gman1971

Well, its still a repeater, even it has limitations... I think it can be done, but given the plethora of digital formats and modulations already in existence, throwing one more in the mix might not make much sense... we'll see. G.

You can stick to NXDN if you don't like FHSS... and BTW, you are basically quoting what I've already stated on the other thread you abandoned: There needs to be an open standard for FHSS to work, otherwise it won't make much sense, and at that point its better stick to what you have that works for you. G.

@Lscott There is an FHSS DTR repeater... I don't remember who makes it, but I know at least one exists. Then there is the fact that everything is narrowband, and only things in the 2.4 ISM bands use this type of spread spectrum tech. Not much demand for an FHSS repeater. The repeater would use the two codes like PL tones, one for input, one for output. G.

Only if you are a ham

Agreed, FHSS makes so much sense, IMO, makes you hope they'll do the same for other crowded bands... it will make sharing the airwaves a lot easier too... G.

The "bottom line", or the "bottom of the line"... pick your poison... G.

Absolutely, the CCRs took the market by storm. And back in 2017ish, at 9.95 for a BF-888s with Prime, shipped to your home was a thing... and I bought like 20 of those... which, at the time, If you needed something to get you by, without having to deal with old/used stuff, that was pretty much unbeatable. During that time, most of the stuff worth owning from Motorola was quite expensive too... maybe the XPR6550 was somewhat affordable, but even that was still quite expensive at the time. Well, the same fate that happened to the US companies in the 70s/80s when the Japanese flooded the market with cheaper radios, its happening now to Japanese companies as well... Japanese people nowadays make a lot of money a year too, so the cheap inrush of radio stuff is no more... and Japan is now more like the US in terms of pay, and for any decent radio they make, its priced accordingly... you won't find any NX-5200 for 49.95 + Prime, that is for sure. Uncertain where/how the bottom of the barrel Motorola stands in terms of performance... maybe its worth owning some, at least given the expensive prices of even the CCRs are going for right now. The old Moto stuff if you can find good deals is really hard to beat. Sure, I am not going to argue that it will require some time investment to grasp the CPS and the other stuff that would've came pre-programmed on dedicated GMRS radios... but again, it would also seem that a lot of the people who post here are also radioaficionados too, so having to program a more complex CPS shouldn't be too bad... IMO. Now, for people who are not into radios at all, etc, I wouldn't recommend anything that requires any sort of tinkering.... just get the beers and pretzels Walmart Midland bubble pack and don't look back... I'd still take a Midland over non American brands... even if Midland is ultimately made in China... G.

Price, absolutely. Unfortunately, once their radios start to cope with the best of the best, price will be similar, so it won't be CCR anymore. They can do it b/c you are talking about employees being paid several thousands of dollars a month, vs employees being paid, if that, several thousands a year. So, the cost of living hasn't caught up there, yet, but it will eventually happen, and maybe the Baofengs will still be around, maybe not, but there will be the same thing as Japanese in the 70s-80s... however, I think that was a different situation than what we are in right now. Feels like in the 70s/80s the US failed to embrace the mass producing ideas they put into practice when Japan was rebuilt after WW2... Its hard to compete against someone who steals your tech and packages it and sells it for 1/100th of the price... G.

I would assume the USB drivers for the radio got installed?

@wayoverthereif you need help with XPR codeplugs, just PM me. Cheers. G.

@SshannonI am hoping that "some people" isn't referring to me this time. <....loads vitriol on the reservoir....> LOL.

@WRKC935 These radios are, AFAIK, all direct conversion receivers. So, there should be no first stage like a classical dual conversion superheterodyne. When the external signals exceed the "bandwidth" it has to reduce gain to fit everything within the bandwidth, otherwise you'll hear a cacophony of intermod mess. A tracking filter that would allow for such DC to daylight listening capabilities would be far more expensive that can be fitted on a $9.95 Baofeng (overpriced to cost x5 times that sadly)... The HF ICOM radios that have these type of sweet tracking filters cost like $3500-$13000... so... there is that. You can help these CCRs with a preselector, or a cavity, it will be good enough, but portability and some sensitivity will be lost... so... that is one tradeoff. G.

