Pretty much the same with all the digital modes, IDAS, P25, whatever the 
repeaters work fine by themselves but can be linked via the internet. I keep 
telling my local club, if I want to talk outside the local area, I have HF 
and the license to use it and HF sounds a hell of a lot better than any 
digital mode right now though the ones that use a newer vocoder than DStar, 
which is all of the more popular ones, sound a little better than DStar. I 
find it funny too that DStar is the most expensive one to get in to with the 
worst equipment. I like Icom, don't get me wrong, but I know many who've 
tried the DStar repeater and say it's an interference nightmare and many 
switch to their own setup to run DStar or go to something else for another 
digital mode and with the Icom DStar repeater you can't run mixed mode, you 
have to build your own setup for that. All the other ones you can run mixed 
mode if you want very easily.
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Colin McDonald" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, December 20, 2012 11:24 PM
Subject: Re: In a state of disbelief here


> no, the internet is not required to use DStar.  It is only required if you
> wish to connect through gateways to other DStar repeaters and users...much
> like IRLP in that one respect.
> A DStar repeater can be used stand alone like any other repeater, except
> it's digital, and allows for both voice and data transfer.  Very useful if
> there is a large emergency and individual stations both mobile and 
> handheld
> need to be tracked and mapped so that the right assets can be sent to the
> right places etc.  Also, your call sign and a user programmable ID message
> are sent each time you key the mike, so it's yet another way to keep track
> of stations during an emergency.
> DStar can also be used on simplex just like regular analogue FM...with the
> addition of data via RF.  So, you can send semi-secure messages that way 
> and
> get allot more words across in a much shorter amount of time compared with
> someone speaking them, potentially making speech errors and then having to
> repeat it all...
> You also do not need to register with the DStar people to use your local
> DStar repeaters, but if you wish to use the reflectors and connect through
> gateways and so on, you have to be registered...which is a simple enough
> process and there is no yes or no sort of game, you submit registration 
> and
> they register you as long as you hold a valid license.  Like Echo link in
> that respect.
> I don't much like the audio quality of DStar myself, but it's certainly a
> viable method of communication no more prone to failure than anything else
> is.
> A DStar radio is as likely to break down or not communicate as a non-DStar
> radio, and the same true for the repeaters themselves.
> As for accessibility, that's not a difficult one to get around because you
> simply program separate memory locations with the various gateways and
> reflectors you want to use and the rest is automated.  It's no different
> than talking on an FM radio once the various protocols are set up in the
> radio.  Setting up those protocols is about the only inaccessible thing
> about DStar for us.
> The monopoly on DStar by Icom is a sore point for me as well, and there is
> most definitely a little bit too much consumer marketting going on in the
> upper teers of amateur radio and within circles of hams who have 
> influence.
> However, you don't have to like DStar, but at least understand it, and 
> judge
> it based on it's marrits and not just the fact that you don't like it, or
> Icom or whatever the case may be.  If it's a matter of not liking DStar
> because the radios that have DStar don't have voice chips, well, that's 
> not
> really a valid reason either because now your not judging DStar but your
> judging the inaccessibility of the radio instead, which has nothing to do
> with DStar.
> Sounds like crap, but so does GSM and pretty much any digital cellular
> telephone these days, and we all have one of those...and we all had one
> before they became accessible to, so I don't get the big hate on for 
> DStar.
>
> 73
> Colin, V A6BKX