Yeah…but isn’t the mobile touch screen? The repeater is, if memory serves.


— 
Buddy Brannan, KB5ELV - Erie, PA
Phone: 814-860-3194 
Mobile: 814-431-0962
Email: [log in to unmask]



> On Mar 4, 2015, at 10:21 AM, Bob Tinney <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
> Our local repeater club just ordered the new Yaesu System Fusion DR1-X 
> repeater.  The mobile Yaesu rig that will do C4FM digital is the 
> FTM400DR and a voice board is available for that model.  It will 
> announce your call when you turn it on and will also tell you the 
> frequency your tuned to, but it will not tell you much else.  C4FM 
> sounds much better than DStar.  I don't know how it compares to DMR, but 
> anything is better than DStar.
> 
> Bob, K8LR, [log in to unmask]
> 
> On 3/4/2015 8:57 AM, Martin G. McCormick wrote:
>> 	Our club had a really good presentation in February by a
>> couple of members about DMR which is also known in the US as
>> MotoTRBO pronounced MotoTurbo. I strongly suspect it is the new
>> and neat thing in amateur radio but it has a lot of growing up
>> to do yet.
>> 
>> 	Look it up in a Google search and there is a lot of
>> information.
>> 
>> 	DMR is an open-source standard which means anybody can
>> make the gear unlike DSTAR so we will probably eventually see
>> many models.
>> 
>> 	Here's the good and the bad.
>> 
>> 	The best hand-held right now is sold by a company in the
>> United States called Connect Systems. I don't know if that's one
>> or two words. The radios are made in China but to commercial
>> specifications and sell for around $300 a piece to business and
>> public safety agencies. Connect Systems gives hams a really good
>> price break. The guys who gave the presentation say the radios
>> are good and solid like a Motorola. They are UHF only and will
>> do analog FM as well as DMR. I'd love to have one, myself, but
>> read on 'cause here comes the bad news.
>> 
>> 	It's your typical screen toy. There are no voice
>> prompts, no helpful beeps except for one that tells you if you
>> are trying to transmit on an occupied channel, absolutely
>> nothing that makes the radio accessible. There's just a nice
>> strip of glass across the front.
>> 
>> 	The programming software is all Windows, all the time,
>> your typical bundle of lost opportunity.
>> 
>> 	Briefly, here is how DMR works.
>> 
>> 	There are two tears of DMR. One is for simplex-type
>> operation such as what one might encounter in a business of some
>> kind where the staff carry talkies around for tactical
>> communication. The other tear is repeater-type operation.
>> 
>> 	A repeater can handle two simultaneous QSO's and each
>> conversation can have a talk group. Think of the old community
>> repeater systems that used to be common in the commercial world.
>> Instead of different CTCSS tones, you have different talk group
>> numbers which is why the loud tone if somebody just transmits,
>> thinking the repeater is free when there is a conversation on
>> their time slot that is on a different talk group.
>> 
>> 	Local systems are connected to the internet, kind of
>> like echolink but when you get a talk group going, you tie up
>> one time slot out of the two available and nobody else can use
>> the system for that slot unless they want to join the talk
>> group.
>> 
>> 	A UHF DMR repeater has one input frequency and one
>> output just like an analog repeater but two users can share the
>> input because their transceivers send packets of audio in bursts
>> at about 20 bursts per second but the repeater tells each
>> transceiver when it's turn comes so they both interleave their
>> packets. It's elegant but I can't imagine it on ten or six
>> meters due to the time lag over skip distances. It would foul up
>> the repeater's timing and you'd probably be able to hear the
>> distant signal but your signals would take too long to get back
>> to the repeater which would stray in to the other guy's slot.
>> 
>> 	I saw a lot of neat technology, here, but since there is
>> no Linux support, it's the same old same old.
>> 
>> 	
>> Since DMR is an open standard, however, there is more likely to
>> be something useful later as more people will be making
>> equipment.
>> 
>> 	Sorry for the length of this post, but I figured some
>> might find it interesting.
>> 
>> 	By the way, the audio is very good, similar to P25 if
>> you have heard that.
>> 
>> 73
>> Martin WB5agz