George - AB1GL (DEC Region 3) just sent this to his ARES TEAM.
He echos many of my own thoughts on Digital Radio.
Please read.
~ Douglas - WA1SFH

Dear Region 3 ARES:

Please be sure to read the region's home web page at www.ctares-region3.org for information about the newly instituted DMR network. Going forward, this appears to be the way ARES command and control will be done during emergencies in our state.

Most of you know I have resisted "fads" in the various digital modes as they tried to gain a foothold in Amateur Radio. I believed all along that our strength was in simple radios that could be used for peer-to-peer analog voice and CW, needing no additional computers or infrastructure. I still believe this is the ultimate fall-back which we should all maintain.

But looking at the time line of a hundred years of amateur radio, it is clear that there are certain points in the evolution of technology where a tipping point is reached that makes it necessary for a wholesale change in our baseline equipment. The heterodyne circuit, multifilament vacuum tubes, transistors, integrated circuits, adoption of the WARC bands all stand out as such "disrupters" that forced us to change our ways.

I believe the DMR digital modulation system has reached that point. Here is why:

1) The state police amateur radio club has put together an extensive network of UHF DMR repeaters across the state, composed partly of the W1SP hardened sites as well as integrating some of our independent amateur repeaters. The network is mostly linked via microwave, with backup power at each site, and is not dependent on the commercial power grid or telecom or cable carriers. The system has been offered for use by all amateur radio operators in the state, with the proviso that ARES will have the ability to take control of the network in emergencies. The DMR scheme has extensive administrative abilities so this can be easily enforced.

2) A radio is available on the market today, capable of both traditional analog, DMR digital, and other digital modes. This 4-watt UHF handheld is available direct from the company, Connect Systems, for $180. This is substantially less expensive than any other digital radio on the market. I realize this is a lot of money for a ham.

3) DMR is not proprietary or single-source. A number of other manufacturers, such as Hytera and Motorola, have DMR models on the market, albeit at a much higher price.
You may prefer their features, they will all work on the CT-ARES network.

What is the advantage to ARES that made me change my thinking?

Our biggest problem in Region 3 in the last few years has been that during the SET and in actual emergencies, there is confusion as to which repeater in our region will carry the ARES resource net. No one repeater covers all of Region 3. Worse yet, repeaters maintained by small clubs go up an down, are moved, or experience interference. And trying to contact the DEC and SEC has been a frustrating exercise -- the ARRL.NET mail forwarding has been unreliable, few people have Winlink mail set up, and the sched for using the KB1AEV linked system gets very complex because of all the groups trying to use it at once.

The DMR ARES talk groups solve most of this. We will distribute a pre-programmed "code plug" that will implement the ARES talk groups in your radio. In an emergency, the SEC can broadcast a message to all the ARES local groups -- changing alert levels, announcing a net on a statewide talk group, whatever. And the digital repeaters support multiple local group conversations simultaneously, so each region can conduct local business and not tie up the entire state network.

The W1SP folks are offering ARES a very valuable resource, and it would be a terrible waste not to take advantage of it.

Why the rush?

Two reasons:

1) the ARES command structure has already started meeting at 8:30 on Sundays on the DMR network, following the analog net on KB1AEV. If you don't have a DMR radio, you can't join the net. (OK, you can add a receive-only dongle to your laptop that can listen to DMR signals, but it costs more than the CS700 transceiver.)

2) the price of the Connect Systems radio goes up on Jan. 1, 2015. Not by much, but why pay more if you don't have to?

I hope you will consider this move. I welcome feedback and questions.

George Lillenstein - AB1GL
CT ARES Region 3 DEC
[email protected]