@axorlov Yes, "Its not a hobby" is certainly not the same as it "wasn't intended to be as a hobby". but then anyone can make a hobby out of anything, as its been stated countless times. Exactly, you certainly don't need to be looking for anyone's approval, or be popular to do whatever you want/need to do, provided its all within the law. Again, the same applies to "intended use". GMRS was intended to "talk to family, friends, or any other GMRS license holder" in the beginning, but nowadays, given the fact that FRS is open to anyone, you can talk to anyone. GMRS is, nowadays, CB on UHF... but that is a different story for another day. G.

Yep, Powerpole is nice, XT60 works too, etc..

Whoah... same thing happening for other manufacturers too, Motorola included. I believe the newest XPR7550e might come without WiFi/BT and/or GPS IIRC.. The new normal...

Well, I'd say however it was done to get the 2.4 GHz ISM band for WiFi, BT, BT Intercoms, etc... that is probably what needs to be done to the GMRS service as well. The devices themselves (no user input) negotiate handshakes, packet collision, etc, and leave the user to just select whatever "channel" among a large pool of "channels", whether these channels being "physical" channels or "virtual" channels, and some privacy codes.. etc. There is/was nothing personal about stating that FHSS is a better scheme for spectral efficiency than any narrowband single-channel modulation, including FM, NXDN, DMR, et. all. An open standard will need to be implemented for this, be it an ETSI standard, or be it ANSI standard. whatever, It just cannot come from a single manufacturer, and that includes Motorola, Kenwood, et. all. G.

Not sure what to say, but a couple of pictures of a book doesn't show me understanding of the concept, but that's fine. In a nutshell: FHSS is a Frequency Hopping Scheme, or Frequency Hopping Spread Spectrum: which could be considered a combination of FDMA (Frequency Division, Multiple Access) and TDMA (Time Division, Multiple Access) in one package. Transmits for a few milliseconds on a given frequency, then it hops to another frequency and transmits again, rinse and repeat. Whatever frequency the radio will hop to next is determined by a random seed number, and a counter. So when both radios hop in the same pattern then you have a viable radio link, but when they do not, the two radios can't talk to each other, nor have a clue that another radio is even talking. At any rate, my vote goes for FHSS, just like the DTR radios in the 900 Mhz band have already proven it works very well. Again, I am also NOT endorsing Motorola radios either, just making a reference to their FHSS scheme. Also, military grade radios use FHSS as well, for all (but not limited to) the reasons I've explained. G.

You never answered this question: Do you know what FHSS is?

How are you arriving to this conclusion about needing more bandwidth? A 12.5kHz channel FHSS scheme over whatever GMRS bandwidth already has currently allocated won't require any additional spectrum to be allocated. So I am not sure what is it you are talking about. Next point: this is not a NXDN vs DMR as you'd like it to be.... and then to reiterate this AGAIN, b/c you seem to just ignore the fact that I am NOT endorsing DMR as a potential GMRS digital modulation, so please pay attention to what I am saying before lecturing me about how super-duper NXDN is, well let me tell you: that is your opinion, and you are entitled to that. I don't agree with it, and I find NXDN totally useless and lacking for many reasons, and certainly for the purpose of de-congesting the GMRS allocated bandwidth. So, I'll state this once again: FHSS, (or DSSS), is the best way to go in so many ways: avoids pissing other users off with random lids barge into your conversation, or hijacking repeaters... etc, and you get 1 MILLION channels, that is: 1,000,000 channels.... no amount of NXDN voodoo BS is going to compete with that. Maybe you don't understand what FHSS really is? Again, you just can't beat that kind of spectral efficiency of an FHSS scheme with anything single-channel narrowband like DMR/NXDN/TETRA/P25/<insert your single channel narrowband modulation name here>. The RC world has been doing this for almost 2 decades now, where you can have dozens of models flying simultaneously next to each other without interfering each other... well, don't try that with any single-channel narrowband stuff... G.

