Talk group misuse, radio ID mismanagement, failure to use time slots and color codes correctly, overuse of worldwide or large talk groups, inconsistent use of call sign identification, programming errors (code plug issues), “parrot” repeater abuse, poor mic discipline, failure to respect ptt over IP delays, use of unsupported or cloned radios, failure to understand digital voice distortion, misuse of hotspots, over reliance on Brandmeister dashboard, etc.. Just to name a few.
@@lesfarmer5111 Public safety has analog, P25, NXDN, DMR and odd balls too. It's not just amateur radio. It's all radio. Interoperability is a huge problem in LMR too.
The big manufacturers suffer from the "not invented here" syndrome. How much more money would it really take to put more than one digital mode in the same radio? There is practically no D-Star or System Fusion where I live. So obviously I won't be buying an Icom or Yaesu digital radio. I really like the quality of the Japanese rigs, but I'm not paying for a mode that I can't use. The silly thing is that if you do have the option of the big three digital modes in your area, that means that you need three different radios. That part really is silly.
Yeah, I think this is the common sentiment. I spent a few hours on the radio talking with some people about this last night too, and literally none of them agreed that it's good to have so many standards. Basically, what you said stands true. Digital modes are software. I doubt VERY VERY seriously, that any of these radios use ASICs to do these digital modes, so it's literally software. UNLESS, and this is the case, it's "not invented here" causing licensing issues. If Yaesu invented Fusion because it served some community function, they would allow Motorola to implement it in their radios, and Motorola absolutely would in some radios because it would amount to a little bit of code to do it and people would absolutely want the option if it came at no real cost. It's ridiculous to believe it's anything other than vendor lock-in.
13:09 @HamRadio2.0 Jason how is it that dmr is not used correctly? I use DMR with my anytone. I’m really not over the top with DMR. I do like using a digital signal on a simplex frequency.
I've used DMR enough to understand it. Other than that, I personally am not interested in digital voice. HOWEVER, the spirit of ham radio IS experimentation. I love that we have options.
100% Agree with your point of view Jason. As a new(ish) HAM, I love that we have all sorts of different ways to “Play Radio”. Also a great way for new Technicians to enjoy the hobby.
FreeDV is my favorite digital mode. I use it on HF. I only own analog equipment and I don't really have any intentions of buying digital equipment at this time.
The answer is yes. All we needed was DSTAR. Instead of fully developing DSTAR, hams got distracted by DMR and Yaesu wanted their own piece of the action with C4FM. It's really a shame of what could have been. We got nothing more with DMR and C4FM.
@@leewardwx it's the oldest, with the oldest codec, so it doesn't sound as good as some of the newer ones. also, in my opinion, it is harder to program than the others.
@@HamRadio2 DMR has been the most difficult I've used (id database, time slot, color code, TGIDs, allowed TGs), despite being the most popular. D-Star is relatively easy just set frequency, dv mode, callsign and key-up, registration is probably the pain point for most. Still wrapping my head around fusion/wires-x linking, just seems odd to me.
Have tried the big 3 and still keep coming back to D-Star where I started in 2006. I just sold my ID-51a and now have a 5100, 52 and a Zumspot running WPSD. I updated the Zumspot to Pi Zero WH2 it works great and the new Pi was only $26. My YSF radios and DMR gather dust.
My area is almost exclusively DMR for digital phone. Since it's an open standard, it would be nice if Yaesu, Icom and Kenwood would be offer an option. As for using DMR correctly, one thing that pops in my head is mic gain. On a net someone will be so low it's hard to hear and the next guy/gal comes in at a painfully loud volume.
I get that licensing plays a role in these digital voice formats, but in the end it comes down to Kodak’s and software. All radios should be able to do all formats.
It is typical corporate greed and inflexibility. Yaesu and Icom should open up their secret book and let Fusion and D-Star be open source, that is the real solution. This is amateur radio it SHOULD be open source. It's almost akin to having an off-the shelf mass-produced International Space Station from Honda.
My favorite is Wires X. Very versatile and quite simple, once you collect all the components and become familiar with the various modes. I would love to check out M-17. Thanks for the discussion..73's
Best digital mode is whatever mode the local infrastructure folk can afford to and have the manpower to maintain. Or whatever one wants to run on their own hotspot. Buying a mode where only the jankest local repeater is on that mode with low coverage and low users, is just a way to listen to the sounds of silence... hahaha... Around here it's a giant multi-state DMR network the club founders put five figure dollars into to cover all that territory. The rest are just "also rans"... and I build and maintain analog repeaters that are completely dead most days, so I could start begging for money like that to build another network, but no point really... sites are expensive and members are dwindling in all clubs. M17? Just a novelty to play with at home on the hotspot, really. Finding a consistent userbase of even ten users would be a miracle even if we paid big bucks to put it on a mountain with 200 miles of coverage. Say three thousand bucks to set it up from scratch with quality hardware, maybe more... and a couple thousand a year in site expenses? Need ten users willing to plunk down $200/mo just to not have it take away from other club member's money they expect quality systems out of... not happening. Not without a benefactor with money to blow... The economics of infrastructure is rough these days.
Peaked my curiosity. How do people not use dmr correctly? I use all the digital voice modes. Would say my most frequently used is dmr, least is dstar, ysf is the easiest to get on the air. D star feels like an impossibility. P25 can be expensive. But I love that we have so many modes.
I totally agree that ham radio is, in part, about inventing and trying new modes. "Standardizing" would go against one of the very justifications of amateur radio, at least in the US, as noted right at the start of Part 97, to "contribute to the advancement of the radio art". HOWEVER (so here's my however), amateur radio modes need to be OPEN. Part 97 prohibits modes with "the purpose of obscuring the meaning of any communication". As far as I can tell, the FCC thinks that a mode is not obscuring communication if anyone can BUY a radio or decoder for the mode. I respectfully disagree. It is most definitely obscuring the communication, with the clear intent that the obscuration requires people to buy their radio or decoder! In my opinion, you succeed in not obscuring a communication if and only if anyone can, in principle, BUILD a decoder for the mode from scratch (e.g. not have to buy a specific proprietary chip), using clear, open, and readily available documentation. D-STAR, as an example, is not open and is patented, with its own undocumented audio codec. DMR is an open standard and is unencumbered by licenses, so yay! - not obscured. My understanding is that C4FM is open, but Yaesu's Fusion adaptation has its own undocumented protocols. Any, again in my opinion, any encoding used in amateur radio, in order to not violate Part 97, needs to be openly documented and reproducible. This goes right back to one of our purposes being the advancement of the radio art. We can't participate in that advancement if the art is increasingly hidden in proprietary, commercial black boxes. AD1M
Actually all of the modes are "open" meaning that any manufacturer can make a radio with that mode. Example: hotspots, which have all the modes. The AMBE codec is proprietary and is licensed by DVSI. That's the limitation. That's also why M17 is an actual open source mode, it doesn't use the DVSI codec.
DMR was the choice for my local ham club. I and one other member have been hosting our weekly DMR net for months. I really appreciate the clarity. I have the two additional digital voice modes that I have not ventured into Yaesu System Fusion and DStar. Also, I just received my Connect Systems CS7000 M17 Plus days ago. I really like the backstory for M17, “By Hams for Hams.” This is in contrast to a commercial standard that gets adopted or morphs into ham usage.
Favorite Digital Voice mode (if I had a favorite) - C4FM/Fusion. That's simply because I have more Yaesu handhelds, and I think it sounds better than the others. But, to answer your question - Do we have too many digital voice modes? - yes. Do we need to standardize around one? - NO. Let hams be hams, and experiment. If you don't want to have to 'keep up' with all of the digital voice modes out there - then choose one; it's not rocket science. So yes, Jason. I completely agree with you.
There's an XKCD comic out there with two characters talking about there being 14 different programming languages and vowing to create a "standard"... which just means there are 15 different languages. People are going to use what they feel suits them best and that's just what people do; old ones will die and new ones will come. Trying to control it artificially won't work.
That's absolutely true. We can't control vendors doing everything they can to create artificial lock-in. Maybe if you could get enough hams to agree on a standard (LMAO) we could boycott the others, but good luck with that. What I haven't seen is one other person who says that they LIKE having all these different modes. I am programming language agnostic. I've done software development for so long that the difference tends to be syntax or available libraries. We get better performance out of CPP, but we can get even better performance out of ASM (assuming you are competent and your own code isn't a performance bottleneck) but Python is amazing for throwing together a quick simple API or admin script. The difference is, that you can use all of those languages and libraries together, and most large applications do use multiple frameworks/languages. Tell me again how DMR compliments or interacts with Fusion to make a better end product? All it serves to do is keep my Yaesu off of the repeaters in my new community. Python doesn't cost CPP programmers anything.
