Samsung featured unique installs of their micro and direct view LED solutions installed at its customers’ locations in New York City this month at a press and industry analyst event. In between quick bouts of chilly weather, we visited four locations across the Midtown and downtown Manhattan areas including stops at Fisher Brothers, Ogilvy, MoMA […]
2019 was like no other year I can recall. While the AV-economy experienced explosive growth, at the same time, a few big brands nearly disappeared, namely InFocus and Polycom. How can the Kleenex of projectors, InFocus, literally divest themselves of projectors? Well, it happened and, that happened to be our biggest story of 2019. In […]
If you are one of my readers (thank you) or if you are one of the many people in the rental industry that I am constantly calling for advice, you know that I have spent most of the last 18 months designing and implementing an “experience center” for a global manufacturer. The experience center type […]
Zoom, Zoom, Zoom. It’s not just a catchy Mazda slogan, but it’s also the tale of the last few projects I’ve worked on. In a world where we hear many that like to complain software and hardware companies are talking to customers directly and that the scourge of “good enough” is ruining our businesses, I […]
Anyone who has ever sat in on a project meeting with end users, purchasers, IT, corporate, architects (and all the other professionals likely to be at the table) knows that perspectives are often significantly distorted. How? They’re distorted by either too much or too little understanding of the technologies involved. In this hypothetical project meeting, […]
This is part four in a four-part series Christopher Gillespie has been writing about the relationship between end users and integrators, particularly with regards to corporations or educational institutions that have a large number of conference rooms. See part one, his introduction, here, part two on the AV bill of materials here and part three, […]
In the previous installment, we took an overview of estimating and examined some of the basic concepts. Building off of that, it’s time to dig in with a little more detail and provide some context about selecting which methods to apply when you need to develop an estimate. One estimation technique I didn’t go into […]
Cinionic announced an exclusive long-term strategic laser agreement with Cinemark Holdings, one of the world’s largest movie exhibitors, operating more than 6,000 screens. During the 10-year deal, Cinionic will upgrade Cinemark’s chain with arco Series 4 laser projectors and integrated Barco Alchemy media servers. The transformation of Cinemark’s fleet in the United States and Latin […]
Extron is shipping its IN1804 DI/DO, a new member of the IN1804 family of compact, four-input scalers that provide scaling, switching and integration features. It supports HDMI 2.0 data rates up to 18 Gbps and is HDCP 2.2 compliant. To ensure best-in-class image quality, the switcher incorporates the Extron-exclusive Vector 4K scaling engine with 4:4:4 […]
Biamp announced Thursday that it has been awarded a patent from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for its Beamtracking technology used in its Parlé family of ceiling, tabletop and pendant microphones. The patented technology allows the microphones to track and mix voices intelligently from around a meeting room. “Our Parlé microphones are empowered by […]
VuWall today announced an update to its TRx Centralized Multi-Video Wall Management System, version 2.5. This release includes three new security capabilities that strengthen the VuWall system: Transport Layer Security (TLS) between the TRx GUI and TRx Server, improved user rights management and more KVM modes. VuWall’s TRx Version 2.5 updates include: TLS between TRx […]
Focusrite plc., the holding company for Focusrite, ADAM Audio, Novation and the Ampify Music brands, announced the acquisition of Martin Audio Ltd. Thursday. This acquisition follows on the heels of Berlin-based studio loudspeaker manufacturer ADAM Audio, but has been a consideration for Focusrite Founder and Chairman Phil Dudderidge for years, who said: “I have known […]
This is part three of a four-part series from Christopher Gillespie. Read his introduction here and his piece on the AV bill of materials here. Years ago, maintaining and reporting on the inventory was a matter of many spreadsheets, maybe a home-baked database, perhaps it was some hybrid, or maybe it was Crestron Fusion or […]
“Picture yourself being able to wake up, raise your blinds to let in that lovely morning sun, listen to some music and still not have to get out of bed. How lovely, right? When you improve the IQ of your home, life itself runs a bit smoother as well. So whether you want a full smart home […]
Amazon, Apple, Google, and the Zigbee Alliance, this week, announced a new working group that plans to develop and promote the adoption of a new, royalty-free connectivity standard to increase compatibility among smart home products, with security as a fundamental design tenet. Zigbee Alliance board member companies such as IKEA, Legrand, NXP Semiconductors, Resideo, Samsung SmartThings, Schneider Electric, Signify (formerly Philips Lighting), Silicon Labs, […]
Extron announced the launch of its XTP II CP 4i HD DMA 4K PLUS, an XTP input board that provides four HDMI inputs with multi-channel audio downmixing and stereo audio connectivity. It’s HDCP 2.2 compliant and accommodates data rates up to 18 Gbps for support of video resolutions up to 4K/60 at 4:4:4 color sampling. […]
