Palmetto 800

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N4LHY_1

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Hello all,
I have the BCD 996P2 and receive Horry County just fine, but cannot get Georgetown on the Palmetto 800 system, even if I am in town. I am not sure what I am doing wrong. I can hear the VHF simulcast for fire/ems, but zero from sheriffs office. Can someone guide to what I may be doing wrong?

Chris
KG4LQZ
 

N4LHY_1

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P25

I thought that was what I had it set as. I will review my setup and see whats up.Thanks for the response
 

INDY72

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Remember there are 2 palmetto systems for a little longer until the rest of the Motorola is converted over.

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garys

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Can you clarify that a bit? I see a combined Analog/Digital Palmetto 800 system, but not a P25 system in the database. Is there a separate entry for it?

Thanks.

Remember there are 2 palmetto systems for a little longer until the rest of the Motorola is converted over.

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brian

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Georgetown County is indeed on the Palmetto 800 system, not Palmetto P25.

You want to program this system: Palmetto 800 Trunking System, Various, Multi-State - Scanner Frequencies

You want to program Site #39. You will not hear Georgetown talkgroups on any other site in the system. Site #39 has a transmission tower in Burgess near Garden City Beach on the south end which covers okay up to the City of Myrtle Beach, but not much further.

If you program the Conway site 38 or NMB site 61, you won't hear Georgetown talkgroups.

The page for Palmetto P25 is here: Palmetto (P25) Trunking System, Various, South Carolina - Scanner Frequencies but Georgetown County is not on that system (yet),
 

garys

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Technically, Palmetto 800 isn't a P25 system. It uses a 3600 baud Type II control channel with some Talk Groups using P25 digital audio. That's sort of an inside baseball distinction, but it's important if you are programming a scanner to receive it.

I also wonder if some of the individual county P25 systems, such as York County and the not yet built Lancaster County system will be integrated into the Palmetto P25 system.

Time will tell, I guess.

I found the RRDB page for Palmetto P25. For some reason, it's not listed as a statewide system even though that is the design intent. I don't know if the DB admin for SC is interested in changing that, but for now you have to find one of the counties actually using it if you want to see the details.

They're not the same system there hoss. Palmetto 800 is not all P25 and the Sheriff's Office isn't even digital
 

drayd48

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It would be nice if an admin would put the P25 system on the SC home page right under the 800 3600 system so people could find it easier
 

trumpetman

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It would be nice if an admin would put the P25 system on the SC home page right under the 800 3600 system so people could find it easier

It isn't a truly statewide system yet. Adding it statewide will increase an already apparent confusion between who's on what system.
 

garys

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It's in build out phase, so it could be years before that happens. It's still worthwhile adding it below the Palmetto 800 system. A note can be added to the page explaining that it's not built out yet.

It isn't a truly statewide system yet. Adding it statewide will increase an already apparent confusion between who's on what system.
 

brian

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The only way to add it to the state page is to mark it as a "statewide" system. It's not statewide (yet, but as indicated, that's the intent.) Later this year, it's expected that all Palmetto 800 sites will transition to P25 and become part of the 1D9 system. When that happens, we'll deprecate the Palmetto 800 page and Palmetto P25 will be statewide.

The only agencies on the Palmetto P25 system at this time are county agencies (with a few rare exceptions). SCHP is still on Palmetto 800, along with pretty much all other state agencies. So, the system appears on the pages of the counties that are using the system.

I also suspect that the new Lancaster County system will use a port off of the Palmetto P25 zone controller. Same with the pending Horry County system, and like Charleston, Anderson, Beaufort and Sumter Counties now. When those come online, if they have the 1D9 system ID, they'll be on the Palmetto P25 page.

It will be interesting to me to see how the overlap between existing 1D9 county sites will be merged (if at all) with existing 2b02 sites in the same county. The counties on 1D9 now hold the licenses for the frequencies being used, and they may not want the state agencies using their frequencies. So I wonder if there will be separate sites in these counties that only state agencies will use, or if they will merge state licensed frequencies with county frequencies and all use the same sites.
 

INDY72

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Lancaster I believe will be part. If the States plans hold true by next January the entire palmetto 800 will be converted. A couple of us foretold this back when they first converted the Charleston county 800 trs which indeed became the keystone for the palmetto p25.

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brian

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Just to clear up any uncertainty, here is the appropriate section from the database administrator handbook, page 17:

Trunked systems shall be assigned to the union of all counties for which they are actually intended to provide coverage in addition to any other counties containing transmitter sites. Only use the “Statewide” special county setting for systems that truly cover all counties in a state. While new systems are being built out, assign them only to the counties actually confirmed to be covered by the system.
 

garys

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This is sort of hair splitting, but it's your DB, not mine.
Also, even though various trunk systems share the controller, which is not unusual considering how much capacity the modern controllers have, it's inaccurate to list ALL of the trunk sites as being part of the statewide system.

The same thing is done for the MA State Police system since a lot of non state systems are using the state's controller. The problem is that people from outside the area are very likely to think that all traffic from all users is going to appear on all sites. Which is pretty obviously not true, but that question arises fairly often. Someone will be planning a trip to the Boston area and ask if they can just plug in all of the TGs from across the state and hear them.

I don't know how to solve that other than to put a note in all of those systems that not all TGs are heard on all sites. Or maybe, edit the DB to show what which talk groups are known to affiliate with which sites.

The only way to add it to the state page is to mark it as a "statewide" system. It's not statewide (yet, but as indicated, that's the intent.) Later this year, it's expected that all Palmetto 800 sites will transition to P25 and become part of the 1D9 system. When that happens, we'll deprecate the Palmetto 800 page and Palmetto P25 will be statewide.

The only agencies on the Palmetto P25 system at this time are county agencies (with a few rare exceptions). SCHP is still on Palmetto 800, along with pretty much all other state agencies. So, the system appears on the pages of the counties that are using the system.

I also suspect that the new Lancaster County system will use a port off of the Palmetto P25 zone controller. Same with the pending Horry County system, and like Charleston, Anderson, Beaufort and Sumter Counties now. When those come online, if they have the 1D9 system ID, they'll be on the Palmetto P25 page.

It will be interesting to me to see how the overlap between existing 1D9 county sites will be merged (if at all) with existing 2b02 sites in the same county. The counties on 1D9 now hold the licenses for the frequencies being used, and they may not want the state agencies using their frequencies. So I wonder if there will be separate sites in these counties that only state agencies will use, or if they will merge state licensed frequencies with county frequencies and all use the same sites.
 
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