P25 question

[stay-con]

Could somebody point me to a link that explains if P25 if a "yes you have to have this" for police radios?

[Bill_G]

Can you be a little more specific? There is a whole subsection on P25 on this board, and Google will yield a brazillion hits.

[stay-con]

Can you be a little more specific?

I'm sorry, I thought I was.

Is P25 a mandated requirement for public safety or not.
One way or the other, is there a specific link, www.something.gov for example, that states it plainly?

My question is related to supporting the communications for a small rural town police and fire services.
As it is, they're going to have to switch over to narrow band next year and the additional cost of P25 is a concern.

Jeff

[xmo]

P25 is not a "requirement" for public safety by the FCC or anyone else, however, it is strongly recommended for interoperability reasons, especially for those agencies who choose to go digital. P25 is a requirement of many grants.

Look at the Safecom narrowbanding guide:

http://www.safecomprogram.gov/NR/rdonly ... _Final.pdf

If you are interested in the specific system features that are mandatory or optional within the P25 standards, have a look at the Project 25 Statement of Requirements. Google "P25 SOR"

[stay-con]

P25 is not a "requirement" for public safety by the FCC or anyone else, however, it is strongly recommended for interoperability reasons, especially for those agencies who choose to go digital. P25 is a requirement of many grants.

Thank you for the response.

This answers a several key issues. "Grant money" being the carrot to go with P25 in an otherwise dismal budget scenario.
Interoperability is less of an issue when you're out in the sticks and not having to deal with large metropolitan agencies that have a bigger trough to dip into.
The biggest issue at this point is replacing defective and soon to be obsolete equipment for the upcoming narrow banding requirement.

Odd, the Safecom link http://www.safecomprogram.gov/NR/rdonly ... _Final.pdf didn't appear in the actual posted comment. And I found this: http://tsiec.region49.org/SOR-2010.pdf regarding the P25 SoR.

Yeah, I know, I *should* know all this stuff, but it makes dealing with mis-informed hearsay a whole lot easier when you can drop reliable printed information on the desks of those that have the final say as to what they want / need and can afford.

Jeff

[escomm]

Analog was already interoperable.

Sorry, couldn't help myself

[motorola_otaku]

Analog was already interoperable.

Sorry, couldn't help myself

Hell, 40 or more years ago almost every police department in the state was on one of two lowband frequencies, and the highway patrol was on one lowband frequency. Can't get much more interoperable than that.

[arlojanis]

I remember too. 37.260, 37.180, 42.9 mc worked for all of Texas. 15 kc mod on many units after 5 kc narrow banding.