When Jim Wells County, an expansive county in South Texas and home to more than 40,000 citizens, first met us, they faced the threat of an outdated analog radio communications system that was unreliable and endangering the lives of the County’s law enforcement and emergency responders.

We committed to understanding the issues the County faced – a unique geography, limited funds, dated equipment and a tight schedule and delivered a three-site hybrid P25 digital and analog simulcast system. The Tait solution is now helping the County’s 400 law enforcement and emergency response agencies operate more effectively and safely. Continue Reading

Principal Engineer Ian Graham explores a common question in radio system design: whether to deploy duplexers or to use separate transmit and receive antennas.

On the face of it, using a duplexer to reduce the number of antennas required by the system sounds like a great idea. But, as usual with RF, it is never quite that simple… Let’s examine the technicalities of both approaches. Continue Reading

If you have never been involved in renovating your own house, you almost certainly know someone who has. It is a major logistical exercise in planning, perseverance, and above all, patience! Mostly, you will end up with what you want, but how often do you think “I wish I had shifted that wall/put in more storage/added another bathroom”?

There are so many things to decide, and only one chance to get it all right. And for most people, you will be carrying on your domestic “business as usual” amongst the chaos of upgrading your home.

Upgrading your radio system is a bit like... Continue Reading

By Evan Forester, Marketing Campaigns Coordinator, Tait Communications.

Last week we introduced the new P25 Best Practice guides and website. Today we’ll dive a bit deeper to take a look at the first guide: First Steps to your P25 System.

I recently drove to a friend’s house and attempted a short cut. Unfortunately, I started by making the wrong turn. I ended up in a place I was unfamiliar with, but kept guessing the general direction of my destination. After a while, I literally found myself on the complete opposite side of town.

So much for finding a short cut.

If your... Continue Reading

Click to visit the website and download the P25 guides

We are happy to announce the launch of our P25 Best Practice website complete with the first four P25 Best Practice guides:

  1. First steps to your P25 system
  2. Specifying your P25 system
  3. Procuring your P25 system
  4. Implementing your P25 system Continue Reading

GSM cellphone technology, APCO P25 in United States public safety, TETRA in Europe and DMR worldwide are examples of successful digital standards. Successful standards bring real advantages. When vendors work to agreed standards, those managing radio systems have a choice of supplier which can bring down prices, and improve quality. Customers are not at risk of being unable to source products for replacement or expansion through the demise of a sole supplier.

To properly qualify, a standard needs to be non-proprietary, so not under the control of one vendor. It... Continue Reading

P25 allows dispatch to have more control over defining talkgroups, prioritizing messages and integrating data.

P25 enjoys an almost unique capability in its ability to operate as a conventional, trunked, or simulcast system. As public safety agencies have already discovered, it is fairly straightforward from an engineering point of view to convert a P25 conventional network to trunking, while retaining the investment in the original network. Simulcast operation can be added to all or part of an existing trunked or conventional P25 system. Each mode of operation has its own strengths and tradeoffs which can be summarized as follows. Continue Reading

What is the all the fuss about P25? What makes P25 so special? What benefits do P25 radio communication systems have over analog radio systems?

In this series of posts on the benefits of P25, we answer how P25 can ensure better reliability, clarity, control and customization of your radio network.  Continue Reading

Q. How does DMR coverage compare with analog?
The coverage of a DMR network is comparable to the coverage of a narrowband analog network. In many instances, the actual coverage of the DMR network is perceived to be better as the voice quality stays the same throughout the whole service area.
Q. Can you combine voice and data on one channel?
DMR supports both voice and data services and on a trunked network, channels can be dynamically allocated to the service that is required. With DMR, priority levels will ensure that traffic with the highest... Continue Reading

Tait MPT 1327 system meets utility’s needs.

Photos courtesy: Rappahannock Electric Cooperative

Faced with frequency squeeze, a federal agency deadline and communications kit from the 80s, Rappahannock Electric Cooperative (REC) formed a co-operative with four other Virginia state rural utilities to find an end-to-end solution for their narrow banding issues.

The answer: a Tait 220 MHz MPT 1327 radio system with IP backhaul.

REC now serves about 157,000 members with more than 16,000 miles of line in more than 22 counties and, in the aftermath of winter snow storm ‘Saturn’, managed over 40,000 radio calls during six days.

Read more to find out how. Continue Reading