The Last In Europe To Have Digital Voice Modes

All other countries in Europe have D-Star (Digital Smart Technologies for Amateur Radio). That is, with the exception of France. Digital voice modes such as APCO25, MOTOTRBO, TETRA and D-STAR with Internet access are prohibited in France at this current time.

According to the DR@F website: But if you loan frequency to ARCEP for professional use, you can access to Internet and use all Digital Voice technologies. ARCEP should treat all Radiocommunications Services in a equal manner.

Although D-Star hasn’t quite perforated every neighborhood in the United States, it is showing surprising growth in some areas. Chances are that you at least know of a D-Star repeater within a hundred miles from you, although you will not be able to hear it without a digital radio.

Believe it or not, D-Star is getting quite popular in some areas. Some hotspots boast a 90% digital audience and a 10% analog audience. Again, click on the link above and you’ll be surprised at the growth.

There is a question of legality with D-Star. Encryption being used is illegal in most countries. Most countries have ignored this part of the digital realm. That one exception is in the country of France. As of April 2010, D-Star is illegal in France, because of the ability to create a connection to the internet with it. Also, because the codec is proprietory.

It is due to the propietary nature of the AMBE codec that hinders Amateur Radio operators from cutting edge modifications. An open source for the code might resolve the matter. Some hams have worked around this technical obstruction.

To further complicate the issue, the term D-Star is a registered trademark of Icom. Icom pretty much has monopolized this side of the market. Proprietary voice compression technology is owned by Digital Voice Systems, Inc. (DVSI). Vocoder Chips are products that use this patented technology.

If you’re into the techie homebrew thing, you might want to visit the page by Satoshi Yasuda, 7M3TJZ.

To catch the buzz about the situation in France click here on the DR@F website.