True... true. And the same can be said for Motorola. Neither company can hold hold a candle to what they once were. It's disappointing.
New York terminates contract with M/A-Com
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True... true. And the same can be said for Motorola. Neither company can hold hold a candle to what they once were. It's disappointing.
freqhopping
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Yes to P25. The Joint National Capital Region system used by the military and has patches to local public safety. All these sites are part of the system.
http://www.radioreference.com/apps/db/?sid=3958
http://www.radioreference.com/apps/db/?sid=4699
http://www.radioreference.com/apps/db/?sid=4687
http://www.radioreference.com/apps/db/?sid=4698
http://www.radioreference.com/apps/db/?sid=3922
http://www.radioreference.com/apps/db/?sid=3959
http://www.radioreference.com/apps/db/?sid=3923
http://www.radioreference.com/apps/db/?sid=4697
http://www.radioreference.com/apps/db/?sid=4662
http://www.radioreference.com/apps/db/?sid=4193
the military systems are generally bad examples, most of them have been deliver and sometimes install contracts, not design and engineer. With the military and feds most of the design and engineering and in many cases the install is done in house.
ElroyJetson
Getting tired of all the stupidity.
Definitely the best that M/A-Com offers in portable radios isn't even CLOSE in build quality to what was available in the late 80s or thereabouts. An M-PD or M-PA has build quality that's really second to none.
Just a few days ago I took an old, totally useless M-PD scan model (it was totally beyond repair, and
if it was working it was worth maybe 10 bucks on ebay if you were lucky anyway) and to see how strong
it was, I started throwing it on the concrete floor, full force with everything I could put into it.
It took four hits before the display broke. And four more before pieces actually flew off.
That's TOUGH. But when it did come apart, it practically exploded.
Now, M/A-Com's mobile radios, the M7100 and earlier Orions in particular, ARE very well made and
comparable in build quality to any earlier generation of mobile radios, in general. And, going back
again to the late 80s, I'd say that I still have the highest respect for the build quality of the Rangr
mobile radios. Motorola never built a radio that was any BETTER than that, but they may have built
some that were as good. Frankly, my mobile radio of choice would be a Rangr to this very day if
it weren't for the persistent programming issues I'm having with the S-850 control heads. If I enter more
than a few talkgroups, they get scrambled up and don't end up in the order I put them in. I've tried
everything to clear that up. Why it does that is a mystery to me.
As for Motorola, the Spectra was a great idea but they don't have great longevity and the high power
units are vastly short on heatsink area. And they use those crappy surface mount electrolytic caps that
always break down and vent corrosive electrolyte on the PC board, causing traces to disappear.
But, the XTS5000 is arguably the most impressive, high quality portable radio I've ever seen out of
Motorola. I still prefer the Astro Saber's thinner profile, but my XTS5000 is one heck of a radio, tops
in every aspect of performance that I care about.
Also, I routinely deal with some of Motorola's more common Pro series radios and also lots and lots of
CP200s and CP150s. The only time I've EVER seen a CP150 or CP200 come in dead, it was due to water
intrusion through the antenna port or earpiece/programming jacks. Those are poorly designed, in those
two critical areas, but if the cover is kept on and the antenna is in good shape and stays tightened down,
the radios seem to last practically forever. The Pro series is also very reliable, except that its weather
sealing gasket needs to be replaced every time someone enters the radio as it's not to be trusted after
the radio is opened. Water damage is the only thing I've ever seen that killed a Pro series radio or
a CP150 or CP200. If it weren't for those design problems, they'd be bulletproof radios.
CJ
Paul-W
Member
I get the feeling from reading about all the problems with Opesky that MA/Com was doing the reasearch and developement of this system while at the same time selling them to customers. It seems that they never actually field tested an Opensky system to see if it actuaklly worked. Several years ago I read a white papaer on Opensky and from what I recall it does have some very impressive capabilites, that is, if they can actually make them work. I have had the opportunity to see first hand there EDACS system in Chicago and in Ozaukee, County, Wisconsin. Both systems actually work very well. The Chicago EDACS system was taken out of service when the Illinois state police switched over to the the statewide Mororola Stacom 21 system.
