Batboard

We are using analog Saber's with DES secure boards installed. Eventually, we are going to upgrade to XTS series radios, but for now, we are stuck using our old analog Sabers. We ordered a new Quantar recently, which is now up and running. When we ordered it, we were assured that it would handle the DES that we use now and would also be able to handle the DES-OFB / DES boards that we plan to order in our XTS radios.

A problem was recognized last week when we loaded up secure keys into our Sabers and they only worked on direct. In the clear, the repeater worked fine, but when we turned on the DES.....nothing. The repeater didn't even key up. I called the radio shop and they looked into the matter. They ended up making several calls to Motorola and were told different things by different people, but the majority of the Motorola techs that our local tech talked to said that what we want to do is not possible. Motorola told our guy that the Quantar doesn't support the old "16 bit" (I think) encryption. He said that our choices were to downgrade the firmware and something else in the Quantar, and order some other part for it, and use it with the Sabers, or leave it as is and order the XTS radios, which would work fine with the Quantar. The Motorola tech also said that if we downgrade the firmware, then the repeater would not work with the XTS radios.

I asked about the firmware downgrade, and if that would preclude us from upgrading it again in the future to use the repeater with our XTS radios, once we order them, and I was not assured that it would work.

Obviously, if we had the money right now to go out and buy 10 XTS portables, we would have done that, rather than sinking $1000 into DES boards, programing, and labor on the old analog Sabers. So, the last option provided by Motorola isn't really an option for us. Our analog Sabers were designed to be a bandaid approach to our encyption problem. We absolutely need secure comms, but we can't afford to go out and get all new XTS portables right now. We figured we could use the Sabers until adequate funding is available to purchase the XTS radios. When we were ordering the Quantar, we were assured that it would pass through the DES traffic we currently use and also the DES-OFB that we plan to upgrade to in the future. Assuming we decide to go with their first option....downgrading the firmware, could we then upgrade it again when the time comes to go to the XTS series radios? The Motorola tech told our local Motorola tech that we would also have to order an additional part for the Quantar to make this work. Our tech did not know what that would cost us. If it is expensive, than this option might not work for us either, since we have already spent all of our grant money used to upgrade our radio system. Other than the two options the Motorola tech gave us, do we have any other options?

Our goal was to phase in the XTS radios, 3 or 4 at a time, while still using our old Sabers, and to have both series of radios communicate securely using DES, when used together, and for the XTS radios to use DES-OFB when no Sabers were being used for that particular operation. We ordered what we were told was our only option for a repeater that was capable of handling this task....the Quantar. It was supposed to pass through anything it received, clear voice, astro voice, DES, DVP, DES-XL, DVP-XL, DES-OFB, etc. Now we are being told that this is not going to work.

Any suggestions / ideas would be greatly appreciated. I should add that we are a 3 man PD, with very little funding available, so any expensive additions to our radio system are not really a viable option for us. I'm really hoping that the current system WILL work, and someone is just giving our local radio shop some bad info.

I would start by holding your sales person accountable.

If they said it would work - tell them "well, we gave you $xx,xxx because you said it would work, you have an obligation to make it work at no cost to us."

It's not your fault it doesn't work. I would take a stern upper hand with these people.

That's the impression that I got from reading your post. Now, if the information they had was incorrect to begin with, I'll take it back, but you need to hold your vendor(s) accountable.

I would go back and look at the sales order, as well as what written spec's you gave them. If you have it written down that these are the spec's you wanted, and they acknoledged them, then they should be responsible for making it work.

-Alex

I believe Motorola dropped support for 12 kbps DES/Securenet in the Quantar two or three years ago.

I'm pretty sure an older Quantar will pass 12 kbps DES, and after reprogramming, P25 DES-OFB as well. I know it wasn't possible for the repeater to support both formats at the same time. You basically had to program it "Analog Only" for 12 kbps DES support, and program it "ASTRO CAI Capable" for P25 DES-OFB. This is just a programming change, and not a hardware or firmware change... So as long as this reprogramming of the repeater between an encryption mode switch isn't a problem for you, an older Quantar is what you need--if you can find one.

Another thing to be aware of, is that I don't believe the DIU supports 12 kbps DES/Securenet at all, so if you use wireline control for encrypted dispatch transmissions, you may out of luck there...

If you can get old firmware that supports 12 kbps DES for your current Quantar, I would think that would be what you need. Sounds like you just need basic repeater functionality, so I doubt you would need any of the improvments or additions in the latest firmware. I'd keep pressing your sales person or tech support person, as I sometimes get the feeling some of these people are too lazy to fully research the problem, and just tell you "no, it can't be done".

Thanks for the replies. I talked to our local Motorola shop today and they said that Motorola is sending them the old firmware, which they will be installing on the repeater as soon as they get it. They said that should fix the problem. We have firmware version 13, and need to go back to at least version 10 to support our analog sabers with DES, according to the Motorola people. The question that I posed, which could not be answered by our local people, was are we going to be able to upgrade that firmware to 13 again, once we buy XTS radios? They best answer that I could get today to this question was that we "should" be able to.

