Why do you all enjoy using DMR?

[mmckenna]

DMR programming is totally impossible for some people, without the right mind set.

I'd like to sit some people down and have them program radios to work on a Type2i system using a DOS based RSS. No downloading pre-built codeplugs allowed.

 

[Omega-TI]

Back in the day, it was challenging, fun and exciting to get a DX contact. I enjoyed it when 6 meters opened up for voice. I enjoyed direct contact with the ISS, even if the passes were short. Packet was my favorite mode though, and it took a lot of patience to node hop four nodes to the nearest HF gateway, pop out in another country, node hope another four or five nodes to make a contact with someone or drop a message in their TNC's mailbox. Once all the Internet guys started passing the traffic faster, most of the HF backbone guys turned off their radios. To me the Internet is NOT radio. Like another guy said, it's about as exciting as making a phone call.

 

[AK_SAR]

DMR programming is totally impossible for some people, without the right mind set. Nothing to do with intelligence, but many older, competent people cannot cope with computer programming.

But that is hardly unique to DMR. I had about as much trouble getting my Kenwood D74A set up as my AT-678.

If you can program an analog radio, you can program a DMR radio. A few different terms to learn, but it really isn't any harder.

 

[N4GIX]

But that is hardly unique to DMR. I had about as much trouble getting my Kenwood D74A set up as my AT-678.

If you can program an analog radio, you can program a DMR radio. A few different terms to learn, but it really isn't any harder.

The major difference is that while analog programming is essentially a single, flat-file database, DMR is a distributed data base.

 

[buddrousa]

I am 64 and have had no problems. Here are the problems most people make.
#1 Buy Radio
#2 Plug up computer and start punching in numbers.
#3 Never doing any background studying on how and why these systems work.
#4 Never look at the directions that came with said radio.
#5 Never knew Radio Techs go to classes to learn the new radios and systems.

 

[DeoVindice]

I don't, I use P25 instead. Better radios, better audio, no operators using cheap Chinese junk. I tried DMR and was not impressed.

 

[k6cpo]

Oh my!

I find it mildly amusing to read this kind of comment about DMR. I see a never ending stream of posts on various forums about how being a ham has become too easy. People claim the tests are too easy, new hams don't know any electronics, they don't build their own gear, no one learns code. Folks claim new hams are just "appliance users" who expect everything to be plug and play. Etc Etc .......

Then we see posts such as this from an apparently experienced ham claiming that DMR is just too complex for a mere amateur to deal with.
I achieved a working knowledge of DMR shortly after getting my Technician level license, using my very first ever ham radio (an AT-678). It really isn't all that difficult, though (like anything worthwhile) it does take a bit of effort to learn.
I have to call bull**** when I see people write simple minded nonsense like "The ONLY reason DMR became so popular ...." There are lots of reasons DMR has become popular, besides Chinese radios.

I had to have another ham come in and help me with my DMR radio to get it to work right. I can program an analog radio or my Yaesu Fusion radios with no problems. Fusion has the same overall capabilities as DMR, but with a simpler implementation.

I live in the second largest city in California and we have a robust, active ham radio community here. DMR was virtually unknown here until the AnyTones burst on the scene. Before then, the only way to get into DMR was an expensive Motorola radio. The inexpensive Chinese DMR radios were certainly a driving factor in the increasing popularity of DMR.

 

[AI7PM]

............ Fusion has the same overall capabilities as DMR, .......

Say what?

 

[alcahuete]

Say what?

I was wondering when somebody would say it.

 

[N4KVE]

Fusion has the same overall capabilities as DMR, but with a simpler implementation.

Around here, it’s known as “confusion”.

 

[buddrousa]

That is Like saying a UGO is like a Corvette

 

[joncleve]

So DMR is a Corvette?

 

[K7MFC]

#4 Never look at the directions that came with said radio.

Oh boy that’s a big overarching theme here - people will go to lengths to not RTFM, as evidenced by the constant advice to look at those “Easier to Read Uniden Scanner Manuals.” Those things are pretty much a verbatim, word-for-word copy of the text in the official Uniden manuals, right down to the identical pictures and diagrams. Or maybe that was the point..to trick people into reading the manual by calling it something else?

Either way, DMR programming required a fundamental shift in the way I thought about programming radios, and the only way to do that was read about DMR. A lot. Mashing keys on the programming software wasn’t effective for me lol.

 

[nd5y]

So DMR is a Corvette?

DMR is an Opel GT.
YSF is a Mazda MX-5.

 

[Thorndike113]

DMR is a digitally transmitted communication medium - and so in many ways more similar to Whatsapp, Zoom, Skype etc. etc. vs. being a ham radio (unless a local, range limited contact is established)

DMR should be allowed on Ham seeing it is another way to communicate via the air waves. However, It should not be praised above any other mode of operation. Its just another way of communicating. What hams need to do is start using it more on simplex or use it in linking towers together, not just connecting to the internet. I see too much frequency and technology in Ham Radio misused and then everyone complaining because its not real Ham Radio.