Good video. My favorite and most used digital mode is DMR. Love PA statewide, 31421 on BrandMeister. Dstar would be my next mode. I'm not familiar with M17. I've seen the Connect systems M17/DMR radio. On the M17 radio with the DMR, does it support promiscuous mode?
In Montana, for digital, DMR is king. The most used repeaters are Hytera machines that do DMR. I have a FTM-400 but do not use Fusion because no one would hear me.
Here in CT, ARES is linked state wide with DMR. We have ARES analog nets but their coverage is limited by repeater/radio wattage. What does ARES chapters in other states use as a standard? I have to admit I have a radio for DMR, Fusion and D-Star digital standards. 73, W1RKB
I have FT5D, FTM-500 and an Anytone 868UV. I like the Fusion/WiresX because it's easier to run on the fly. DMR is a pain to change on the fly when something is outside the existing codeplug.
@@HamRadio2 Yipper. Didn't say that I couldn't, just that the WiresX is easier. Unless you know the number for less common DMR "rooms", you're stuck with looking them up somewhere where as with WiresX once you connect to the repeater the names of the "rooms" are right there.
P25 and DMR should be the standard, just like the emergency services and commercial users. Yes theyvare somewhat proprietary modes, however they are the most widely used. All the other modes seem to be only an effort to corner the amateur market.
@@Tobys-Dad What would you prefer? All the other digital modes use the same vocoder (except for M17), so it’s basically the same thing packaged differently
I have handhelds for both D-Star and DMR, not being able to carry both, I would like to have both modes in one box. I would not want everything linked for the reasons you gave.
The difference with HF obviously there’s no repeaters but for the most part local repeaters are acquired for each individual digital voice standard like in my area we have no D Star repeaters
First of all, we need to clarify why we would even want to use digital voice modes instead of analog. Once we understand this, and why large numbers of people don’t use digital modes-such as the notoriously poor audio quality-we could start developing a new digital voice mode by combining these factors. However, it’s clear that no matter what protocol we develop, the major manufacturers are unlikely to implement it. Nonetheless, it might be worth a try if the largest amateur radio organizations could organize a roundtable discussion with the manufacturers on this topic.
I wish they would have a standardized Digital mode, I think that would make it easier to talk to more people without shelling out money on different radios.
I use DMR, but I think all of these modes have some advantages. DMR radios are the cheapest, but have quite low audio quality and are hard to set up. C4FM on the other hand is easy to gei into but its more expensive. I'm not very familiar with other ones, but I'm pretty sure they have advantages
Well DMR is C4FM also. DMR is C4FM TDMA while Fusion is C4FM FDMA. They use almost the same codec and sound almost exactly the same. I personally think DMR sounds better than any of them
The problem for some areas is in getting coordination for a repeater. Myself, I like the sound of P25 or C4FM over that of DStar or DMR. I've been able to set up hotspots for DStar and for C4FM, but DMR has been too challenging for me, so a fellow ham has been setting up DMR for me. I wish one handheld could do multiple digital modes, but manufacturers seem to be against that. Maybe M17 will eventually push the others aside. 73 de n0km
C4FM signals carry so much further readable than analog.. I do think it’s a shame there isn’t one FM Digital standard… I blame the manufacturers for trying to each make their own hook of proprietary protocol… end result.. they have to start making new analog radios bc nobody wants to pay for a digital mode that you can rarely talk on over RF… if we’re going to rely on the internet, just as we’ll use your phone.. my opinion
I agree: options are a good thing, and I really hope M17 catches on. However, it would be nice if one radio could do more than one mode, just like you can buy a scanner that decodes multiple digital modes. I think the CS7000-M17 Plus is a good start, but it's not quite ideal in that it functions like two different radios depending which side you boot up. I'm thinking something like one ham-specific mode (D-STAR/YSF/M17) and one general LMR mode (probably DMR, but perhaps some hams might want P25 or NXDN instead) in a radio. I can't imagine it's too difficult, especially since everything but M17 uses DVSI codecs anyway. I'm not particularly fond of Uniden's scanner business model of charging for software unlocking of additional digital modes, but maybe this is the way to go for a ham radio that does all the modes and the user can decide which ones they want in their radio. Who am I kidding? I'd still own a whole lot of radios anyway, even if there's was one that did everything. 😆
Oh standards...the infinite debate about universal standards. Here's the thing about how I use Amateur radio - 1. As a tool. 2. As a hobby. In that order. My primary goal in getting licensed has been to use it while traveling remotely by vehicle. I use FM/C4FM, APRS, P.25, VARA FM and a few others as practical tools. FM for vehicle to vehicle communications (C4FM if Im lucky to be with other Yaseu users), APRS lets me wife and kids keep tabs on me in the boonies, P.25/Vara lets me get weather downloads and send messages in remote areas. I would love to get an FT-891 for HF, but I don't need it. I love learning and I love the hobby side as well, but I get his point: When you use something as a tool, its better to just have it work. DMR is ridiculous in this application (hotspot? no thanks) and a basic, open source digital voice mode that is universally accepted would go a long way to helping people of various brand persuasion to communicate. If radios were semi-modern and could offload some signal processing to a phone via bluetooth, then we wouldn't have this issue, but thats a long way off. That being said, I also see your point about the hobby being about experimentation (it is) and that there are commercial radios that may serve the tool use case better, but the networks that make HAM a valuable tool aren't there outside of HAM. GMRS is the next best thing and...meh. repeaters are sparse, there is no APRS, and there are few useful tools there...plus its users are a mess. For me? I agree. It would be great to have at least one open source digital voice modulation that anyone could easily add to a radio for cheap.
C4FM for 2 reasons, 1.bought a ft-991a for the shack in the box rig and it came with it. 2. It seems to be much easier to configure than DMR. However, DMR seems to be the favorite among the locals to which I say more power to them if that's the mode they want to use.
Each digital mode developed tends to link you to one of the big three standards locking the user to one manufacturer or another. The whole reason for amateur radio is for amateurs to communicate with each other independently of the manufacturer. I know lots of amateurs who wish a freely developed digital codex was universally available. I am not knocking the other digital modes but a free codex would also make it cheaper in the long run. Repeaters would not have to convert from one digital mode to another again improving communication and cost.
I’d like to see M17 succeed as it’s open source. I use all the big 3 DV options. I least like DMR. Fragmented over differing networks (BM, DMR+, TGIF) with too few users. Add on the codeplug hell - not for me. I can do it, but don’t want to. Only TG91 is busy. The only plus point is the hardware AKA radio cost can be very low, hence the wider adoption of that format.
Outside of Echolink I have not played with any of the digital voice modes. My area is a mix of DMR, Dstar, and Fusion. There are three Dstar repeaters, two Fusion repeaters, and one DMR repeater within a 25 mile radius of my house. I am leaning more toward Fusion because several members of my club have Fusion radios and we have Fusion repeater tied to the West Michigan Fusion network of repeaters. In theory if I had a Fusion capable radio I could communicate with my club members in southern Michigan while I am driving to and from deer camp in northern Michigan. I am curious as to why you say most people don't use DMR properly in ham radio. I would love to see a video on that.
I tell you want i want to see; more and affordable all-in-one mobile radios. As a company truck driver & radio enthusiast, I'm currently looking at my C.B., LMR, GMRS HT, & Quad-Band HT that I use for Ham & Airband monitoring as well as channel scanning which channel an unfamiliar terminal is using with my company. 4 radios 1 GPS & 1 Electronic logging device (tablet). Oh, and 1 AM/FM/XM stereo. Electronics everywhere.
You both make very valid points. For what it's worth, Wayne is correct (factually) about most of what he has said. But I also think we need all the options. The problem, is manufacturers not working together to bring more people to common ground. I personally think DMR is the superior mode for a few reasons, but HAM's have made a dogs breakfast of it! (It's perfect in the more simple, commercial/professional world, which I work in as my career!). PS - check out the new FreeDV RADE HF mode - it is unbelievably good! 73
Years ago, I used to think there should be only one digital voice mode so I only needed one radio. Then I realized people much more intelligent than me thought outside the box and made a hotspot that does all modes instead of the radio. This is a much better solution. FWIW, I have multiple radios each for D-Star, Fusion, and DMR. D-Star is the one I use the vast majority of the time. Despite the fact that I have 4-5 DMR radios, IMO DMR sucks. I have been on it for probably close to 15 years. I thought it sucked 15 years ago and hundreds of QSOs later, I still do.
