This report presents the procedures and results of a series of tests to evaluate the functionality of the Multiple Agency Radio Interoperability Program (MARIP) TRP-1000 Transportable Intelligent Interconnect System and its integrated ACU-1000 audio gateway switch.
The TRP-1000 and ACU-1000, which are manufactured by JPS Communications, Inc., are part of a collection of "crossband" technology products offered by various manufacturers. The MARIP TRP-1000 comprises an ACU-1000 configured in a shock-mounted rack with 10 land mobile radios already installed as part of the system. The transportable TRP-1000 is promoted as allowing almost turnkey operation for many public safety situations. The ACU-1000 is designed to allow wireless communication systems to be combined at a common denominator, namely, the audio baseband. Thus, radios that operate within different parts of the radio spectrum, use different modulation and access techniques, or use analog versus digital encoding can interoperate. The test procedures were designed to determine the functionality of the ACU-1000 primarily and the MARIP TRP-1000 secondarily. The series of measurements compared actual performance against the manufacturer's specifications. Testing focused on audio quality performance, ACU-1000/TRP-1000 performance to establish communication network scenarios, and ACU-1000/TRP-1000 unintended electromagnetic interference performance. The testing found that the ACU-1000 contained within the MARIP TRP-1000 met the manufacturer's electrical performance specifications, did not impair the audio quality of the voice communications (beyond the impairments already encountered due to the radios themselves), and was easy to configure and operate; however, if distant radio users are allowed to configure network configurations remotely, as opposed to a local operator, there is a possibility of creating undesirable network configurations. 19 figures and 8 tables