Nureva announced that multiple QuickShare groups can now be enabled in Span Workspace, Nureva’s cloud-based digital canvas for visual planning and team collaboration. The QuickShare feature allows all participants in a collaboration session to contribute digital notes and images to a group on the Span canvas from their phone, tablet or laptop by simply scanning a QR code. With […]
By Scott Walker Principal, Waveguide LLC There it is. I’m putting it out there. I’ve thought about this a lot and from my vantage point, having spent the past 30 years of my life as an AV design consultant, I believe there’s no other single individual who has had a greater impact on the lives […]
To help create a warm, comfortable living space for families with children receiving hospital treatment, especially during the holidays, Almo Corporation (#AlmoGivesBack), a distributor of appliances, consumer electronics, proAV equipment and housewares, has provided a total of 23 major appliances to the Ronald McDonald House (RMH) in Philadelphia. The appliances are part of a significant […]
By David Danto Director of UC Strategy and Research, Poly Turning the page into a new decade gives us the opportunity to put our past into perspective and predict where we’re going. In the world of unified communications and collaboration, this exercise reveals a space that is eliminating most of the poor experiences and exploding […]
At ISE 2020, Vivitek, a brand of Delta, together with Delta Display Solutions, will exhibit under the banner ‘Beyond Visual Communication’ on its stand in Hall 5-S30. In addition to it showing its NovoConnect Solution ecosystem, Vivitek will also introduce three new additions to its existing visual display and collaboration solutions. Debuting at ISE 2020, […]
Starting today, Microsoft Teams is available for Linux users in public preview, enabling collaboration experiences for the open source community at work and in educational institutions. Users can download the native Linux packages in .deb and .rpm formats here. The Microsoft Teams client is the first Microsoft 365 app that is coming to Linux desktops, […]
At ISE, CTOUCH will officially launch a new member of the BRIX family of collaboration boards in the form of the Leddura 2Share Pro. The Leddura 2Share Pro is an interactive whiteboarding (with built-in wireless content sharing) that adds ideation in the form of digital sticky notes and text recognition in addition to the capability […]
Leyard and Planar showcased its latest display and video wall innovations across a network of showrooms worldwide. The New York Showroom is located on 11th Avenue in New York City. The New York showroom occupies the entire fifth floor of a beautiful historic building constructed in 1905. The showroom is separated into approximately one dozen […]
MuxLab just started shipping its 1Gbps AV-over-IP PoE Transmitter integrated with Dante conversion (model 500759-TX-Dante), which is specified to deliver HDMI at up to 4K@30Hz (4:4:4) together with Dante audio signals with HDR. It uses JPEG 2000 compression, which is specified to only use up to 5000Mbps. Installation requires a connection to a 1G Ethernet […]
AVIXA announced two new categories to its annual awards program: The Emerging Talent Award and Event Design Professional of the Year Award. The award winners will be recognized during a ceremony at InfoComm 2020 in Las Vegas on June 17, 2020. “The annual AVIXA Awards program honors ProAV professionals making significant impacts in all corners […]
Remember when Polycom and Cisco were always mentioned in the same sentence? Seems like a long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, huh? Do you remember when we were all saying, “Why don’t Polycom and Cisco just make their stuff interoperable?” Well, that was what led to their ultimate demise — in […]
By Andrew Jimenez Vice President of Technology, Anixter The commercial building lighting controls market is experiencing a period of rapid transformation. With commercial lighting technology making the shift from traditional fluorescent to LED lighting fixtures, legacy analog lighting controls are being replaced by more scalable and reliable digital controls that can operate over a wired […]
SYNNEX’s Share the Magic fundraiser initiative topped $2,063,680 in 2019 for four South Carolina-based charities, including A Child’s Haven, Clement’s Kindness, Make-A-Wish South Carolina, and Pendleton Place. In the last eight years of holding this fundraiser, Synnex has raised more than $12 million cumulatively. “We are very proud of surpassing the $12 million milestone — an achievement that […]
Harro Heinz, the co-founder of Renkus-Heinz, celebrated a significant milestone on the weekend: his 90th birthday — an event that sits synchronously within the 40th year of the company that bears his name. Heinz founded the cutting-edge speaker company with Algis Renkus in 1979. A few years later, Heinz bought his partner out of the […]
THIS IS A PROMOTED POST FROM TELEPORTIVITY Last month, I wrote about Teleportivity, a scalable and fully integrated help desk solution. Here is a takeaway from that article from a University campus help-desk perspective: “We need to fix this stat: On university campuses, fewer than 10% of Level 1 support inquiries and service calls are […]
Extron just added the DXP 42 HD 4K PLUS to the DXP HD 4K PLUS Series of high-end HDMI matrix switchers. This 4×2 model supports data rates up to 18 Gbps and video resolutions up to 4K@60Hz with 4:4:4 chroma sampling. To maintain signal integrity and reliability, it provides automatic cable equalization on each input […]
