gortex2

@wayoverthere DMR sounds good when setup correctly and uses good radios. When DMR first got popular the only option was Motorola MotoTrbo repeaters and radios. None of the CCR market was building anything. Over time they did. I know of a few DMR repeaters that sound pretty good over the air. They are mostly MotoTrbo but some other LMR brands on the air also. On the other side there are a lot of "home brew" repeaters now on the air with MMDVM boards on analog radios. Most that get put up never get aligned or setup properly and don't have the audio quality of a LMR repeater. Mostly because many hams don't have the test gear required or the know how to set them up right.
Next issue is the subscribers. Again the CCR market has flourished and blanketed the market with cheap stuff. They don't sound as good and putting them over a home brew repeater makes it sound even worse. Some of us have learned the hard way after buying "economy" radios then spending a bit more on a true LMR radio the difference. Even though I have many high quality P25 radios I got suckered into the cheap DMR market when I wanted to dabble in DMR. Mostly because it was easy. The radio got used once. Its in a box. Sadly DMR is dead where I am so only listened when working in different cities. I did finally get an XPR7550 and its night and day from the MD I had. YMMV

True, though how many analog repeaters are dead silent day in and day out. The point of digital in my opinion is to have options to reach further than the local RF footprint. I often have a good 5-10 minute qso from people in Dayton, Columbus, Cincinnati or even Toledo, all of which wouldn't ever be in range (with the exception of 1 repeater than manages to reach Canada and WV on a good propagation day). My real point is poor internet connections kill the DMR exprience, and lets be honest, the local use (RF to RF) is non existent. Look at this repeaters last used:

 
And it's coverage is pretty massive. It's also been offline 95% of the time due to internet connection issues.

I would suggest you contact Oklahoma State Department of Homeland Security, which is who those interop frequencies are licensed to. It should also be noted, you likely won't get anyone on those frequencies. Looking at the license, the emissions designator is for P25, and considering the state has gone to P25 for OMACS there is likely not a single soul that will be listening to analog NFM to even pick up your call for help.

Section 90.427(b) specifically prohibits programming unauthorized frequencies into a transmitter:
(b) Except for frequencies used in accordance with § 90.417, no person shall program into a transmitter frequencies for which the licensee using the transmitter is not authorized.
So, how does that fit into this conversation?  I’ll try to answer with some scenarios that I hope will explain my understanding.
1. Ms. Sierra Citizen, while out for a walk, finds a sheriff’s deputy slumped over in the front seat of his cruiser.  She has no cellphone service or any other communication device with her.  She picks up the microphone in the cruiser and asks for help. I believe the various exceptions which allow emergency communications would protect her from prosecution. 
2. Mr. Joe Prepper has every frequency programmed into his portable radio.  He finds a person slumped over in the front seat of their car.  He picks up his portable radio and calls on an EMS dispatch frequency for which he is not authorized.  I believe that even though he potentially saves the life of the person, he has clearly violated 90.427(b) by having his transmitter preprogrammed with unauthorized frequencies.  I’d be surprised if he wasn’t prosecuted.
The bottom line is this, the emergency provisions allow great latitude in radio usage in true emergencies, but they don’t serve to waive the rules that establish and protect communications systems simply to be prepared.

@tweiss3 There is no need for internet other than linking. I think a lot of hams forget about that. In commercial DMR systems that are linked there are specs for links however many don't go by them. In Public Safety those are crucial. 
I have seen many DMR repeaters using a hotspot or similar LTE router on top of a repeater. Most issues are poor coverage inside shelters and hams don't want to put up real LTE outside antennas. A county I just finished has this issue. The ham guys continue to complain that since they moved the repeater it doesn't sound right. Local talk groups are fine. They have a cheap hotpot on the repeater with no antenna. I have no Verizon and 1 bar of ATT inside the shelter. The hotspot shows 1 bar sometimes. It would not surprise me when the repeater keys up the bar goes away just from local interference and RF. . They don't understand that. 
With no linking a DMR repeater can sound really good. As said good test gear and properly setup sites are really good. 
 

I would agree, the property setup stuff sounds great. Even further, a Moto or Hunters DMR repeater is hard to setup badly out of the box. We have a handful of the multimode repeater that sound good, but the technical team that maintains these those are really good and have the proper equipment. The biggest problem with DMR repeaters appears to be maintaining a good reliable internet connection.
The Anytone sounds like junk no matter what, but it's loud, which is what many people like. Sound quality is exceptional on the XPR and SL radios, even on a hotspot. I even bought an SL7550 just for at home hotspot use, and it's always on the Ohio talkgroups 247. My CS800Ds do sound good, not as good as the Motos but much better than the trash Anytone.