I appreciate your insights and logic. I agree that consolidating to one network has more negatives than positives. That said, I believe there are two things that would make everything better and solve the issues. One is HTs supporting multiple modes so we’re not having to switch radios to switch networks. The second is to standardize and simplify the programming software. That’s both a coding and a UIX challenge. Make it easy enough to program with Chirp.
Create your own talk group and chat group works the best keep the multimode network to minimum and " Bridge modes need a good amount of attention in any application to ensure the best data relay signals over the network".
Hey Jason here on Florida's west coast the repeaters are hardly used I haven't bothered to buy a digital radio or even want one at this time... if I want to know what the weather is 50 miles from my qth I'll check the weather app on my phone... that said Ham Radio is the experimentation and innovation platform on the planet and it still fascinated me how many new modes are coming on line I remember reading an article in QST many years ago about the need to come up with an alternative to SSB. These certainly qualify, and digital formats will evolve even more as technology advances. 73's W4THX
I think the point is interoperability. If I want to send a message to someone else over the Internet, I shouldn’t only be able to communicate with other PC users. I should be able to also communicate with Mac users or I shouldn’t only be able to email other Outlook users with Outlook, and have to buy another email program to talk with users that use Thunderbird for email. Maybe not tying them all together because as you said, it would cause massive congestion. But the ability to pick and choose what standard you wanted on the fly would be awesome. (like I can choose to transmit FT8 and in the same program switch to FT4).
My favorite digital mode is System Fusion but I get aggravated that people like to congregate on just one Wires-X room. I have gotten more into DMR because most of the Virginia regional rooms are really active but don't stay crowed like America Link or KC Wide.
I have different groups in my area, and in order to be able to communicate on their repeaters, I need to have all of those digital modes covered by my radios. I could, of course use something like pie star. But that's sort of goes against what I'm trying to do as a radio operator I shouldn't really need to go through the internet to hit a repeater that I would be able to access normally. So I can understand wanting to have a bit more standardization. I kind of hope that M17 wins. Well, do that, but obviously yaesu is pushing out practically free repeaters to groups.So maybe that one will end up being the standard.
Yes, too many. The industry needs to agree on a standardize digital version, preferably Yaesu’s System Fusion. Not because I own some Yaesu radios, but because it is superior to the other forms in voice quality and digital throughput speeds.
I can't tell the difference between DMR and YSF (on DN) in audio quality... Unless you start transcoding between modes in which case everyone sounds awful
@@jacobmccallie9525 but can DMR send digital files, like pictures? Both Fusion and DSTAR have that capability built into their radios (Yaesu and iCom). Also, iCom DSTAR has it's own digital data (DD) protocol called D-RATS.
I'm up in the Northwood of Wisconsin, no repeaters are in reach with digital. I use a raspberry pi programmed with Dvswitch and my Android phone to work all the digital modes. So for $35 dollars and my cell phone I can work the digital modes. I do have a hot spot and a DMR radio but I'll take Allstar over all of them. Thank you for your video's, please keep them coming.
The only thing that I would like to see is a way to maximize the repeaters that are out there. It would be nice to have a smaller number of modes, such as DMR, so that we can have more repeaters and not just have to use hotspots to make it work. Otherwise might as well just use computer chat if that is all we are doing is using hot spot to talk over internet. I like that my area has a good DMR network to communicate on and that you can talk worldwide on it with the groups. Just my two cents and open to feedback.
@@HamRadio2 Pony express vs radio is a very different comparison than digital vs analog. The fact is if all digital modes went away today most hams I know wouldn't give a single * about it. However, take away AM or FM and watch the show. I'm sorry, but you are wrong on this one man.
@@quebirt your opinion, which you have the right to. but no, take away digital and lots of Hams would get mad also. all I hear these days is how all the repeaters are dead, so why would taking analog away affect anything? (I'm talking vhf/uhf here, which is where the DV modes live) the main point in the video was that Ham Radio is about experimentation and if someone wants to use a specific digital mode, they should be able to. standardizing or regulating it isn't the answer.
@@HamRadio2 To be clear, I didn't say no hams would get mad. I said none that I know would. I'm sure the reverse is true in some places, but I promise you if you asked all hams whether they wanted to lose the ability to transmit via FM or give up digital modes, the vast majority would elect to keep FM. Again, the point is that the comparison here was apples and oranges. Pony Express vs. radio communications is a much bigger difference than analog vs. digital. It's true that experimentation is a ham staple, but when we talk about experimentation in the ham community, we are talking about you and me building our own stuff. Experimentation isn't what Motorola is doing with digital modes. I like you, but I have to say I think you know this and I suspect your motivation may not be pure. I'm sorry if that bothers you but I truly do believe this BECAUSE I believe you to be too intelligent to believe what you are saying.
@@quebirt IDK how you think my motivation isn't pure. I am telling you the truth of my honest opinion. If you don't believe it, that really is on you. True, you didn't say that all hams would get mad if we lost digital, but why would they get mad about losing FM? Again, I constantly hear about how all the repeaters are dead. Hardly anyone is using FM repeaters anymore, so would they really notice if they were to go away? I just don't think THIS is an accurate comparison either, like you said you don't think Pony Express and Radio are a comparison ( they are, actually, in context to the first replay where I used that scenario) Experimention is much, much more than just you and I building our own radios. There's a large number of software engeineers, GNU Radio devs and application devs that would disagree with that statement.
I think one thing was missed in the discussion, and that's digital voice simplex. Sure, you can get a hotspot and cross mode on reflectors, but that's very different than utilizing the benefits of a digital mode radio to radio (or even via repeaters). (By the way, check out the M1ke project). You can jump on the calling frequency and call CQ via FM and it won't be long before you find a QSO, but try that with digital voice and see how far it gets you. Is having so many modes the problem? Eh, I don't think so. But it would sure help if more radios could modulate and automatically detect multiple digital modes. As it stands, digital voice is primarily useful for two things: 1) Internet chat rooms, and 2) A curated network of people. It's not very friendly to simplex adventure, but then again, maybe it doesn't have to be. The right tool for the right job, I suppose. So let's ask the question: what is the purpose of digital voice after all? And do the various digital voice modes solve the same problem, if there is one, or are they solving different problems (hence the unique aspects of each)?
Yes!!!! I have never made a repeater contact using DMR, only when I use my Raspberry Pi have I made contacts. I have infinitely more Fusion contacts using a repeater than any other digital modes.
I prefer System Fusion over DSTAR, and DSTAR over DMR. I prefer System Fusion because navigating through WIRES is way easier than navigating through DSTAR, but DSTAR has call routing which is something System Fusion doesn't have. I don't have P25, NXDN or M17. Absolutely, you should make a video about how ops don't use DMR correctly. Also, for DMR I prefer the TGIF network over Brandmeister. Oh, and for those who do not know, Die Hard is in fact a Christmas movie
Digi mode: DMR. I have a concern about the U/VHF didi modes. You need an Internet connection to make this stuff work. Extreme weakness in ecomm emergency. Have plain phone as s backup.
Jason, I 100% agree with your view on this. WE ALL need to seperate but accessible. Anyone that has ever been “locked” into a chat & NO OPEN tome to get OUT???!!!! Yeah, give me ALL the Modes you can imagine. Just got myself a SharkPro. Then the M1KE gets released. Boy is my wife going to be Pissed!!!!! Really Enjoy Your channel!!! Thank You for what you do. W4EPS
First, the standard is analog AM/FM/ SSB. Additionally, the main reason I still have an IC-7000 is because I want a VHF/UHF SSB radio. If we could get a new VHF/UHF SSB P25 C4FM radio, I would be thrilled to death! That said, I agree with your points. Just because P25 and C4FM is what I prefer, I have no desire to force anyone to use it.
I don't use any of the digital modes, but the more Ham options the better so more people are on the radio. That said, I'd like to see more non-digital radio options that are therefore less expensive. I'd like a high end/top quality HT that's not $500-700 just because it has a digital mode.
