Thought: DMR inherently offers two channels on each frequency (which still blows my mind). Would it be easy to use this 2nd channel for data, especially since it’s all digital already?
Rich - What's frustrating about DMR is that yep - in the end, it's bits being transmitted, but the structure of the transmissions is pretty well fossilized (as in burned into the firmware of hundreds of thousands of units being used) into two voice channels and no one wants to "freelance" to experiment with it for fear of breaking the fragile DMR infrastructure.
There is some provision in DMR for data, at least short messaging (location, short text messages). DMR voice works because there's a very vested interest in every manufacturer testing for VOICE interoperability between the different manufacturer's implementations of DMR. If one manufacturer's DMR radio doesn't work with all the others (and repeaters) then it won't sell many.
In fairness, Brandmeister does encourage some experimentation with data... I just have never been able to parse out the bigger picture of using data over DMR, and it's tough to find a DMR that is friendly for data experimentation. In my previous research, Hytera and Motorola both have some data capability, but only within their own products.
And that lack of interoperability for data, that most commercial users (buyers) don't care about data interoperability. If they're going to use data over DMR, they're going to go for low-headaches and buy just one brand (such as Motorola or Hytera).
I'll eventually revisit data over DMR, but my previous research was a bag of hurt trying to figure it out.
Thought: DMR inherently offers two channels on each frequency (which still blows my mind). Would it be easy to use this 2nd channel for data, especially since it’s all digital already?
Rich - What's frustrating about DMR is that yep - in the end, it's bits being transmitted, but the structure of the transmissions is pretty well fossilized (as in burned into the firmware of hundreds of thousands of units being used) into two voice channels and no one wants to "freelance" to experiment with it for fear of breaking the fragile DMR infrastructure.
There is some provision in DMR for data, at least short messaging (location, short text messages). DMR voice works because there's a very vested interest in every manufacturer testing for VOICE interoperability between the different manufacturer's implementations of DMR. If one manufacturer's DMR radio doesn't work with all the others (and repeaters) then it won't sell many.
In fairness, Brandmeister does encourage some experimentation with data... I just have never been able to parse out the bigger picture of using data over DMR, and it's tough to find a DMR that is friendly for data experimentation. In my previous research, Hytera and Motorola both have some data capability, but only within their own products.
And that lack of interoperability for data, that most commercial users (buyers) don't care about data interoperability. If they're going to use data over DMR, they're going to go for low-headaches and buy just one brand (such as Motorola or Hytera).
I'll eventually revisit data over DMR, but my previous research was a bag of hurt trying to figure it out.