It is very common to hear participants to be excited to talk to a person from a new country or continent and consider the connection an achievement.

I hear this all the time. Even though ham radio is only known for talking around the world on HF only, statements like this even make me shake my head and I don't like HF. Personally I cant see the excitement if you are connected to the internet. Of course you're going to talk around the world at ease when you are connected to the internet ha ha.

Overall, seeing what Ham Radio has become in the past 25 years, Hams need to do one of two things. 1 - embrace ALL forms of radio communication even if its through an internet network, even if its a repeater or a link etc. or 2 - Hand the bands and all of its technology above 30MHz to the FCC to be placed into another service similar to Ham Radio. This way, all those who feel DMR or repeaters are not Ham Radio can go sit on HF and not worry about it and those who enjoy the repeaters, Internet, and digital comms can have their own bands. This way you can keep the classic Ham Radio, and the newer technology that divides Hams, can be put into another radio service just like Ham Radio. I understand the whole nostalgic thing behind sitting on over $5,000 worth of radio equipment and talking around the world. Many Hams don't like it being tied in with the internet. Even I am on the fence about tying the internet into radio communications on Ham. Its convenient, but it should not be relied upon. There should be a separate system that links everything together using all the technology available to Hams, and I know many Hams have the smarts to do it, they just refuse to.

 

[KK4JUG]

Al Gore's invention of the Internet (or not) is used for everything from ogling girls to paying bills to turning on the lights in the bathroom. Hams might as well used it, too. If you don't like it, don't use it.

 

[N4KVE]

Al Gore's invention of the Internet (or not) is used for everything from ogling girls to paying bills to turning on the lights in the bathroom. Hams might as well used it, too. If you don't like it, don't use it.

Use it as a convenience, yes. But to get a woody because one may feel it’s a major accomplishment that they spoke to someone around the world through the internet on a $50 CCR is crazy. It’s certainly not the same accomplishment as talking around the world on HF where the signal between the two radios travels thousands of miles in the air from one antenna to the other. .

 

[K7MFC]

It’s certainly not the same accomplishment as talking around the world on HF where the signal between the two radios travels thousands of miles in the air from one antenna to the other. .

You not liking it doesn't make it not ham radio though. Other peoples' accomplishments are not indexed off yours, nor do peoples' perception of their accomplishments take anything away from your own. This is already a niche hobby, any behavior that is intended to exclude people or limit the advancement of the hobby is what I would call "not real ham radio."

 

[slicerwizard]

Fusion has the same overall capabilities as DMR, but with a simpler implementation.

Fusion has half of the voice capacity of DMR.

Fusion uses a ridiculous scheme that sends 104 OTA bits per 20 ms voice frame and that has worse FEC capabilities than the standard 72 OTA bits per 20 ms voice frame that everyone else (DMR, NXDN, P25p2, ...) uses. Instead of using Golay error correction, Fusion has a mode that takes the first 27 bits of a 49 bit AMBE+2 voice frame and just sends them three times! (Yes, just like brain-dead EDACS...) The receiver has to vote on those three copies and if the same bit gets flipped in two of those copies, the voice frame is hosed. Meanwhile, with the standard method - that uses 32 fewer OTA bits - it takes a minimum of four flipped bits to trash a voice frame.

 

[k6cpo]

Say what?

The commonality between DMR and Fusion are the ability to use either analog or digital voice, either through a repeater or simplex and the ability to talk around the world via the internet. What else is there? Beyond that, it comes down to the complexity or simplicity of implementation (programming, repeaters, ease of use on the radios, etc.) I find Fusion a lot more intuitive than DMR. Fusion was designed with amateur radio in mind while DMR is a system designed for business and commercial users that was co-opted by amateur radio. And I still think DMR wouldn't be as popular as it is without the influx of inexpensive radios from China.

Fusion has half of the voice capacity of DMR.

Fusion uses a ridiculous scheme that sends 104 OTA bits per 20 ms voice frame and that has worse FEC capabilities than the standard 72 OTA bits per 20 ms voice frame that everyone else (DMR, NXDN, P25p2, ...) uses. Instead of using Golay error correction, Fusion has a mode that takes the first 27 bits of a 49 bit AMBE+2 voice frame and just sends them three times! (Yes, just like brain-dead EDACS...) The receiver has to vote on those three copies and if the same bit gets flipped in two of those copies, the voice frame is hosed. Meanwhile, with the standard method - that uses 32 fewer OTA bits - it takes a minimum of four flipped bits to trash a voice frame.

Thanks for the explanation, not one word of which I understood. I could care less about the jibber-jabber of digital radio. I'm not an EE and never will be. I just appreciate something that is relatively easy to use and for me that's Fusion.