The big 4 radios are out of touch with what we want. I'm fine with so many digital modes in ham radio. I use DMR and P25. Those are popular in our area. I really like the hot spot pi-star so much it's fun. Merry Christmas to and Happy Holidays, everyone 73s
There are plenty of different modes out there, I'd like to be able to trans code across each one so I can use one radio to get to all the different modes using one radio. I like the sound of DMR and P25 but the ease to get on the air with fusion is unmatched in my opinion. I find D-star simple enough to use once setup, that and the battery in that handheld doesn't die if I leave it in the radio. I don't think there is one mode to rule them all or that needs to be the case. Every mode has its benefits and its drawbacks, I think it is up to the operator to pick which one(s) work best for them and the totality of their circumstances. In my area we have fusion repeaters, but not a ton of people use that capability, most of the time they are used for analog, so a hot-spot is the perfect solution for my needs. There is way too much nuance to have a "one for everyone standard". That's kinda the spirit of the hobby anyway right, Not all the bands are good for all the same things, the same goes for digital voice modes. I would like to see more M17, to maybe learn a bit more about it.
My local city uses D-star but not for voice. It works great for basic data transmissions (via D-rats) and voice comms are analog. So I use D-star in that realm, and I do own a DMR radio but never use it for that. Oh well, even the analog repeaters available here are not used much anymore so it is a moot point it seems.
That is exactly the reason we put up DMR repeaters at our club. Our analog repeaters are dead but with digital you can always find someone to talk too. Maybe not your buddies but at least someone to talk to.
Buying an OpenSpot is like buying a radio for the price. If you commit to getting one then you can select the digital radio you want without making the choice of which digital forum you like the most. A few years ago I got a D-74A and an openSpot3 and have not had any complaints. To me it was the right move and worth the money.
I have "NO" desire to use any of the digital modes. I am not very tech savvy. I can do basic things with my computer that need to be done. I look at it like txt msgs. Don't send them to me because I have notifications off and might check it once a week or less. You either want to talk to me or you don't. Some times LESS is more.
I'm still waiting for those combination D-Star, DMR and analog radios that TWO different manufacturers were releasing 'any second now' a decade ago. There was even a Ya-Hoo group that was all hot & bothered over these pending releases. BTW: If you search RUclips the video of the European version can still be found. I'm NOT about to have a separate radio for each digital mode, so I will not be using digital modes any time soon.
D-star modulation is the most efficient of all digital voice modes the only occupy 6 khz unlike fusion DMR in P25 all is 15 khz, also both the Kenwood D75A and the Icom ID-52A Plus can do Bluetooth Terminal Mode,
Your information is wrong. Most all digital modes are 12.5khz. DMR splits those into 2 voice channels, which are 6.25khz each, making it the most efficient. Fusion does the same thing, except they use 6.25khz for voice and the other for GPS
Technically DMR is the most efficient. Dual time slot means two different conversations simultaneously on the same bandwidth. Doesn't divide the traffics bandwidth, just separates it 30 milliseconds apart.
Not a fan of digital, so my opinion is irrelevant, but I will add this: the market and improved technologies and innovation will sort this out in due time.
“When you say digital modes in HF, you’re talking about….” Digital voice does exist on HF! 10m has an FM portion and I watched a guy running Fusion there (they don’t let us tech rookies mess up that portion of 10meter, so I can’t partake). With the solar cycle being what it is currently, and with Fusion being such a great weak signal mode, you can DX and sound like you’re talking on your local repeater. I think there’s a C4FM calling frequency. Not sure if other modes work or are being used there. I’ve only used Fusion.
I never said digital voice didn't exist in HF. But in any conversation, when you mention digital modes in HF, you are 99.9% of the time talking about modes like FT8
I think the multiple modes make DV more interesting - always something new to learn. I also think the ham community will move to a defacto standard over time - DV is still in its infancy.
I mostly agree with the perspective of the person's comments that you discussed in this video, but let me state it differently than he did... No, we don't have too many digital modes, but the unfortunate thing is that, to borrow a phrase, they are all "locked behind different pay walls" - meaning you have to buy totally new and different radios to be able to talk on them via RF. And I do want to distinguish between Internet connectivity vs. RF connectivity, as I believe he was without explicitly stating it. Your HF radio example of using multiple different analog and digital modes is a great comparison - but you're missing the main point/perspective! All of those analog and digital modes that are available for HF, do not require purchasing a new HF radio in order to use the mode via RF. Same with AllStar and APRS. Yes, some radio include more and better built-in APRS features - but you can use APRS with just about any radio. So, I agree with the sentiment that - just like with any other VHF/UHF/HF mode available to us today - I wish we could use any mode with any radio so that everyone could use the mode without having to purchase an entirely new (and usually expensive) radio in order to do so.
So many different modes, systems, etc. it makes me want to get out of Ham radio all together. I am new to Ham, but not to radio. I retired from public safety a couple of years ago. I have used VHF communications and for the last several years a trunked 800mhz system that was built by and used state wide. I understand radio pretty well, but there are so many systems and modes in the Ham world that it’s almost impossible for the everyday Ham to follow. I’m not a ham geek and I don’t want to study this for hours each day to understated. The problem with not at least setting some kind of standard just means that there are going to be more and more systems or modes that will make even harder to keep up with. It’s not good for the radio hobby for this to continue.
Our local analog repeater allows echolink and allstar. They're annoying. We have fast paced QSOs on our repeater. When echolink or allstar comes in, it kills the pace of the conversation. I don't usually participate when those digital modes are talking. It's way too slow.
@HamRadio2 I'm a new ham. All I know is they use cell phones, internet, or data service. None of which I am currently interested in for Amateur radio communications. I'm pretty simple for now. HF or 2m 70cm. I tried D-Star, but I didn't like the sound quality or lack thereof. I have a fusion radio, but I rarely use fusion repeaters. KQ4UHS, 73.
Yes most of those use internet, but all DV modes are also capable of Simplex, so internet isn't actually needed to make the mode work. They are still radio modes like FM is.
Okay, Jason ... I'll ask ... "people don't use DMR correctly..." we want to know more! So what'dya mean by that!?
I'm not sure everyone is ready for that...
Yes please tell us!
Talk group misuse, radio ID mismanagement, failure to use time slots and color codes correctly, overuse of worldwide or large talk groups, inconsistent use of call sign identification, programming errors (code plug issues), “parrot” repeater abuse, poor mic discipline, failure to respect ptt over IP delays, use of unsupported or cloned radios, failure to understand digital voice distortion, misuse of hotspots, over reliance on Brandmeister dashboard, etc.. Just to name a few.
@@HamRadio2 Maybe frame it as “some hams would say…” so you don’t hurt feelings 🤪
@@lesfarmer5111 Public safety has analog, P25, NXDN, DMR and odd balls too. It's not just amateur radio. It's all radio. Interoperability is a huge problem in LMR too.
The big manufacturers suffer from the "not invented here" syndrome. How much more money would it really take to put more than one digital mode in the same radio?
There is practically no D-Star or System Fusion where I live. So obviously I won't be buying an Icom or Yaesu digital radio. I really like the quality of the Japanese rigs, but I'm not paying for a mode that I can't use.
The silly thing is that if you do have the option of the big three digital modes in your area, that means that you need three different radios. That part really is silly.
Yeah, I think this is the common sentiment. I spent a few hours on the radio talking with some people about this last night too, and literally none of them agreed that it's good to have so many standards. Basically, what you said stands true. Digital modes are software. I doubt VERY VERY seriously, that any of these radios use ASICs to do these digital modes, so it's literally software. UNLESS, and this is the case, it's "not invented here" causing licensing issues. If Yaesu invented Fusion because it served some community function, they would allow Motorola to implement it in their radios, and Motorola absolutely would in some radios because it would amount to a little bit of code to do it and people would absolutely want the option if it came at no real cost. It's ridiculous to believe it's anything other than vendor lock-in.
13:09 @HamRadio2.0 Jason how is it that dmr is not used correctly?
I use DMR with my anytone. I’m really not over the top with DMR.
I do like using a digital signal on a simplex frequency.
I've seen a few comments on that, so I will make plans for a video soon. It will probably get me some hate mail, lol
@@HamRadio2Thank you!!!! Very curious as to what you have to say!
I've used DMR enough to understand it. Other than that, I personally am not interested in digital voice. HOWEVER, the spirit of ham radio IS experimentation. I love that we have options.
100% Agree with your point of view Jason. As a new(ish) HAM, I love that we have all sorts of different ways to “Play Radio”. Also a great way for new Technicians to enjoy the hobby.
D-Star was my last to try but has quickly become my favorite. I enjoy how easy it is to switch channels with very minimal programming.
My favorite is DSTAR - because it works on any band, and has the ability to do fast DD mode on 23cm!
M17 works on any band as well.
@batoniarz that's great news!! I really want to try it out as well! Thanks for sharing!
