P25 TG10700 Activity as of 19th Jan 2026

 P25 TG10700 Activity as of 19th Jan 2026

Alternative DMR Networks for VK & ZL as of October, 2025

 Alternative DMR Networks for VK & ZL (Australia & New Zealand)

Apart from the VKDMR Network (DMR-MARC)   and  Brandmeister DMR Network, there are some other alternate DMR based networks, providing servers in Australia and New Zealand, these are :

Digitial Voice DMR Australia (DVAU) Network    https://dmr.dvau.au/

Digital Voice DMR New Zealand  (DVNZ) Network    https://dmr.dvnz.nz/

the DVAU and DVNZ are experimental networks working together.

VKFreeDMR Network Australia    https://www.vkfreedmr.org/

FreeDMR Network New Zealand    https://freedmrnz.dvnz.nz/

The two FreeDMR networks are associated with the FreeDMR network   https://www.freedmr.uk/

They all have their own dashboards so you can see activity, and similar structured talkgroups.

VK-DMR and P25 Activity for VK & ZL as of 25th September, 2025

here is some screenshots to show some of the typical activity on VK-DMR and P25  talkgroups covering VK & ZL,  recently noting a few ZL's appearing on P25 mode which is  good, as the P25 gateways and talkgroups for ZL had basically faded away or turned off.

VK-DMR

 

P25 TG10700

P25 TG10400

P25 TG10401   Note: this is APAC/WICEN TG, but being used by stations from China.

XLX Reflectors for VK & ZL as of 23rd August, 2025

 XLX Reflectors for VK & ZL as of 23rd August, 2025

here are some of the XLX Reflectors, looking at them, they are now all XLX, replacing the older XRF,DCS reflectors. Note- some are purely DStar, some are multi-protocol

XLX014 AU multi-protocol
XLX087 AU VK3AGK Ballarat  DStar
XLX129 NZ Hamilton 
XLX299 NZ BM530 and multi-protocol
XLX432 AU  VK3JED   Multi-protocol
XLX500 AU BM DMR & multi protocol
XLX530 NZ Taupo ARC
XLX750 NZ DVNZ multi-protocol
XLX751 AU multi-protocol

XLX820 AU VK4 DStar
XLX824 AU VK4 DStar
XLX903 AU VK2YI  Dstar
XLX940 AU VK2YM  DStar
XLXVMM NZ  DStar
VK4TUX  gone

 

here are some Nets to listen to on DMR in VK/ZL, as of 13th May 2024

VK3XEM's Welfare Net, Mon to Fri 10am AEST, runs on the VK3 AllStar Network, but accessible from Brandmeister DMR TG 50525, also P25 TG 50525 and I think also on NXDN TG50525.

VK3KK Round Table Net, Wed 8pm AEST, same network as above, on the VK3 AllStar Network, but accessible from Brandmeister DMR TG 50525, also P25 TG 50525 and I think also on NXDN TG50525.

ZL Digital Net, Friday night, 8pm NZT, 6pm AEST, on  VKDMR TG 530 ZL Call Freq

Westlakes  Net, VK2ATZ  Sunday morning from 8.00am AEST on VKDMR TG3802 linked to Brandmeister TG5052

Westlakes Broadcast, Sunday morning 9.00am AEST on VKDMR TG3802 linked to Brandmeister TG5052

VK7 WIA / REAST Broadcast, Sunday morning 9.30am AEST on VKDMR TG5

VK-DMR Net, Tuesdays 0900z on VK-DMR TG505

BMARC Monday night net 19.30pm AEST and Thurs 19.30pm AEST via Brandmeister TG50520

