Public safety problems with digital radios

You may have read reports in the news of problems experienced by public safety users while using the new digital radios. Like most other "news" you only have part of the story. The fact is that the "problems" reported deal ONLY with 800 MHz radios using a particular digital system from a single manufacturer. The truth is that NO 800 or 900 MHz radio has good building penetration whether it be analog or digital (think Nextel). This alleged "problem" has not been reported in the VHF or UHF bands nor has it been reported for dPMR (Icom IDAS), PMR (Motorola MotoTRBO), or P25 (APCO-25) non-trunked digital systems. A second "problem" reported deals with alleged background noise problems associated with digital radio systems. The fact is that if the level of background noise exceeds the voice level, it will be heard whether the radio is analog or digital. The solution is to either (a) reduce the background noise, or (b) use a noise cancelling microphone. The world is going digital and that's a fact. The quality of communications is better, the batteries last longer, the features are more advanced, and it is more efficient. Cellphones are already there, TV is there, broadcast radio is going there and so are progressive 2-way users. Check out http://www.icomfuture.com/ for more information.