69? you paid 30 too much... I paid 39.95 for each BF-1801, the same piece of crap garbage CCR as the GD77... 
G.

Dude... Midland just completely punked out.  They said the specs are 42-50 watts.  They are trying to get out of it by saying it's close enough and my gear.
 
@gortex2  The 12 feet is the total length of the antenna transmission path.  I may have added too much information, causing some confusion with that statement.  There is only 3 feet of patch cable between the radio and the watt meter and the meter shows a perfect 50 Ohm load, so the rest of the path, after the meter should not be relevant, no?  
My loss meter is showing 0.102dB on the patch cable.  The watt meter is not reading at the end of the path, it’s the first item in the path (not including the cable).  Even if we get really picky and add the typical 0.019 dB per UHF connector, we are assuming a total of 0.204 dB of loss, not 1 dB.  That should be a total measured output power of 47.7 watts.  Would you agree?
I’m not trying to give anyone at Midland a hard time.  I am a life-long Midland customer, purchasing CB’s, FRS and GMRS handhelds and GMRS mobile radios.  I love the products.  The main reason why I am even complaining is because my MXT400 (siting right next to me) is putting out the exact same power (measured) as the MXT500, which is supposed to be more powerful.  So I hop people can understand my frustration.

So using some math here 10% +/- is 5 watts. So that puts the radio at 45 watts in specification to some point. Take your cable loss and connectors out of the mix I think 40 watts is what you would get.
As reference I just finished the install of a 100 watt GTR 8000 repeater. Programming shows 100 watts. My R&S Meter shows 79 watts. Jumper in radio to back plain is .18 db. Cable from Base to Power Sensor is .75 db. That is about 1 db for quick math. 1 db from 50 db (100 Watts = 50 db) is 49 db which is 79.433 watts. So in all you still meet the 10% +/-
With the Midland 50 watts should be about 47 db. Just take away 1 db for cables and inconsistency of meters. That's 40 watts (39.811 per my PC)
So in reality it most likely meets the specs provided by the manufacturer. I think too many get worked up over a number. I think the real test is the real world use that Mark plans to use it for. I'm curious to see what he finds and how the radio performs in the world and not on a bench.  I like to see a number on my service monitor or watt meter match what a box says but it doesn't always happen. 
 
Mark keep us posted once its in the JT ! 
 

My IC-F43GT radios are working fine.
But I've really moved to Moto XPRs. As I'm working on my General HAM. and can do DMR HAM on the proper UHF1 XPRs.
 

I tested the radio using a 40 amp Astron adjustable power supply set to 13.8vdc for the power source.  For a load, I first tested with a Diamond X300 Repeater antenna and a Diamond watt meter.  When I did not get the expected results, I move to a Vectronics 50 Ohm resistive load, monitoring the output with a Tectronics oscilloscope and a Bird watt meter.  I am using just 12 feet total of LMR400 patch cables and they all test fine.

It's got a clean signal with minimal spurs.  My SWR on the live antenna was 1.1:1 and the dummy load was a perfect 1:1.  This radio is NOT putting out 50 watts.

I'm waiting on the 575 to hit. As soon as it does I'll be ordering one and will put it on my service monitor and validate. I hate to order the 500 to do true tests as I have no need for it. The 275 is what I'm running right now and plan to upgrade just to test more or less. 
On testing I agree that real world over the air vs into a dummy load may be different. In TIA102 testing standards radios there is a tolerance for all tests on a radio. Normally this is provided by the manufacturer but TX power of +/- 10% after accounting for test cable and internal cable losses is not uncommon. Any test is going to show some uncertainty. Using calibrated test cables, calibrated test equipment is really the only way to know for sure. Many don't have access to either. In addition environmental factors could cause a reading to be different in field use. 
 
I think Mark provided a good representation of what other users would see using similar gear. 99% of the hobby uses hobby gear. While I love my Bird 43 that's kind of like a 57 Chevy in regards to technology updates also. Now Bird and Rohde & Schwarz make some really nice stuff (AKA not cheap). 

@PACNWComms supposedly with the next release of software the next can be programmed by CPS again or RC. I hate having to use RC but on the other side I have the code plug backed up. As for FF use agree. I took mine on a few calls and the display doesn't work well with my gloves. There is a new "XE" version out but don't think i'll end up with one anytime soon. I do use the NEXT for SAR because I can look at the map. Just a feature. Not for navigation. But still like my 8000XE for Fire stuff.

