Upgrading conventional systems to p25

[thefireguy07]

I am curious how plausible it is to upgrade to a conventional p25 system. I'll use Cambria county PA county system as the example. Full narrowband compliant.16 UHF duplex channels(I believe) Designed well and implemented great. Many towers due to the terrain and mountains. tested with a kenwood portable as well as a UHF xts 2500 with great results.

Money is tight with rural jurisdictions like this. There is no reason these officers, emt's and fire fighters should be using business grade portables.

When will reliable p25 become within reach of everyone? Or is it already affordable?

I count 5 p25 manufactures. Kenwood, icom and vertex seem better priced. Sad to say but Motorola is still way to expensive without funding for most it seems.


Cambria County Police

Frequency* License* Type* Tone* Alpha Tag* Description* Mode* Tag*
453.30000* KTU247* RM 118.8 PL Cam PD North North Police Dispatch* FM* Law Dispatch*
453.37500* WPAI297* RM 107.2 PL Cam PD South South Police Dispatch* FM* Law Dispatch*
453.65000* WPBZ866* BM 118.8 PL Cam PD Metro Metro Police Dispatch (Johnstown)* FM* Law Dispatch*
453.57500* * RM 107.2 PL Cam Sheriff Cambria County Sheriff's Department* FM* Law Talk*




Public Safety Interoperability
Cambria County Interoperability
These frequencies provide interoperability for*Fire, EMS, and Law Enforcement.

Frequency* License* Type* Tone* Alpha Tag* Description* Mode* Tag*
453.48750* WQHQ555* RM 141.3 PL Cam N Ops 1 North Operations 1 (Police/Fire/EMS)* FM* Interop*
453.76250* WQHW555* RM 141.3 PL Cam N Ops 2 North Operations 2 (Police/Fire/EMS)* FM* Interop*
453.50000* WPBZ866* RM 107.2 PL Cam N Ops 3 North Operations 3 (Police/Fire/EMS)* FM* Interop*
453.58750* WQHQ554* RM 141.3 PL Cam N Ops 4 North Operations 4 (Police/Fire/EMS)* FM* Interop*
460.36250* WQHQ555* RM 141.3 PL Cam S Ops 1 South Operations 1 (Police/Fire/EMS)* FM* Interop*
460.03750* WQHQ555* RM 141.3 PL Cam S Ops 2 South Operations 2 (Police/Fire/EMS)* FM* Interop*
460.28750* WQHQ554* RM 141.3 PL Cam S Ops 3 South Operations 3 (Police/Fire/EMS)* FM* Interop*
460.40000* WQHQ554* RM 141.3 PL Cam S Ops 4 South Operations 4 (Police/Fire/EMS)* FM* Interop*
453.73750* WQHQ554* RM 141.3 PL Cam S Ops 5 South Operations 5 (Police/Fire/EMS)* FM* Interop*
453.60000* WPBZ866* RM 107.2 PL Cam S Ops 6 South Operations 6 (Police/Fire/EMS)* FM* Interop*
453.56250* WQHQ555* RM 141.3 PL Cam C Ops 1 Central Operations 1 (Police/Fire/EMS)* FM* Interop*
453.66250* WQHQ555* RM 141.3 PL Cam C Ops 2 Central Operations 2 (Police/Fire/EMS)* FM* Interop*
460.33750* WQHQ555* RM 141.3 PL Cam C Ops 3 Central Operations 3 (Police/Fire/EMS)* FM* Interop*
460.26250* WQHQ555* RM 141.3 PL Cam C Ops 4 Central Operations 4 (Police/Fire/EMS)* FM* Interop*
453.20000* WPBZ866* RM 107.2 PL Cam C Ops 5 Central Operations 5 (Police/Fire/EMS)* FM* Interop*

CONVENTIONAL p25 only!!! Voice is what they need. Advanced features and data/ip connect is useless outside metro areas.


Not being a jerk but after adding up a handful of the later post 9/11 FEMA grants(most useless only) Im positive they could have built statewide fdma systems for every state on the east coast. How usefull would that be if needed for a large area disaster? Screw it, smoke signals, fax machines and iden phones for all! Nooooooooooo only after buying devices did someone say wait we killed Nextel for the 800mhz reband. Nooooo! Then they remember about 700mhz. Not used at all! I've picked up a few advanced data pushes on 700 in the dc area but nothing else. The whole band given to public safety. F it let's crowd 800, kill Nextel(very intrusive network I agree) in the process and master smoke signals. Off topic I know. But I **** a brick after seeing the waste of money. Yet they still complain about a failure to communicate. Again off topic

 

[thefireguy07]

.................rip iden...........

Nextel-iden
Retasked 2013
"father of today's pub safety systems"


Nerd alert.... Good news is sprints new direct connect is better! It's cheap right now as well. Safe to say it will be back in strength. What's cooler than "chirp" sounds everywhere and a lack of care who he's your convo. I loved the "yell into your friends phone feature" it always seemed to be at a bad time and loud as hell.

 

[mmckenna]

A lot of companies make P25 capable radios, more than you listed, but you nailed the major players.

Due to a number of reasons, P25 will never make it as THE standard that the government wants it to be.

First of all, COST! I just purchased a Kenwood TK-5410 800MHz P25 portable for work at about $2000. That's one radio. I could likely reduce that by 10-15% for a UHF version, but with accessories, battery, charger, etc, you are still looking at $2K per radio. By the time all the smaller agencies, volunteer fire departments, counties, etc can afford to purchase these radios, a newer, cheaper technology will come along (LTE anyone?). To be fair, the same will happen with LTE, technology moves faster than money and purchasing contracts.

P25 will never be THE standard it's supposed to be, because it's not enough. P25 is the emission, it doesn't do anything to make agencies on different bands be able to talk together without adding more technology and more costs. There is a lot of assumptions that once departments switch to P25 they will all talk together happily. They won't, unless they have the expensive gateways, or are all on the same bands, it doesn't fix anything.

P25 alone isn't enough. Training is what makes interoperability work, not expensive technology alone.

There is no reason that this agency can't stay on narrow band FM for now. Analog is just as interoperable as P25, it's cheaper, it's technology that they already have. Coverage is proven, changing emissions can change coverage and require additional towers and infrastructure to make it all work.

Hopefully common sense will prevail and agencies will not blow the budget on equipment they don't need.

 

[thefireguy07]

I cant disagree. Can anyone say TETRA? I think it's obvious I like hardware monsters. Lol.

 

[thefireguy07]

Why fill one rack when you have a whole room to fill

 

[thefireguy07]

Lastly damn.... I keep talking myself out of a tri band apx for 2000. I hear the kenwood series is quite nice, however not enough people are playing with them yet for me to feel comfortable playing with it. A paper weight is cheaper.

 

[thefireguy07]

Can u tell I want input..

Another example. The city of new York..

Narrowband. Duplexed(injected audio) and the neatest part is how it is 1 MHz above the federal UHF band. When mixed it works as expected. 3 inner city UHF receive sites and 3 outer VHF sites for the mobile radios.

Calling x2 calling x2. Operate with a simulcast site plan and keep the conventional in place programmed in to the radios for fall back. Hell! Fit them with GSM modules for fun.

A kid could "cripple" VHF dispatch with open mic attacks as it is now. Well a 10yo with an iphone, 2 ham radiso and tape could inhibit voice as it is now. No nac, sys id,keys or flashing= bad in city settings. Without enjoying hex/dec conversions u can't hurt it. Or just decode the control to get all u need. If anything NYC should be hooked up after 10 years. The Cambria system I used as example is better off. At least they use proper portables for the most part in NY