 Port Stephens Net Thurs nights 19.30pm AEST VK-DMR TG3809 & Brandmeister TG5109

P25 Activity as of 6th May, 2024

 looking at some of the P25 Activity  around as of 6th May 2024,

TG10100

TG10201

TG10700

P25 TalkGroups Activity as of 29th April, 2024

I showing some of the activity over past week,

TG10100 WW  (M1GEO  UK), - it has a new Dashboard URL  - it has activity

TG10101   WW - some activity

TG10102    WW TAC2  - some activity

TG10103     WW TAC3  - unknown

TG10200 NA TAC

TG10201 NA TAC1 - plenty activity

TG10202 NA TAC2  - some activity

TG10203 NA TAC3 unknown

TG10400 Pacific P25

TG10401  Pacific TAC1/WICEN  - nothing, but it is a WICEN channel

TG10402  Pacific TAC2 - used by stations in China

TG10403 Pacific TAC3 - no response could be gone

TG10700 plenty of activity, a good dozen stations on here.

TG50525  plenty of activity, as it linked to VK3 Allstar network, multimode gateway

Dashboard URL's :

TG10100 - TG10100/Worldwide P25Reflector-Dashboard (m1geo.com)

TG10200 - - P25 North America Reflector (dvswitch.org)

TG10201 - - P25Reflector-Dashboard by DG9VH (dvswitch.org)

TG10400 - TG10400 PACIFIC P25-NXDN Bridge - VK2HK

TG10401 - TG10401 PACIFIC TAC1 (WICEN) P25 - VK2HK

TG10700 - AU P25 NSW - YSFReflector-Dashboard by DG9VH (gustotech.net)

TG50525 -  TG50525 P25 Gateway-Bridge - VK2HK & TG50525 NXDN-DMR-P25-YSF - VK2HK

Data Rate on Brandmeister AU DMR network from OpenSpot hotspot

 just saving a screenshot of Received Data rate from my OpenSpot1 on the Brandmeister AU DMR network,

approx 3.1 kbytes/sec

Pi-Star DMR Configuration Options for Static TalkGroups

 I was playing around with my Pi-Star configuration, with defining Static TalkGroups under DMR mode, I had added 11 x TG's in the TS1, and found the last couple were not there, meaning that I didnt see or hear any activity in the Activity (heard list) on the Pi-Star Dashboard for two of the 11 defined static TG's.  I tested with another radio, to test each TG defined, to find that TS1_10 and TS1_11 dont work, I trimmed the string back to 9 and it all working.

Did some Google searches to find that it is true,  each TS can have maximum of 9 x static talkgroups.

DMR+ Dynamic Talk Groups - forum.pistar.uk

In the Pi-Star Forum it says  you can have 9 x static TG's defined under TS1 and 9x static TG's defined under TS2.

DMR Node count for VK & ZL

 I have taken stat count of nodes in the past, this time I have written it down, but a couple years ago,  I found the numbers were much the same for VK-DMR versus Brandmeister nodes, in terms of VK activity, what I recall was around the 240-250 mark and looks much the same again today.

here is the count as of today, 22nd April 2024 for VK and ZL

VK-DMR :  Hotspots 242, Repeaters 56, Total=298.

BM  (VK): Hotspots  269, Repeaters 11, Total=280

ZL DMR+ : Hotspots Total=55 

BM (ZL): Hotspots Total=32

NOTE in ZL, repeaters don't have distinctive callsigns like VK does.

This is not a comparison of what is best, each type of DMR network does a different job, they are configured and operate differently, it is all about experimenting and learning, regardless of using one or both DMR modes and same goes for experimenting with other digital modes within the hobby.

DMR Nets for VK & ZL regions

 here are some Nets to listen to on DMR in VK/ZL:

VK3XEM's Welfare Net, Mon to Fri 10am AEST, runs on the VK3 AllStar Network, but accessible from Brandmeister DMR TG 50525, also P25 TG 50525 and I think also on NXDN TG50525.

VK3KK Round Table Net, Wed 8pm AEST, same network as above, on the VK3 AllStar Network, but accessible from Brandmeister DMR TG 50525, also P25 TG 50525 and I think also on NXDN TG50525.