My only issue with the NEXT series is the cloud based programming, Motorola CPS as a service.......I work for a corporation that often messes up billing and payment, especially with Motorola, so I can see my programming option being held hostage until payment is current. (Can't fault Motorola on that though, at least not entirely.) Software as a service was tried by Harris, they needed the MAC address of a specific computer to program XG-100P handhelds and mobiles, where I can download Motorola CPS and put it on a dozen computers if I want. The one APX NEXT we borrowed as a demo did not work well for firefighters, but security it worked well.....that huge touchscreen was the issue with fire, and gloves.

I think @kb2ztx makes a great point. You use the radio that matches the group you are with. I've been doing a lot of research and realize that I don't need all the things I thought I did. Like dual band for example. @gman1971, you are correct, I personally don't need that. However, if I'm going to cover different groups with a radio, then burden falls to me to have that capacity. Hmmm ...

$400.00 But You DO get an NMO magnet mount with an antenna that does a good job if you have a  good ground plain, and if youwant a different antenna , unscrew the shorty and add a different NMO antenna to the mag mount.
My MXT500 arrives this Friday , looking forward to trying it out in my Jeep.
The image, was an answer in the questions on the Midland MXT500 page, looks like they are getting really serious on becoming the goto brand for GMRS!

I'll give them credit for finally including a proper mount (outside of the additional $$ bundles). That response is also an interesting development. Given their current focus on novice users, almost to the expense of features, I'll stay very cautiously optimistic...it IS nice to see they've finally made some progress in features though.
Rt97 competitor on the horizon?

It's really simple.. Don't expect to be impressed unless you are looking to be impressed with the simplicity and ease of use.

There is alot of P25 stuff out there, just depends on the band. Alot is in the 800mhz range as many agencies are upgrading. UHF and VHF is not as common as 800. I tossed hundreds of XTL5000's and XTS2500/XTS5000 in the dumpster last year on a project as no one wanted them. 
The 8000/8500 are very good products. I use mine for both work, public safety and ham and love them. P25 in ham is simple and for the most part clean because the guys using it are using quality LMR gear and not some CCR. I think that's an advantage of P25 over DMR in ham for me. The audio is so much nicer. See what the future of the 8000/8500 is with the new NEXT on the horrizons...

https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0531/2856/0817/files/MXT500_Setup_1.04.exe?v=1640104635
Or just got to Midlands page and click setup = 
https://midlandusa.com/collections/micromobile/products/mxt500-micromobile®two-way-radio
 
 

https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0531/2856/0817/files/MXT500_Setup_1.04.exe?v=1640104635
Or just got to Midlands page and click setup = 
https://midlandusa.com/collections/micromobile/products/mxt500-micromobile®two-way-radio
 
 

I know that some Kenwood diehards will disagree with me, that is fine, but I tried the NX stuff and they have measurably worse receivers, inferior audio and features that I didn't deem critical for our application. I reached the same conclusion as the other guys who chose APX over the NXDN stuff. Unfortunately, my budget didn't have an extra zero at the end of the check, otherwise I would've certainly chosen APX radios over the XPR as well...
XPR radios provide 100% crystal clear audio pretty much all the way to the end coverage, even in noisy environments, inside a car, inside a store... etc.
People who have the gain on ther mics +20dB, forcing me to lower the volume... etc...  is a thing of the past.... And the APX radios are even better from what people who own both keep telling me... and like I said before, unfortunately the budget isn't that rich to own and operate a fleet of APX8000 and APX8500...
G.

Very nice products is the understatement of the year... hahaha... mewantstwenty!!
I agree with the audio suffering in DMR if CCRs are used... on my system, everything is SL/XPR so the audio quality is pretty good. Isn't the older XTS radios use the IMBE vocoder vs the AMBE2 on the DMR and P25 Phase2 stuff?
 
G.
 

I edited the original post for clarification on the "two meter / 2m" confusion. I appreciate the feedback. 

That's too bad. I would have taken a couple of the XTS-5000's you trashed for free. A buddy got a used one for 800 MHz which he's using as a scanner for the local PD.
I have some Kenwood NX-200's and NX-300's for NXDN. They use the same VOCODER chip as the Kenwood P25 radios I've got.
https://purcellradio.com/Downloads/Radio/Kenwood/nx-200-300_brochure_nx-200-300-brochure.pdf
The sound quality should be about the same I would assume between the P25 and NXDN radios.