@@bruehlt There's even a set of GNU Radio blocks (gr-m17), so you can transmit M17 with your favorite SDR.
FreeDV is my favorite digital mode. I use it on HF. I only own analog equipment and I don't really have any intentions of buying digital equipment at this time.
the new FreeDV RADE mode is amazing!
The answer is yes. All we needed was DSTAR. Instead of fully developing DSTAR, hams got distracted by DMR and Yaesu wanted their own piece of the action with C4FM. It's really a shame of what could have been. We got nothing more with DMR and C4FM.
Dstar is the weakest of them all
@@HamRadio2 Would love to know why you think it's the weakest. Not saying your wrong just curious on your angle/points.
@@leewardwx it's the oldest, with the oldest codec, so it doesn't sound as good as some of the newer ones. also, in my opinion, it is harder to program than the others.
@@HamRadio2 DMR has been the most difficult I've used (id database, time slot, color code, TGIDs, allowed TGs), despite being the most popular. D-Star is relatively easy just set frequency, dv mode, callsign and key-up, registration is probably the pain point for most. Still wrapping my head around fusion/wires-x linking, just seems odd to me.
@leewardwx "allowed TGs" - if I understand what you mean by that... THAT is part of the problem.
Have tried the big 3 and still keep coming back to D-Star where I started in 2006. I just sold my ID-51a and now have a 5100, 52 and a Zumspot running WPSD. I updated the Zumspot to Pi Zero WH2 it works great and the new Pi was only $26. My YSF radios and DMR gather dust.
My area is almost exclusively DMR for digital phone. Since it's an open standard, it would be nice if Yaesu, Icom and Kenwood would be offer an option. As for using DMR correctly, one thing that pops in my head is mic gain. On a net someone will be so low it's hard to hear and the next guy/gal comes in at a painfully loud volume.
I get that licensing plays a role in these digital voice formats, but in the end it comes down to Kodak’s and software. All radios should be able to do all formats.
It is typical corporate greed and inflexibility. Yaesu and Icom should open up their secret book and let Fusion and D-Star be open source, that is the real solution. This is amateur radio it SHOULD be open source. It's almost akin to having an off-the shelf mass-produced International Space Station from Honda.
Fusion wires X is my favorite… the easiest to use !
Totally agree. I like the audio quality of DSTAR, but prefer the ease of navigation with WIRES-X.
WiresX is my favorite digital voice mode along with the underlying YSF protocol.
I totally agree with you. I love the options. Also, there are XLX reflectors out there that crossmode that do join all the digital modes.
Yep
My favorite is Wires X. Very versatile and quite simple, once you collect all the components and become familiar with the various modes. I would love to check out M-17. Thanks for the discussion..73's
What is its advantage compared to other digital modes?
I like all the digital modes, but if I had to pick a favorite it would be D-Star. I like the sound of it and it works well for me.
Best digital mode is whatever mode the local infrastructure folk can afford to and have the manpower to maintain. Or whatever one wants to run on their own hotspot. Buying a mode where only the jankest local repeater is on that mode with low coverage and low users, is just a way to listen to the sounds of silence... hahaha...
Around here it's a giant multi-state DMR network the club founders put five figure dollars into to cover all that territory. The rest are just "also rans"... and I build and maintain analog repeaters that are completely dead most days, so I could start begging for money like that to build another network, but no point really... sites are expensive and members are dwindling in all clubs.
M17? Just a novelty to play with at home on the hotspot, really. Finding a consistent userbase of even ten users would be a miracle even if we paid big bucks to put it on a mountain with 200 miles of coverage. Say three thousand bucks to set it up from scratch with quality hardware, maybe more... and a couple thousand a year in site expenses? Need ten users willing to plunk down $200/mo just to not have it take away from other club member's money they expect quality systems out of... not happening. Not without a benefactor with money to blow...
The economics of infrastructure is rough these days.
Peaked my curiosity. How do people not use dmr correctly? I use all the digital voice modes. Would say my most frequently used is dmr, least is dstar, ysf is the easiest to get on the air. D star feels like an impossibility. P25 can be expensive. But I love that we have so many modes.
Man, I think I agree with you on all points here. But ok, yes.. some others have asked about my comment, so I will elaborate soon.
I totally agree that ham radio is, in part, about inventing and trying new modes. "Standardizing" would go against one of the very justifications of amateur radio, at least in the US, as noted right at the start of Part 97, to "contribute to the advancement of the radio art". HOWEVER (so here's my however), amateur radio modes need to be OPEN. Part 97 prohibits modes with "the purpose of obscuring the meaning of any communication". As far as I can tell, the FCC thinks that a mode is not obscuring communication if anyone can BUY a radio or decoder for the mode. I respectfully disagree. It is most definitely obscuring the communication, with the clear intent that the obscuration requires people to buy their radio or decoder! In my opinion, you succeed in not obscuring a communication if and only if anyone can, in principle, BUILD a decoder for the mode from scratch (e.g. not have to buy a specific proprietary chip), using clear, open, and readily available documentation. D-STAR, as an example, is not open and is patented, with its own undocumented audio codec. DMR is an open standard and is unencumbered by licenses, so yay! - not obscured. My understanding is that C4FM is open, but Yaesu's Fusion adaptation has its own undocumented protocols. Any, again in my opinion, any encoding used in amateur radio, in order to not violate Part 97, needs to be openly documented and reproducible. This goes right back to one of our purposes being the advancement of the radio art. We can't participate in that advancement if the art is increasingly hidden in proprietary, commercial black boxes. AD1M
Actually all of the modes are "open" meaning that any manufacturer can make a radio with that mode. Example: hotspots, which have all the modes.
The AMBE codec is proprietary and is licensed by DVSI. That's the limitation. That's also why M17 is an actual open source mode, it doesn't use the DVSI codec.
DMR was the choice for my local ham club. I and one other member have been hosting our weekly DMR net for months. I really appreciate the clarity.
I have the two additional digital voice modes that I have not ventured into Yaesu System Fusion and DStar. Also, I just received my Connect Systems CS7000 M17 Plus days ago. I really like the backstory for M17, “By Hams for Hams.” This is in contrast to a commercial standard that gets adopted or morphs into ham usage.
Favorite Digital Voice mode (if I had a favorite) - C4FM/Fusion. That's simply because I have more Yaesu handhelds, and I think it sounds better than the others. But, to answer your question - Do we have too many digital voice modes? - yes. Do we need to standardize around one? - NO. Let hams be hams, and experiment. If you don't want to have to 'keep up' with all of the digital voice modes out there - then choose one; it's not rocket science. So yes, Jason. I completely agree with you.
There's an XKCD comic out there with two characters talking about there being 14 different programming languages and vowing to create a "standard"... which just means there are 15 different languages. People are going to use what they feel suits them best and that's just what people do; old ones will die and new ones will come. Trying to control it artificially won't work.
Agreed 100%
That's absolutely true. We can't control vendors doing everything they can to create artificial lock-in. Maybe if you could get enough hams to agree on a standard (LMAO) we could boycott the others, but good luck with that. What I haven't seen is one other person who says that they LIKE having all these different modes. I am programming language agnostic. I've done software development for so long that the difference tends to be syntax or available libraries. We get better performance out of CPP, but we can get even better performance out of ASM (assuming you are competent and your own code isn't a performance bottleneck) but Python is amazing for throwing together a quick simple API or admin script. The difference is, that you can use all of those languages and libraries together, and most large applications do use multiple frameworks/languages. Tell me again how DMR compliments or interacts with Fusion to make a better end product? All it serves to do is keep my Yaesu off of the repeaters in my new community. Python doesn't cost CPP programmers anything.
Good video. My favorite and most used digital mode is DMR. Love PA statewide, 31421 on BrandMeister. Dstar would be my next mode. I'm not familiar with M17. I've seen the Connect systems M17/DMR radio. On the M17 radio with the DMR, does it support promiscuous mode?
It would really be good if there was just one standard digital mode but that will not happen cause of MONEY
Probably true. But then you would have standardization and regulation, which people also are against.
@@HamRadio2 True
In Montana, for digital, DMR is king. The most used repeaters are Hytera machines that do DMR. I have a FTM-400 but do not use Fusion because no one would hear me.
Totalmente de acuerdo con vos!!!
Un abrazo grande desde Argentina LU7EUG!!!
Here in CT, ARES is linked state wide with DMR. We have ARES analog nets but their coverage is limited by repeater/radio wattage.
What does ARES chapters in other states use as a standard?
I have to admit I have a radio for DMR, Fusion and D-Star digital standards. 73, W1RKB
You have an FT-530.