Assuming the firmware downgrade works, it is only going to fix part of the problem though, as I see it. It will get us up and running, using our analog Sabers, which is what we need right now, and that part of it is great. However, our plan to gradually migrate to P25 radios over the next four to five years seems like it is out of the question now. We wanted to use the analog Sabers with the XTS radios, both with DES encryption, once we started buying the XTS radios later this year or early next year. Eventually, we would replace all of the Sabers with XTS radios. However, during the transition period, we need (and were told that we could) use the Sabers with the XTS and have them both communicate securely using DES. Then, once the Sabers were phased out, use DES-OFB with the XTS....and pass all of this through the Quantar. It seems now, if I'm understanding all of this correctly, that we will need to make drastic changes, all at once, and not be able to gradually phase in the P25 radios over time (as our budget would allow). Once we start using our first XTS radio, I guess we would have to upgrade the firmware again, assuming you can do so, to make the Quantar compatible with the XTS radios. In doing so, we'd be shutting out the Sabers again. So, it appears as though we're getting locked into a position where we would need to buy 10 XTS radios @ $3500 each to replace the 10 Sabers we use now, as opposed to buying them 3 or so at a time, which would be much more economically feasable. That four to five year transition period that we thought we would have doesn't seem like it is possible now, unless I am missing something.

Buying an old Quanter isn't an option. We bought this one with grant money, which is now all gone, and we have nothing else budgeted for radios this year, other than the money we just spend to get the DES modules installed in all of our old Sabers.

Yes, all we need is basic repeater functionality, and we do not get dispatched over the radio. We are not dispatched, like your typical law enforcement agency. We take calls at our office and respond on our own, with no dispatchers involved. At our office, we have a Spectra, with DES, that is set up as a base unit, and the agents in the office use that, or another portable, to talk to the units in the field. We only planned to use the Quanter as a secure operations channel. Up to this point, we have a circa 1980's suitcase repeater with DES that we had been using as a mountain top repeater. That was our only repeater, putting out a booming 22 watts, at that! Before we finally fry that thing, I convinced my supervisors that we needed something better, which is where the Quantar came into play. Now we have it, and everyone is ready to start using it with the DES enabled, and I'm looking like the idiot because it doesn't work. I'm hoping this firmware downgrade works, but in solving one problem, I believe it will be creating another.

Thanks again for the replies.

alex wrote:I would start by holding your sales person accountable.

If they said it would work - tell them "well, we gave you $xx,xxx because you said it would work, you have an obligation to make it work at no cost to us."

It's not your fault it doesn't work. I would take a stern upper hand with these people.

That's the impression that I got from reading your post. Now, if the information they had was incorrect to begin with, I'll take it back, but you need to hold your vendor(s) accountable.

I would go back and look at the sales order, as well as what written spec's you gave them. If you have it written down that these are the spec's you wanted, and they acknoledged them, then they should be responsible for making it work.

-Alex

Our local shop never dealt with anything like this before. Our salesperson was up front with us when I was asking all of the questions when placing our order. I explained, in great detail, what we were looking for. The guy was not sure what the Quantar could do or what options to order with it, etc., and he told me that, and he called Motorola and posed my questions to them. He ordered exactly what they told him to. Now, I'm anxious to see how big M responds, since, as I see it, this is their screw up.

here's my recommendation.


you CANNOT run analog securenet (read that as DES-XL) *AND* have ASTRO CAI (P25) enabled at the same time.

you can have ANALOG and SECURENET or ANALOG and ASTRO CAI, but not mix the two. the quantar doesn't care if the ASTRO CAI being received is secure or not - it just re-clocks and re-transmits the data.

what you should do is when you order XTS radios, order them with dual mode secure boards that support DES-XL *AND* DES-OFB.

when you have replaced all the sabers, re-program the station to ANALOG and ASTRO CAI, switch the radios to astro mode and utilize DES-OFB.

you will not have to upgrade the firmware in the quantar to do this....

and it allows you to phase in astro portables (XTS's) using DES-XL as you can afford them - once you have them, simple 1 day programming change in the station and all the portables... and whammo - you are all running P25 voice w/ DES-OFB


p.s.... i think there is a note in the most recent release of the astro station RSS that notes something to the effect that once you use the newest software to program the station, BUH-BYE analog securenet... NO LONGER SUPPORTED.



doug

I Love /\/\ sales personnel, /\/\ Customer Response Center, /\/\ Make Order Team and the /\/\ Quantar SP Bid & Quote Brand personnel .... they're lucky to know their lower posterior from their elbows let alone the products they represent but hey, they all have their Master Business Administration Degrees! Point them at a Two-way Radio Infrastructure Base Station Product and they don't have a CLUE in HELL what they're looking at!