I think you are confusing 4FSK and FHSS. You can FHSS in any modulation, be it FM... SSB, etc. Anything narrowband will just run into the same service (22 channels) problems we are facing right now: interference and band congestion/saturation, and that includes NXDN too which is still narrowband BTW, and it doesn't matter how much narrowband it can get. At best, if all channels were to be split in 4 (or 2), you'll only get a few additional channels over the pre-existing 22, and that would be assuming the FCC ever makes 6.25kHz mandatory, which we both know it won't happen. So its a waste of time to provide the least efficient RF digital format there is. TDMA 2-slot offers double the spectral efficiency over a single 12.5kHz, and please, spare me the BS about you being able to split a channel in 2... hahaha, with what filters? 600kHz split in Ham repeaters already requires 6" cans the size of oxygen tanks.... Then, even if all channels were split in 6.25 chunks, that will only provide roughly 88 channels... at best... vs a 1 Million interference-free channel pool with a properly implemented 20-bit FHSS scheme. In addition to that, FHSS also provides other benefits that NXDN simply can't and will never be able to afford: far superior spectral efficiency, slightly better range (due to frequency hopping, (if one particular frequency is blocked, the next hop frequency might not), very strong interference resistance, a good deal of privacy against casual eavesdropping, and all that without the use of the big no-no word called "encryption." Using narrowband and analogue stuff is the way of the dinosaurs. DMR is also narrowband but its saving grace would be its using a TDMA (Time Division) scheme, and can do something that NXDN will never be able to do: Have 2 concurrent conversations over the same single 12.5kHz channel. I think its called 6.25kHz equivalency... With that said, and for as much as I am invested in DMR, I would rather see the implementation of an open FHSS (ETSI/ANSI) standard instead. G.

I was gonna say, LTE radio is becoming a thing, a lot of commercial users are abandoning the classic LMR radios in favor of cellular based radio, b/c with LTE you get all the infrastructure already in place, little to no maintenance, etc... it is happening. But like you said, the cell network works until it doesn't. G.

@marcspazsounds awesome!! If CB (11m) on FM using a radio like an Alan Multi42/RPSY-201 Titan Handled was nice, I can only imagine what it is with higher quality stuff... G.

I'll bite! Well, since GMRS/FRS is meant to be "easy to use" I'd say replicate what the DTR radios on the 900mhz band are doing. Set a 16-bit or 20-bit pseudo random FHSS sequence and have them hop in the upper 12.5kHz of every wideband GMRS channel, and use the whole 12.5kHz for the FRS channels. IMO. it doesn't get any simpler than that. Eiter 65k channels, or 1M channels, depending on 16 or 20 bit for the random FHSS sequence. G.

Well, I've spent a lot b/c I've purchased a ton of XPR radios and accessories... most of my XPR7550e radios were acquired for an average well under <300 bucks. I don't spend money on analog radios anymore, its just not worth it... but that is really besides the point. This is not a who has spent more or less thread. Obviously, back on the thread, about interference, as stated: a radio like an XPR7550e, or an XPR5550e will have a very sensitive and selective front end, which will make it very resilient to interference; however, at this point in time, I simply cannot recommend anyone who isn't beyond serious about radios getting one due to the insane pricing.... With that said, if you are willing to sacrifice most of that bandwidth on your CCR VFO, then a good preselector will work well to improve most CCR's front end. Obviously, say goodbye to portability, but at least you'll have improved the RX capabilities substantially. G.

Intermodulation on RX when using weak front-end radios is best dealt with using cavity filters or preselectors. To test this, add a 10dB attentuator to the radio cable, if the noise is gone, then it is most likely IM, probably caused by very strong signal present. G.