Subscribed! 😉
I have FT5D, FTM-500 and an Anytone 868UV. I like the Fusion/WiresX because it's easier to run on the fly. DMR is a pain to change on the fly when something is outside the existing codeplug.
With that 868 radio, you shouldn't have any issues programming outside of the codeplug
@@HamRadio2 Yipper. Didn't say that I couldn't, just that the WiresX is easier. Unless you know the number for less common DMR "rooms", you're stuck with looking them up somewhere where as with WiresX once you connect to the repeater the names of the "rooms" are right there.
P25 and DMR should be the standard, just like the emergency services and commercial users. Yes theyvare somewhat proprietary modes, however they are the most widely used. All the other modes seem to be only an effort to corner the amateur market.
This.
DMR sucks
@@Tobys-Dad What would you prefer? All the other digital modes use the same vocoder (except for M17), so it’s basically the same thing packaged differently
I have handhelds for both D-Star and DMR, not being able to carry both, I would like to have both modes in one box. I would not want everything linked for the reasons you gave.
Choices make ham radio the hobby it is today.
The difference with HF obviously there’s no repeaters but for the most part local repeaters are acquired for each individual digital voice standard like in my area we have no D Star repeaters
I love D-STAR and System Fusion (C4FM) and use both equally. I gave up and sold my DMR radios years ago.
First of all, we need to clarify why we would even want to use digital voice modes instead of analog. Once we understand this, and why large numbers of people don’t use digital modes-such as the notoriously poor audio quality-we could start developing a new digital voice mode by combining these factors.
However, it’s clear that no matter what protocol we develop, the major manufacturers are unlikely to implement it. Nonetheless, it might be worth a try if the largest amateur radio organizations could organize a roundtable discussion with the manufacturers on this topic.
I wish they would have a standardized Digital mode, I think that would make it easier to talk to more people without shelling out money on different radios.
Jason, people don’t use DMR correctly is an interesting thesis statement. I would love to hear more.
Lots of comments about the same thing, I'll make another video
I use DMR, but I think all of these modes have some advantages. DMR radios are the cheapest, but have quite low audio quality and are hard to set up. C4FM on the other hand is easy to gei into but its more expensive. I'm not very familiar with other ones, but I'm pretty sure they have advantages
Well DMR is C4FM also. DMR is C4FM TDMA while Fusion is C4FM FDMA. They use almost the same codec and sound almost exactly the same. I personally think DMR sounds better than any of them
The problem for some areas is in getting coordination for a repeater. Myself, I like the sound of P25 or C4FM over that of DStar or DMR. I've been able to set up hotspots for DStar and for C4FM, but DMR has been too challenging for me, so a fellow ham has been setting up DMR for me. I wish one handheld could do multiple digital modes, but manufacturers seem to be against that. Maybe M17 will eventually push the others aside. 73 de n0km
C4FM signals carry so much further readable than analog.. I do think it’s a shame there isn’t one FM Digital standard… I blame the manufacturers for trying to each make their own hook of proprietary protocol… end result.. they have to start making new analog radios bc nobody wants to pay for a digital mode that you can rarely talk on over RF… if we’re going to rely on the internet, just as we’ll use your phone.. my opinion
"if we’re going to rely on the internet, just as we’ll use your phone.. my opinion"
@ agree 100%
I agree: options are a good thing, and I really hope M17 catches on. However, it would be nice if one radio could do more than one mode, just like you can buy a scanner that decodes multiple digital modes. I think the CS7000-M17 Plus is a good start, but it's not quite ideal in that it functions like two different radios depending which side you boot up. I'm thinking something like one ham-specific mode (D-STAR/YSF/M17) and one general LMR mode (probably DMR, but perhaps some hams might want P25 or NXDN instead) in a radio. I can't imagine it's too difficult, especially since everything but M17 uses DVSI codecs anyway. I'm not particularly fond of Uniden's scanner business model of charging for software unlocking of additional digital modes, but maybe this is the way to go for a ham radio that does all the modes and the user can decide which ones they want in their radio.
Who am I kidding? I'd still own a whole lot of radios anyway, even if there's was one that did everything. 😆
I have a Alinco MD5, a Yeasu FT5D and Two Icom ID52, ID 52 plus 60th anniversary and a Kenwood D75A,
Oh standards...the infinite debate about universal standards. Here's the thing about how I use Amateur radio - 1. As a tool. 2. As a hobby. In that order. My primary goal in getting licensed has been to use it while traveling remotely by vehicle. I use FM/C4FM, APRS, P.25, VARA FM and a few others as practical tools. FM for vehicle to vehicle communications (C4FM if Im lucky to be with other Yaseu users), APRS lets me wife and kids keep tabs on me in the boonies, P.25/Vara lets me get weather downloads and send messages in remote areas. I would love to get an FT-891 for HF, but I don't need it. I love learning and I love the hobby side as well, but I get his point: When you use something as a tool, its better to just have it work. DMR is ridiculous in this application (hotspot? no thanks) and a basic, open source digital voice mode that is universally accepted would go a long way to helping people of various brand persuasion to communicate. If radios were semi-modern and could offload some signal processing to a phone via bluetooth, then we wouldn't have this issue, but thats a long way off. That being said, I also see your point about the hobby being about experimentation (it is) and that there are commercial radios that may serve the tool use case better, but the networks that make HAM a valuable tool aren't there outside of HAM. GMRS is the next best thing and...meh. repeaters are sparse, there is no APRS, and there are few useful tools there...plus its users are a mess. For me? I agree. It would be great to have at least one open source digital voice modulation that anyone could easily add to a radio for cheap.
C4FM for 2 reasons, 1.bought a ft-991a for the shack in the box rig and it came with it. 2. It seems to be much easier to configure than DMR. However, DMR seems to be the favorite among the locals to which I say more power to them if that's the mode they want to use.
DMR is C4FM also, FYI. You mean YSF
@@HamRadio2 Yep
Each digital mode developed tends to link you to one of the big three standards locking the user to one manufacturer or another. The whole reason for amateur radio is for amateurs to communicate with each other independently of the manufacturer. I know lots of amateurs who wish a freely developed digital codex was universally available. I am not knocking the other digital modes but a free codex would also make it cheaper in the long run. Repeaters would not have to convert from one digital mode to another again improving communication and cost.
M17
@HamRadio2 Pity the Connect Systems CS7000 M17 & M17 Plus are not dual band, only UHF.
on VHF/UHF I use fm because that's all my radios do.. maybe someday I'll get a digital capable radio .. when the pension funds allow...
We only need one DVM! P25 should be the standard across the board.
Apart from P25 is an exclusively USA thing. It barely exists outside
I’d like to see M17 succeed as it’s open source. I use all the big 3 DV options. I least like DMR. Fragmented over differing networks (BM, DMR+, TGIF) with too few users. Add on the codeplug hell - not for me. I can do it, but don’t want to. Only TG91 is busy. The only plus point is the hardware AKA radio cost can be very low, hence the wider adoption of that format.
Outside of Echolink I have not played with any of the digital voice modes. My area is a mix of DMR, Dstar, and Fusion. There are three Dstar repeaters, two Fusion repeaters, and one DMR repeater within a 25 mile radius of my house. I am leaning more toward Fusion because several members of my club have Fusion radios and we have Fusion repeater tied to the West Michigan Fusion network of repeaters. In theory if I had a Fusion capable radio I could communicate with my club members in southern Michigan while I am driving to and from deer camp in northern Michigan.
I am curious as to why you say most people don't use DMR properly in ham radio. I would love to see a video on that.
Incorrect dmr usage video please.
I tell you want i want to see; more and affordable all-in-one mobile radios.
As a company truck driver & radio enthusiast, I'm currently looking at my C.B., LMR, GMRS HT, & Quad-Band HT that I use for Ham & Airband monitoring as well as channel scanning which channel an unfamiliar terminal is using with my company.
4 radios 1 GPS & 1 Electronic logging device (tablet). Oh, and 1 AM/FM/XM stereo.
Electronics everywhere.
You both make very valid points. For what it's worth, Wayne is correct (factually) about most of what he has said. But I also think we need all the options. The problem, is manufacturers not working together to bring more people to common ground. I personally think DMR is the superior mode for a few reasons, but HAM's have made a dogs breakfast of it! (It's perfect in the more simple, commercial/professional world, which I work in as my career!).