Here in Milwaukee, the city was suppose to switch over to a Opensky system and they are already several years behind schedule. They turned on the system several weeks ago and the system was so bad that they had to go back to the old Motorola system. Right now, the police have the Opensy radios in the squad cars and they sound just horrible. They are using these radios on the old MOTO system. Remember what the first generation of digital cell phones sounded like, they sound like they are under water when the officers are using these radios. The fire dept is using the Opensky handi talkies and those don't sound too bad. One of our local TV stations, WTMJ, did a story on this syetem. The video is on Youtube. I only hope the local authorities here realize that Opensky is junk and move to another system or vendor.
Here in Milwaukee, the city was suppose to switch over to a Opensky system and they are already several years behind schedule. They turned on the system several weeks ago and the system was so bad that they had to go back to the old Motorola system. Right now, the police have the Opensy radios in the squad cars and they sound just horrible. They are using these radios on the old MOTO system. Remember what the first generation of digital cell phones sounded like, they sound like they are under water when the officers are using these radios. The fire dept is using the Opensky handi talkies and those don't sound too bad. One of our local TV stations, WTMJ, did a story on this syetem. The video is on Youtube. I only hope the local authorities here realize that Opensky is junk and move to another system or vendor.
This is common practice. Laboratory testing can only go so far, and at some point, real customers need to buy real systems. Do you honestly think a manufacturer would sell and install a system if they didn't feel it would actually work? That would be corporate suicide - which happens, but it's usually accidental, not intentional.
In a controlled environment, it DOES work. But in many cases, IP based systems let loose in the wild don't perform anywhere near as well as they do in the lab. VOIP phone systems are a good case in point. In their earliest iterations, they were a disaster. Internet data can tolerate packet loss, and transmission latency. VOIP and IP based radio systems like Opensky cannot. How many Opensky failures can be attributed to IP transport issues? I have my suspicions it's happened... But all in all, I'm of the opinion that IP based radio systems are not ready for prime time. I'm dying to see how Motorola's offerings work. I don't expect their version of "Opensky" to fare any better.
EDACS is an excellent system, in spite of what the unwashed masses here may feel about it.
I witnessed a demo of a similar Batwing product that sounded pretty horrid. It's that heavily compressed digital voice. It's understandable, but not recognizable - meaning the person speaking's voice is just a generic mechanical sounding voice. I am aware of some large agencies refusing to go to any digital mode because of this.
The fire services seem to be much more aware and concerned about poor digital voice quality than law enforcement seems to be. Perhaps it's the promise of encryption that has all the cops so starry eyed. I'm less inclined to look at Opensky as junk, but rather, I look at it as more of a laboratory curiosity that promises to someday be refined enough to survive in the real world. Unfortunately, it's taking a lot of real world failures to learn how to do it. And so it goes...
ElroyJetson
Getting tired of all the stupidity.
OpenSky was originally developed by AMP Wireless Systems for FedEx. It was designed for the role of real-time package tracking, and NOT for voice communications or public safety usage.
M/A-Com acquired the OpenSky from AMP and apparently thought they had bought a gem. It appears
that when you try to turn it into a public safety system with voice capability, it reveals itself to be a
well-polished turd.
Elroy
M/A-Com acquired the OpenSky from AMP and apparently thought they had bought a gem. It appears
that when you try to turn it into a public safety system with voice capability, it reveals itself to be a
well-polished turd.
Elroy
I have dealt with some of the Federal engineers... and they could screw anything up...
As for the feds installing.... haha never seen it done... Heck it takes an act of congress to get them to climb a tower
jrm5265
Member
list
wow......i printed out the list of problems that brey posted from NewYork and same kinda things we have going in Newton Co. Ga. I WONDER how much trouble it would be for MaCom to change us to EDACS anbody know, we have seven sites, we have the nicer dtmf full front talkies I cant remember if theyr 7100 or 7200 and the mobiles dont look like the one in the youtube video for Milwaukee, our mobile is a twopiece remote mount unit but it doesnt have that face on it. Most of our old stuff is pulled already so we cant really go back to old system, anybody on here know if thats reasonably feasible to change from OpenSky to EDACS and does EDACS require multi sites like the OpenSky did?
wow......i printed out the list of problems that brey posted from NewYork and same kinda things we have going in Newton Co. Ga. I WONDER how much trouble it would be for MaCom to change us to EDACS anbody know, we have seven sites, we have the nicer dtmf full front talkies I cant remember if theyr 7100 or 7200 and the mobiles dont look like the one in the youtube video for Milwaukee, our mobile is a twopiece remote mount unit but it doesnt have that face on it. Most of our old stuff is pulled already so we cant really go back to old system, anybody on here know if thats reasonably feasible to change from OpenSky to EDACS and does EDACS require multi sites like the OpenSky did?
