrypted so it is only a matter of time until scanner companies enable TDMA reception on their monitoring gear. If range is less of an issue (you didn't say how far these need to communicate)
perhaps a pair of Motorola DTR550 radios operating in the Private mode would suffice ? They are digital, freqency hopping and quite impossible for nonfederal monitoring equipment to decode. I'm getting pretty good simplex range out of mine.

 

[wkredick]

You need the TRBO repeater to run the digital aspects of the radios
Using a LMR for personal/non business is not really legal AFAIK
TRBO uses IP addresses for each radio,so to casually monitor in digital mode you need a cloned IP TRBO ( which is not available)-so it is secure,casual monitoring will only hear the modulation.
Range for the TRBO and DTR is limited.
Best to stick to cellular,but if needed a business radio for wide area invehicle I would at least demo a TRBO mobile.