PS - check out the new FreeDV RADE HF mode - it is unbelievably good! 73
Years ago, I used to think there should be only one digital voice mode so I only needed one radio. Then I realized people much more intelligent than me thought outside the box and made a hotspot that does all modes instead of the radio. This is a much better solution. FWIW, I have multiple radios each for D-Star, Fusion, and DMR. D-Star is the one I use the vast majority of the time. Despite the fact that I have 4-5 DMR radios, IMO DMR sucks. I have been on it for probably close to 15 years. I thought it sucked 15 years ago and hundreds of QSOs later, I still do.
good take
I appreciate your insights and logic. I agree that consolidating to one network has more negatives than positives.
That said, I believe there are two things that would make everything better and solve the issues.
One is HTs supporting multiple modes so we’re not having to switch radios to switch networks.
The second is to standardize and simplify the programming software. That’s both a coding and a UIX challenge. Make it easy enough to program with Chirp.
MARANATHA!!!
It’s all fun! The more the merrier!
Freedom!
I agree, keep them separate. I love D-Star. Wish I owned a D-Star repeater. I would share with my friends.
Yes, too many and the OpenSpot4 Pro cross modes to talk groups, not radio types 🤷♂️
Create your own talk group and chat group works the best keep the multimode network to minimum and " Bridge modes need a good amount of attention in any application to ensure the best data relay signals over the network".
Hey Jason here on Florida's west coast the repeaters are hardly used I haven't bothered to buy a digital radio or even want one at this time... if I want to know what the weather is 50 miles from my qth I'll check the weather app on my phone... that said Ham Radio is the experimentation and innovation platform on the planet and it still fascinated me how many new modes are coming on line
I remember reading an article in QST many years ago about the need to come up with an alternative to SSB. These certainly qualify, and digital formats will evolve even more as technology advances.
73's W4THX
I think the point is interoperability. If I want to send a message to someone else over the Internet, I shouldn’t only be able to communicate with other PC users. I should be able to also communicate with Mac users or I shouldn’t only be able to email other Outlook users with Outlook, and have to buy another email program to talk with users that use Thunderbird for email.
Maybe not tying them all together because as you said, it would cause massive congestion. But the ability to pick and choose what standard you wanted on the fly would be awesome. (like I can choose to transmit FT8 and in the same program switch to FT4).
I have the big three. They’re all good, but YSF is the easiest to setup, and use.
As far as DMR (BM) only TG 91 is “popular”.
In Kansas City Fusion is king. No dstar repeaters. Fusion programming is easy. My advice is to check which digital modes repeaters are in your area.
My favorite digital mode is System Fusion but I get aggravated that people like to congregate on just one Wires-X room. I have gotten more into DMR because most of the Virginia regional rooms are really active but don't stay crowed like America Link or KC Wide.
Have used all, but sold all except Wires-X/C4FM
I have different groups in my area, and in order to be able to communicate on their repeaters, I need to have all of those digital modes covered by my radios. I could, of course use something like pie star. But that's sort of goes against what I'm trying to do as a radio operator I shouldn't really need to go through the internet to hit a repeater that I would be able to access normally. So I can understand wanting to have a bit more standardization. I kind of hope that M17 wins. Well, do that, but obviously yaesu is pushing out practically free repeaters to groups.So maybe that one will end up being the standard.
Yes, too many. The industry needs to agree on a standardize digital version, preferably Yaesu’s System Fusion. Not because I own some Yaesu radios, but because it is superior to the other forms in voice quality and digital throughput speeds.
You'll have to explain that. Can system fusion operate 2 simultaneous voice conversations on its 12.5 bandwidth? How is it superior again?
I can't tell the difference between DMR and YSF (on DN) in audio quality...
Unless you start transcoding between modes in which case everyone sounds awful
@@jacobmccallie9525 but can DMR send digital files, like pictures? Both Fusion and DSTAR have that capability built into their radios (Yaesu and iCom). Also, iCom DSTAR has it's own digital data (DD) protocol called D-RATS.
I'm up in the Northwood of Wisconsin, no repeaters are in reach with digital. I use a raspberry pi programmed with Dvswitch and my Android phone to work all the digital modes. So for $35 dollars and my cell phone I can work the digital modes. I do have a hot spot and a DMR radio but I'll take Allstar over all of them. Thank you for your video's, please keep them coming.
The only thing that I would like to see is a way to maximize the repeaters that are out there. It would be nice to have a smaller number of modes, such as DMR, so that we can have more repeaters and not just have to use hotspots to make it work. Otherwise might as well just use computer chat if that is all we are doing is using hot spot to talk over internet. I like that my area has a good DMR network to communicate on and that you can talk worldwide on it with the groups.
Just my two cents and open to feedback.
No, we don’t have enough! Keep innovating… If you don’t want to use them…. Don’t.
Too many digital modes? HELL YES! How did HAM radio survive many decades without digital modes?
Prior to radio existing, we had the Pony Express, so you could ask the same question there. Or just realize that technology changes everything.
@@HamRadio2 Pony express vs radio is a very different comparison than digital vs analog. The fact is if all digital modes went away today most hams I know wouldn't give a single * about it. However, take away AM or FM and watch the show. I'm sorry, but you are wrong on this one man.
@@quebirt your opinion, which you have the right to. but no, take away digital and lots of Hams would get mad also. all I hear these days is how all the repeaters are dead, so why would taking analog away affect anything? (I'm talking vhf/uhf here, which is where the DV modes live)
the main point in the video was that Ham Radio is about experimentation and if someone wants to use a specific digital mode, they should be able to. standardizing or regulating it isn't the answer.
@@HamRadio2 To be clear, I didn't say no hams would get mad. I said none that I know would. I'm sure the reverse is true in some places, but I promise you if you asked all hams whether they wanted to lose the ability to transmit via FM or give up digital modes, the vast majority would elect to keep FM. Again, the point is that the comparison here was apples and oranges. Pony Express vs. radio communications is a much bigger difference than analog vs. digital.
It's true that experimentation is a ham staple, but when we talk about experimentation in the ham community, we are talking about you and me building our own stuff. Experimentation isn't what Motorola is doing with digital modes.
I like you, but I have to say I think you know this and I suspect your motivation may not be pure. I'm sorry if that bothers you but I truly do believe this BECAUSE I believe you to be too intelligent to believe what you are saying.
@@quebirt IDK how you think my motivation isn't pure. I am telling you the truth of my honest opinion. If you don't believe it, that really is on you.
True, you didn't say that all hams would get mad if we lost digital, but why would they get mad about losing FM? Again, I constantly hear about how all the repeaters are dead. Hardly anyone is using FM repeaters anymore, so would they really notice if they were to go away? I just don't think THIS is an accurate comparison either, like you said you don't think Pony Express and Radio are a comparison ( they are, actually, in context to the first replay where I used that scenario)
Experimention is much, much more than just you and I building our own radios. There's a large number of software engeineers, GNU Radio devs and application devs that would disagree with that statement.
I think one thing was missed in the discussion, and that's digital voice simplex. Sure, you can get a hotspot and cross mode on reflectors, but that's very different than utilizing the benefits of a digital mode radio to radio (or even via repeaters). (By the way, check out the M1ke project).
You can jump on the calling frequency and call CQ via FM and it won't be long before you find a QSO, but try that with digital voice and see how far it gets you. Is having so many modes the problem? Eh, I don't think so. But it would sure help if more radios could modulate and automatically detect multiple digital modes.
As it stands, digital voice is primarily useful for two things: 1) Internet chat rooms, and 2) A curated network of people. It's not very friendly to simplex adventure, but then again, maybe it doesn't have to be.
The right tool for the right job, I suppose.
So let's ask the question: what is the purpose of digital voice after all? And do the various digital voice modes solve the same problem, if there is one, or are they solving different problems (hence the unique aspects of each)?
Yes!!!! I have never made a repeater contact using DMR, only when I use my Raspberry Pi have I made contacts. I have infinitely more Fusion contacts using a repeater than any other digital modes.
I prefer System Fusion over DSTAR, and DSTAR over DMR. I prefer System Fusion because navigating through WIRES is way easier than navigating through DSTAR, but DSTAR has call routing which is something System Fusion doesn't have. I don't have P25, NXDN or M17. Absolutely, you should make a video about how ops don't use DMR correctly. Also, for DMR I prefer the TGIF network over Brandmeister. Oh, and for those who do not know, Die Hard is in fact a Christmas movie
Digi mode: DMR.
I have a concern about the U/VHF didi modes. You need an Internet connection to make this stuff work. Extreme weakness in ecomm emergency. Have plain phone as s backup.
Variety! Only have fusion.
Jason, I 100% agree with your view on this. WE ALL need to seperate but accessible.
