[OZAPRS] Gating DPRS to APRS

[Darryl Smith]

People 

Since the subject of the D-Star has been brought up, I thought I would
reiterate my view of this radio. I will write a review of the D-Star but
since the WIA seems to be getting some support from ICOM I doubt that a
negative review would be accepted from a non-member for publication.

Anyway there are a number of reasons why people should stay away from the
D-Star.

But before I start I should mention that I attended the US release of this
radio, and attended a focus group on the radio at the request of ICOM. I
know a heap about the radio and the technology inside it.

1. It is not an Amateur Radio. It is a professional radio operating on HAM
BANDS. It is targeted at groups like the AMERICAN RED CROSS, Doctors
without
Borders, etc. Basically NGO's (Non-Government Organizations) for use where
they do not have access to phones. You can see this by looking at the
repeater system, and imagine the cost.

2. The VOCODER is AMBE2000. The IP on this is VERY closed. There is a page
on Wikipedia on it, suggesting that licensing starts at US$100,000. And
they
specifically PROHIBIT any PC implementation of the VOCODER. Therefore
there
is no use for using a software defined radio with this VOCODER since it
would be against licensing. It is not open at all. They made the previous
chip - the AMBE1000 obsolete without a compatible replacement being
available. I suspect one of the reasons was so that the AMBE2000 would be
single sourced with patent protection for longer.

3. Digital voice is restricted to the narrow band operation. It cannot be
used on the 128 kbps channel. What would be good with this radio would
have
been to have a 50% TX/RX duty cycle where each end could get 64 kpbs data.
Well, more like 52 kbps with guard tone timings. Then Allocate 4 kbps for
digital voice and you could have had full duplex voice and 48 kbps data
each
way. How cool would that have been? 

4. The D-1 radio is brain dead. It has an Ethernet port for Data, but any
control needs to be done by USB. I know why this is done - simply because
you can then use the D-1 as an Ethernet bridge. But it is dumb.

5. The repeater has a different protocol for interconnects than the data
connecting to the repeater. One of them is ATM, and I think the other is
IP
or Ethernet. Making things so different really does not make sense. 

Sure, this does have some interesting features, and is extending the state
of the art. But It is the platypus of radios. It has been put together
with
bits and pieces, and although it looks cute, it really is a strange beast!
Having said all this, if someone from Icom wants to give me a radio to
play
with I would be happy to give them a more detailed analysis... 

Darryl

-----Original Message-----
From: ozaprs-bounces at aprs.net.au [mailto:ozaprs-bounces at aprs.net.au] On
Behalf Of Richard Hoskin
Sent: Wednesday, 19 September 2007 6:17 AM
To: 'VK / ZL APRS Users'
Subject: Re: [OZAPRS] Gating DPRS to APRS


Zik

Work is underway by The WIA's National D-Star Team to build a DPRS to APRS
Gateway for VK3.

There will be an announcement and more details soon.

Cheers
Richard
VK3JFK

> -----Original Message-----
> From: ozaprs-bounces at aprs.net.au [mailto:ozaprs-bounces at aprs.net.au] On
> Behalf Of Zik Saleeba
> Sent: Monday, 17 September 2007 8:54 AM
> To: VK / ZL APRS Users
> Subject: [OZAPRS] Gating DPRS to APRS
> 
> Does anyone what what plans if any there are to gate posit data from
> the D-STAR DPRS network to the APRS network? I have a brand spanking
> new D-STAR rig and would like to track it using my existing APRS
> tools.
> 
> Cheers,
> Zik VK3MHZ
> _______________________________________________
> Ozaprs mailing list
> Ozaprs at aprs.net.au
> http://aprs.net.au/mailman/listinfo/ozaprs

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