[Scan-DC] Trunked Radio audio quality

[Bote Man]

Some remarks, in no useful order:

#1 I didn't know Muttgummery fire had started using 800, other
than for testing purposes. I thought the big switch was to come
in April; heck, I might even make a special trip to D.C. 
to witness the big event. It's gonna be a sorry scene when
I can't tune to 154.16 and hear them. :-( x 10

B) The jurisdictions that you list as having poor audio quality
are all using digital modulation. Arlington is still using
their ancient, antiquated, old-fashioned Project 16 analog
trunked system. (It's amazing that police and fire fighters
aren't dropping dead every day, to read the Big-M press releases
about how much better things get with a NEW, IMPROVED digital
trunked system.)

Also, digital radio systems are not designed to improve
audio quality, they are intended to reduce bandwidth consumption.
You seem to be an unfortunate victim of the cellular and
long distance carrier ads that imply that "digital is better";
it's only better for the carrier, because they can squeeze
the daylights out of your voice and cram more calls down
their channels. Their promise of "pin drop" quality is
just a sales gimmick. Sorry about that.

Bote
F.E.C. milepost 339.3 
Look -> http://pages.prodigy.net/bote/rail
Listen -> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/scanaudio_FLL (DEAD)
Live -> http://www.fecrs.com


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Eco14@aol.com
> Sent: Tuesday, 18 March, 2003 22:55
> Subject: [Scan-DC] Trunked Radio audio quality
> 
> I was sitting at work playing with one of our new $3,000 trunked radios and 
> was disappointed in the audio quality.  It sounds like people talking with 
> their mouths full and their head in a trash can.  On the Montgomery system 
> there's a patch between the 800 and VHF so that could help explain part of 
> it.  I was listening to both VHF & 800 at the same time and the audio quality 
> on VHF is far superior.
> 
> So I flipped over a few zones to DC, Fairfax, Frederick, & Loudon.  Same 
> garbage.  The best quality signal seemed to coming from Arlington's radio 
> system.  I hope the audio gets better in the future.  If this is what 
> millions of dollars gets you, we got ripped.