Anyone that has ever been “locked” into a chat & NO OPEN tome to get OUT???!!!!
Yeah, give me ALL the Modes you can imagine.
Just got myself a SharkPro.
Then the M1KE gets released.
Boy is my wife going to be Pissed!!!!!
Really Enjoy
Your channel!!!
Thank You for what you do.
W4EPS
Thanks!
If we limit people to one thing, we limit innovation.
First, the standard is analog AM/FM/ SSB. Additionally, the main reason I still have an IC-7000 is because I want a VHF/UHF SSB radio. If we could get a new VHF/UHF SSB P25 C4FM radio, I would be thrilled to death! That said, I agree with your points. Just because P25 and C4FM is what I prefer, I have no desire to force anyone to use it.
I don't use any of the digital modes, but the more Ham options the better so more people are on the radio. That said, I'd like to see more non-digital radio options that are therefore less expensive. I'd like a high end/top quality HT that's not $500-700 just because it has a digital mode.
DMR radios can get down to 200 because DMR is an open standard. D-Star, YSF, P25 use AMBE encoders which aren't open source or cheaply licensed.
@@krisguy Agree, I just don't consider those top quality like a TH-D75 or an ID52
DMR uses AMBE also
@@krisguy DMR uses the AMBE half-rate vocoder.
The big 4 radios are out of touch with what we want. I'm fine with so many digital modes in ham radio. I use DMR and P25. Those are popular in our area. I really like the hot spot pi-star so much it's fun. Merry Christmas to and Happy Holidays, everyone 73s
Merry Christmas to you too and Happy Holidays! 73s
There are plenty of different modes out there, I'd like to be able to trans code across each one so I can use one radio to get to all the different modes using one radio. I like the sound of DMR and P25 but the ease to get on the air with fusion is unmatched in my opinion. I find D-star simple enough to use once setup, that and the battery in that handheld doesn't die if I leave it in the radio. I don't think there is one mode to rule them all or that needs to be the case. Every mode has its benefits and its drawbacks, I think it is up to the operator to pick which one(s) work best for them and the totality of their circumstances. In my area we have fusion repeaters, but not a ton of people use that capability, most of the time they are used for analog, so a hot-spot is the perfect solution for my needs. There is way too much nuance to have a "one for everyone standard". That's kinda the spirit of the hobby anyway right, Not all the bands are good for all the same things, the same goes for digital voice modes. I would like to see more M17, to maybe learn a bit more about it.
My local city uses D-star but not for voice. It works great for basic data transmissions (via D-rats) and voice comms are analog. So I use D-star in that realm, and I do own a DMR radio but never use it for that. Oh well, even the analog repeaters available here are not used much anymore so it is a moot point it seems.
That is exactly the reason we put up DMR repeaters at our club. Our analog repeaters are dead but with digital you can always find someone to talk too. Maybe not your buddies but at least someone to talk to.
Buying an OpenSpot is like buying a radio for the price. If you commit to getting one then you can select the digital radio you want without making the choice of which digital forum you like the most. A few years ago I got a D-74A and an openSpot3 and have not had any complaints. To me it was the right move and worth the money.
Yep, exactly
I have "NO" desire to use any of the digital modes. I am not very tech savvy. I can do basic things with my computer that need to be done. I look at it like txt msgs. Don't send them to me because I have notifications off and might check it once a week or less. You either want to talk to me or you don't. Some times LESS is more.
Not a fan, either. If the internet is involved, it ain’t radio. But to each his own.
I'm still waiting for those combination D-Star, DMR and analog radios that TWO different manufacturers were releasing 'any second now' a decade ago. There was even a Ya-Hoo group that was all hot & bothered over these pending releases. BTW: If you search RUclips the video of the European version can still be found. I'm NOT about to have a separate radio for each digital mode, so I will not be using digital modes any time soon.
D-star modulation is the most efficient of all digital voice modes the only occupy 6 khz unlike fusion DMR in P25 all is 15 khz, also both the Kenwood D75A and the Icom ID-52A Plus can do Bluetooth Terminal Mode,
Your information is wrong. Most all digital modes are 12.5khz. DMR splits those into 2 voice channels, which are 6.25khz each, making it the most efficient. Fusion does the same thing, except they use 6.25khz for voice and the other for GPS
Technically DMR is the most efficient. Dual time slot means two different conversations simultaneously on the same bandwidth. Doesn't divide the traffics bandwidth, just separates it 30 milliseconds apart.
I have DMR and D-Star. D-Star is so much easier for me but most hams in my area use DMR on non-internet DMR and FM repeaters. No talk groups.
You still have to set a talkgroup... likely they are using TG9. But yes, I have seen some repeaters that are not internet connected.
@ For that reason I have to haul around 2 radios to stay connected digitally. It would be nice to have a work around but…
Geez I thought you meant digital modes like Olivia or BPSK etc. do a video on that like how to identify them and use cases :)
That is why I explained "digital modes" in the first part of the video
Not a fan of digital, so my opinion is irrelevant, but I will add this: the market and improved technologies and innovation will sort this out in due time.
“When you say digital modes in HF, you’re talking about….”
Digital voice does exist on HF! 10m has an FM portion and I watched a guy running Fusion there (they don’t let us tech rookies mess up that portion of 10meter, so I can’t partake). With the solar cycle being what it is currently, and with Fusion being such a great weak signal mode, you can DX and sound like you’re talking on your local repeater. I think there’s a C4FM calling frequency. Not sure if other modes work or are being used there. I’ve only used Fusion.
I never said digital voice didn't exist in HF. But in any conversation, when you mention digital modes in HF, you are 99.9% of the time talking about modes like FT8
In Greece we have only Dmr and fm repeaters. We don’t have many options:)
Wish they’d make a radio with all the modes. They’re all using a form of DVSI’s AMBE for the vocoder, so why not implement them all?
Agreed
Yes
1) DSTAR 2). P-25. 3) C4FM . I Just don’t like DMR. Would to try M-17, but where I live, no one will use it. I live in a dead area.
I think the multiple modes make DV more interesting - always something new to learn. I also think the ham community will move to a defacto standard over time - DV is still in its infancy.
I mostly agree with the perspective of the person's comments that you discussed in this video, but let me state it differently than he did...
No, we don't have too many digital modes, but the unfortunate thing is that, to borrow a phrase, they are all "locked behind different pay walls" - meaning you have to buy totally new and different radios to be able to talk on them via RF. And I do want to distinguish between Internet connectivity vs. RF connectivity, as I believe he was without explicitly stating it.
Your HF radio example of using multiple different analog and digital modes is a great comparison - but you're missing the main point/perspective! All of those analog and digital modes that are available for HF, do not require purchasing a new HF radio in order to use the mode via RF. Same with AllStar and APRS. Yes, some radio include more and better built-in APRS features - but you can use APRS with just about any radio.
So, I agree with the sentiment that - just like with any other VHF/UHF/HF mode available to us today - I wish we could use any mode with any radio so that everyone could use the mode without having to purchase an entirely new (and usually expensive) radio in order to do so.
So many different modes, systems, etc. it makes me want to get out of Ham radio all together. I am new to Ham, but not to radio. I retired from public safety a couple of years ago. I have used VHF communications and for the last several years a trunked 800mhz system that was built by and used state wide. I understand radio pretty well, but there are so many systems and modes in the Ham world that it’s almost impossible for the everyday Ham to follow. I’m not a ham geek and I don’t want to study this for hours each day to understated. The problem with not at least setting some kind of standard just means that there are going to be more and more systems or modes that will make even harder to keep up with. It’s not good for the radio hobby for this to continue.
Our local analog repeater allows echolink and allstar. They're annoying. We have fast paced QSOs on our repeater. When echolink or allstar comes in, it kills the pace of the conversation. I don't usually participate when those digital modes are talking. It's way too slow.
Echolink and Allstar aren't digital voice modes, but I see what you're saying
@HamRadio2 I'm a new ham. All I know is they use cell phones, internet, or data service. None of which I am currently interested in for Amateur radio communications. I'm pretty simple for now. HF or 2m 70cm. I tried D-Star, but I didn't like the sound quality or lack thereof. I have a fusion radio, but I rarely use fusion repeaters. KQ4UHS, 73.
Yes most of those use internet, but all DV modes are also capable of Simplex, so internet isn't actually needed to make the mode work. They are still radio modes like FM is.
@@HamRadio2 I appreciate the information. Merry Christmas to you and yours. Thank you for what you do for the hobby.
Yes! ~N1SLA