Your Quantar station should have been ordered with the X598AFSP Option for Securenet Operation with the Q401 Software which was the last release by the Quantar Product Group and was Canceled as a Standard option at the end of 2001. With the X598AFSP you would have been required the X461ABSP020xx Bid & Quote number to go along with SP option and lots of $$$$$$$.

Now as to the compatibility between 12 Kb Securenet (25 kHz Channel Spacing) and the newer Astro / Astro-Secure P25, First Type (12.5 kHz Channel Spacing), There is NO compatibility! The older 12 Kb Analog Wide Band 3 by 4 QAM Securenet requires a 25 kHz RF Channel Bandwidth and Spacing between each channel due to the nature of the encryption / decryption scheme. The newer Astro / Astro-Secure uses a narrower Digital 4 by 2 QAM signaling scheme on the 12.5 kHz RF Channel Bandwidth and Spacing FDMA format due to the encryption / decryption scheme and never shall the two work together!.

The newest APCO P25 Second Type is incompatible with the older 12 Kb Securenet and Astro-Secure P25 First Type since the latest and greatest encryption / decryption scheme uses even a narrower RF Channel Digital Bandwidth of 6.25 kHz requirement, Linear FDMA format and different Digital signaling Platforms. This Digital signaling format is only sold with the STR3000 Infrastructure Base Stations currently on 700 / 800 MHz Digital Trunking Systems.

Once you have completely switched to XTS Astro / Astro-Secure Handheld portables, your authorized /\/\ service shop can easily switch from the older legacy 12 Kb Securenet to the Astro / Astro-Secure mode with the latest RSS / CSS on their laptop computer and Write the new data into the Quantar Base Station Repeater's Code Plug.[/u]

You may want to have your FTR and sales guy consult with the Motorola Secure Group in Schaumberg. I'm a bit concerned that if you load an older generation of the Quantar firmware into a brand new Quantar, you MAY have one (or more) compatability issues. Don't assume everything is 100% OK, even if it appears to load and work, at first blush. You could get bit (and hard) by a problem by mixing old firmware into a new Quantar. For instance, the SCM is very sensitive to this. Make sure you have the Secure Boys in Schaumberg give your local FTR the COMPLETE low down on this unusual combination of new hardware with old firmware. You might be OK, but don't assume so. Hopefully, the Motorola guys have been there/done this before.

Good Luck!

larry

While you're at it, contact Jody Brown in Schaumburg as she is the Quantar SP (Specialty Products) Quote Person, regarding the X598AFSP Option Securenet Operation. There's also a SP Quantar Securenet Downgrade Field Modification Kit that was set up in 2003 which is in their COF and Oracle IIi Databases, as a QLNxxxxA but I just can't quite remember the way I set it up in the databases. The SP Quantar Securenet Downgrade Field Modification Kit which contains the Q401 (Fourth Quarter 2001) Software will require the customer's /\/\ service shop to read the Quantar's Base Station Electronic Backplane I.D. and Serial Numbers and supplying that information when submitting the Factory Order through the system. This is the /\/\ process set up in the Tech Editor's Rules or the F.O. will automatically be placed on a D1 HOLD till Jody Brown and the Tech Editor can review the information.

As Larry has pointed out there's an issue with the Securenet Downgrade and the first thing that comes to mind is the Q401 Software. Your /\/\ service shop can not use a current version RSS / CSS Softwae with the older Securenet Q401 Version otherwise the service personnel can easily blow away the Downgrade software version by their own mistake therefore placing your station back to the original configuration as it shipped from the /\/\ factory. Compatibility between the Quantar Base Stations is not an issue otherwise it would have been caught in the Factory's Final Back End Test Area and the Factory's Quality Audit Dept. before the station shipped.

As far as contacting /\/\ Secure Design Center for their opinion on the SP Downgrade Software. Well I can't think of a current engineering individual within that department that could provide the knowledge I'm sharing with you right now. Whom ever you were able to contact would probably transfer you back to Jody Brown and she would need to contact the Quantar's Standard Product Group's Engineers for further information.

Dan

i am just curious about something here.

the only way i found out about the lack of securenet capability (12kbs) was with the version 13(?) readme.txt file in the quantar rss.

i would have thought that this MAJOR change would have warranted some kind of SRN or something...tech bulletin, whatever.

granted, 12kbs securenet is going away quickly....however, there are still many fed/3 letter/military agencies using it daily - and all it takes is one wayward MSS tech to go out and do a simple read/write of the station codeplug to neuter the station....at least that's how i read the note.

i've not run into this "in the field" so to speak, but i would hazard a guess that there is a pop-up in the RSS that warns that the codeplug will be upgraded upon writing the station with version 13 software.....

this is why the old addage of "keeping that old software handy" applies....and I make it absolute habit to use only the latest version that's compatible with the device to read and write it....

if only everyone would read those "readme.txt" files....

dan, you sure remember a LOT of stuff...good info...keep it up.


doug