[EAS] Decoder-Only EAS Units

[Sean Donelan]

On Sat, 17 Sep 2016, Adrienne Abbott wrote:
> Does anybody know how the decoder-only EAS units used by some Low Power
> stations will respond to the NPT? What are the station operators supposed to
> do? Part 11 seems very vague on this...

>From what I understand from a couple of EAS manufacturers, decoder-only 
equipment will decode the NPT and automatically relay the NPT audio on the 
air (assuming the EAS equipment is correctly configured and connected).

Operators at decoder-only stations should not need to do anything, i.e. 
they don't (and probably shouldn't) need to manually read the NPT script 
themselves.

In the extremely unlikely case they've configured the EAS equipment in
"manual" instead of "automatic" mode, the operator on duty should press 
the "Proceed" button (or the equivalent for your manufacturer) 
immediately upon receipt. The EAS equipment will do the correct thing.
But its better to configure the EAS equipment in "automatic relay" mode 
for NPT and EAN.

While the rules say decoder-only equipment only needs to relay the 
audio part of the EAS message, in practice all the decoder-only equipment 
sold actually relay the full EAS protocol message (i.e. EAS header 
data burst, attention signal, audio message, and EOM).  Although the 
decoder-only software "relays" full EAS messages with EAS protocol, it 
won't let the operator "originate" any EAS data bursts or attention 
signal.