You know, if NYS wanted wide scale radio system kind of like what OpenSky was promising, they should of just setup invested a giant private iDEN system. I'm not kidding; it would of done the same thing as OpenSky but would of worked!
P
PolarBear25
Guest
Milwaukee Opensky Radio Systems Doesnt Work - TMJ4 - Nov 2008
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXFkYGsFJmM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXFkYGsFJmM
ScannerDude244
Member
Folks, the problem is not M/A-Com - it's the open sky technology. If you read through the exact points of non-remedy, you'll see that all the issues have to do with OpenSky as a new technology.
First and foremost, it appears that the quality of the end-user subscriber equipment was very bad. Poor PTT switches, intermittent failure rates that were far higher than acceptable.
Second, the user of vehicular repeaters that act as trunked-cells is a very complicated architecture. Not only do you have to get just the simple task of a radio handing off to and from a vehicular cell, but throw in a number of vehicular cell/repeaters in one location and having the subscriber unit vote against those is a pretty daunting tasks for software to handle.
All in all... I think the concept of an OpenSky system was very attractive and practical for a statewide system. The implementation of something so complex though, for a state agency, was a flawed approach. I'd guess there are still hundreds of bugs in the software implementation that must still be worked out.
If I was M/A-Com - I would have sold the system to a public utility or some other less critical customer and given them discounts and free service while tweaking the system architecture before moving on to a public safety realm.
Good concept, but not ready for prime time.
First and foremost, it appears that the quality of the end-user subscriber equipment was very bad. Poor PTT switches, intermittent failure rates that were far higher than acceptable.
Second, the user of vehicular repeaters that act as trunked-cells is a very complicated architecture. Not only do you have to get just the simple task of a radio handing off to and from a vehicular cell, but throw in a number of vehicular cell/repeaters in one location and having the subscriber unit vote against those is a pretty daunting tasks for software to handle.
All in all... I think the concept of an OpenSky system was very attractive and practical for a statewide system. The implementation of something so complex though, for a state agency, was a flawed approach. I'd guess there are still hundreds of bugs in the software implementation that must still be worked out.
If I was M/A-Com - I would have sold the system to a public utility or some other less critical customer and given them discounts and free service while tweaking the system architecture before moving on to a public safety realm.
Good concept, but not ready for prime time.
I happen to agree. I knew someone who worked to install OpenSky radios for Coast Mountain Bus Company in Vancouver, BC and while they didn't quite have the same issues as NY and PA did with the voice side, the data side was pretty unreliable. Fortunately, they were still in testing phase of the system, but my understanding they now have changed their minds as well.
ElroyJetson
Getting tired of all the stupidity.
I think it's interesting that M/A-Com has not said one word about this yet. I'd have expected a protest letter to be published at the very least.
Elroy
Elroy
jmm346
Member
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Not necessarily.
"Motorola Inc. (NYSE: MOT) today announced the successful completion of a Project 25 (P25) interoperability demonstration project by five leading mission critical manufacturers including Motorola, EFJohnson Technologies, Tait Radio Communications, Technisonic Industries Ltd. and Tyco Electronics. These industry leaders demonstrated a new landmark in interoperability by successfully completing all of the P25 Common Air Interface (CAI) Trunked Interoperability tests outlined in the Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA) TSB-102.CBBJ required to claim P25 Phase 1 CAI Trunking Interoperability."
http://mediacenter.motorola.com/content/Detail.aspx?ReleaseID=10550&NewsAreaID=2
It doesn't have to be just Motorola.
iamhere300
Member
The RF decks in the Techsonic radios are Motorola XTS5000 radios.
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