ZL Digital Net, Friday night, 8pm NZT, 6pm AEST, on  VKDMR TG 530 ZL Call Freq

Westlakes  Net, VK2ATZ  Sunday morning from 8.00am AEST on VKDMR TG3802 linked to Brandmeister TG5052

Westlakes Broadcast, Sunday morning 9.00am AEST on VKDMR TG3802 linked to Brandmeister TG5052

VK7 WIA / REAST Broadcast, Sunday morning 9.30am AEST on VKDMR TG5

VK-DMR Net, Tuesdays 8pm AEST on VK-DMR TG5

M17 Project & WSPD - next generation digital voice

 M17 Project 

WPSD is a next-generation, digital voice software and dashboard suite by W0CHP, which includes native M17 support; as well as programs to update your modem firmware to the latest versions, which support M17

Software | M17 Project

The WPSD Project - W0CHP.radio

Pi-Star MMDVM Upgrades

 I just poking around doing some TalkGroup config changes today on my DMR Pi-Star MMDVM node that I use for VK DMR network, I was prompted with an upgrade notice, so I proceeded to upgrade that DMR node and I also upgraded my P25 Pi-Star Node while I was a it.

I been running version 4.1.6 for probably 2 years now since it  was release in November 2021

I noticed during upgrade it did two steps, upgrade to 4.1.7, then onto 4.1.8

I then thought it be good idea to check the Release Notes to see what it is about, 

here is extract off the Pi-Star website, no new functionality, its underlying infrastructure changes, required to allow for new functionality to be added in future, such as M17 Support. I still hanging out for some P25 Gateway functionality. (fingers crossed)

Pi-Star Downloads - pistar.uk

current Release Notes, as of 19th April, 2024

16-Feb-2024 **Version 4.2.1** - Available for Download or Upgrade.
    This version addresses some issues with the nextiondriver.service
        unit file, and with NextionDriver in general. I had
        not actually intended to include the unit file with
        4.2.0, but it's there, so to clean that up, we need
        a minor upgrade.
    While working on NextionDriver, I also noticed an issue with
        4.2.0 not always syncing the time correctly.
        This update also addresses NTP issues in the 4.2.0
        build.
    Additional disk cleaning is done in the release image,
        reducing the image size slightly.

05-Feb-2024 **Version 4.2.0** - Available for Download.
    This release upgrades the base OS from Buster to Bullseye.
        Binaries / Dashboard are all the same as 4.1.x chain.
        There will be some of you that need (for some reason)
        to use the older binary set, if that happens to be
        the case, check out this post on the forum:
        https://forum.pistar.uk/viewtopic.php?t=4806
    On the NanoPi / OrangePi and Odroid releases, the kernels
        are now updated as part of normal OS updates.
    Along with the "Legacy" branch should you need them, there
        is also now a "Testing" that is going to keep pace
        with the upstream releases, so now any of you can
        take part in the testing of new packages.
    If you have a 4.2.0 Beta image installed, you can keep using
        it so long as it's working OK for you, the last bug
        that has been crushed relates to Wi-Fi on the
        Raspberry Pi Zero 2W, it would drop the Wi-Fi after
        a few hours, if you are seeing that, re-flash with the
        current release.

21-Jan-2024 **Version 4.1.8** - Available for Download.
    This it is not possible to in-place upgrade and get the changes
        that matter in this download, the /boot volume has
        been 64MB in size for many years, and before there
        were too many versions of Raspberry Pi boards, this
        was fine. The ever growing number of kernels and
        systems supported by Raspbian means that 64MB is just
        not large enough any more.
    This change to the size of /boot (up to 256MB) also requires
        that I lift the minimum uSD card size to 4GB (it has
        been 2G since Pi-Star launched 10 years ago). This is
        the start of a lot of work to take Pi-Star past some
        of the baked in decisions from years ago that have made
        upgrades painful.
    If you have a working system, upgrade to 4.1.8, but don't rush
        to re-image, 4.2.0 is on the horizon, bumping the OS
        to bullseye, and paving the way for what comes next.
    Those of you waiting for bookworm, well you need to wait just
        a little bit longer, we need a stable release on
        bullseye out, before we get too radical.
    New binaries are coming soon, I wanted to get some of the long
        standing issues cured before pushing those, I will
        re-spin the images once they land.

18-Jan-2024 **Version 4.1.8** - Available for Upgrade.
    Bringing in M17 components, it's not configurable on the dash
        yet, but that is coming soon. First bring in the parts
        to make the service work, and pull in audio files etc.
    More work is required, but the basics of the dash changes are
        done, still to-do update config page and the repeater
        info panel. Thos should get pulled in over the next
        few days.

05-Jan-2024 **Version 4.1.7** - Available for download and upgrade.
    It has been a while since I pushed a full update. Mostly that
        has been owing the to the very stable nature of the
        current build, however, it was getting to have some
        issues creep in.
    What is new? - Actually nothing new, this update us just fixing
        the expired keys for the apt repos. This caused the OS
        and other packages not to get some updates.
        Upgrade to 4.1.7 from the dashboard (it's faster) and
        the new keys get installed, allowing all of the update
        goodness to function once more.
    I know this is not terribly exciting, but there are other things
        being worked on that are more exciting, more news on that
        later.

NOTE: as I mentioned back in October, 2022, to run P25 mode, you have to use the old Kernel 4.19.97+  as the P25 Mode doesn't like the later 5.10.11+ kernel.
To use the later versions of DMR (ie. 4.1.6 and later) you need to use a later version kernel, 5.10.11+ or later, otherwise it starts up and looks fine, but will not connect to a Master, e.g. DMR+.

some amateur radio Nets to listen to

 today is Net for RAOTC (Radio Amateurs Old Timers Net held on first Monday of each month at 11am local  AU eastern time  on VK-DMR network TalkGroup 5

WELCOME to the Radio Amateurs Old Timers Club Australia Inc (raotc.org.au)

also is Simon VK3XEM's Welfare Net, held Mon to Fri at 10am local AU eastern time, on the VK3 All Star Network and VK3RBA network, including Brandmeister TG50525 and  P25 TG50525 and  NXDN TG50525

VK3RBA - Callsign Lookup by QRZ Ham Radio      VK3XEM on the Web – The truth is out there

also is the CCARC (Central Coast Amateur Radio Club) Morning Tea Net, held Mon-Fri  at 10am on the VK2RAG repeater 146.725 MHz , noting it needs 91.5 Hz CTCSS tone to access.

Home - Central Coast Amateur Radio Club (ccarc.org.au)

P25 Activity for NSW & Qld areas as of 9th April, 2023

 P25 Activity for NSW & Qld areas.

we have some P25 repeaters linked to the network on TG10700, these include :
VK2RCG GPT Sydney City 438.200 MHz
VK2RNS Asquith (Sydney North) 439.975 MHz
VK2RHP Horsley Park, (Sydney south west) 438.1375 MHz

VK4RVR, The Knobby, Ipswitch - NEW P25 rptr  has joined the network

Other Operational P25:
VK2RMB Terrey Hills 438.175 MHz but is standalone, waiting to be configured and linked to P25 network
VK2RWK Kurrajong, standalone
VK2RGN Goulburn - not sure if it linked into network yet.

Non-operational or redeployed :

VK2ROT Paddington, off air, 
VK2RWI Dural - now a VK-DMR rptr
VK2RHT Chatswood - now a VK-DMR rptr
VK2RAG Somersby - gone, redeployed
VK2RHR High Range - failed, getting fixed
VK2RCF Carlingford - gone
VK2RLE Heathcote - gone
VK2RWS Berowra - gone

Planned :
possibly a P25 repeater for central west NSW (Bathurst-Orange region).

Activity:

I heard yesterday VK4AZ and VK4MCU testing on the VK4RVR multimode P25/DMR rptr, others heard this weekend VK2LP, VK2PCH, VK2GUM, VK2PET, VK2PTB, VK2JDS, WB9COY