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It’s 1 p.m. (Every Other) Tuesday. Do You Know Where Justin and Matt Are?

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sdvoe live episode 8

Hello, besties! I’m back with another (sort of late — please don’t kill me, Justin) recap of the March SDVoE LIVE! episodes. So, yes, the episodes I will be talking about today are from March, but the content is evergreen. Today we’re going to be learning about installs in houses of worship and troubleshooting a network.

Let’s go!

Here’s the Tea.

SDVoE LIVE! is a TV show for the AV industry. It is:

  1. Entertaining.
  2. Educational.
  3. Hilarious.

The show is hosted by Matt Dodd and Justin Kennington of the SDVoE Academy, and each episode centers around a crucial ProAV topic that you want to know more about. Episodes feature things like case studies, the latest news, interviews with SMEs and more.

The show has 10 episodes so far, and if you want to catch up on episodes 1-7, read our previous wrap-ups here. You can also go back and watch each episode at the SDVoE Alliance YouTube channel, but the aftershow (in which Justin usually sits on a cooler for some reason?) is only available by signing in to the SDVoE Academy account. Sign in and create a free account if you don’t already have one.

Now for the fun stuff. Today I’m telling you about episodes 8 and 9.

Episode 8: “HOW Special Is That?”

The house of worship corner of our industry doesn’t get enough love, in my opinion. Therefore, I was thrilled to catch this episode and listen to Dodd, Kennington and special guest Matt Scott — of AVNation TV and Omega Audio Video — discuss house of worship installations.

Some questions the guys dove into:

  • How is specifying a HOW different from specifying a big lecture hall?
  • How can SDVoE be applied in a HOW?
  • Are LED walls or projection solutions better for churches and other houses of worship?

Dodd and Kennington showed a snippet of a course from the SDVoE Academy to talk about some common AV layouts in different churches.

sdvoe live how 1

sdvoe live how 2

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Well, the last one isn’t exactly what I would call common. But — Dodd says there are some houses of worship that are really leaning into the aesthetics of art and are building AV systems that look like portraits in a hall. Chances are, if you have ever specified a house of worship, you’ve at least seen two out of three.

Dodd and Kennington looked into an article which asked whether LED or projection is appropriate for house of worship. They agreed that LED is quickly becoming a viable alternative to projection.

“The use of LED paneling … means it works for budget as well,” Dodd explained. “Churches can buy LED screens and continue to add more and more screens as they can afford them, rather than uprooting the entire system.”

Kennington also pointed out that these conversations are happening in all AV verticals, not just HOW.

“This is a trend in the industry of moving toward these direct-view microLEDs,” he said.

The two then invited Matt Scott on, and he discussed a few problems he’s had to troubleshoot in his experience doing major installations with houses of worship.

Things I learned from Scott:

  1. Specifying churches can mean anything from top-end stuff for congregations of a few thousand people, to small local churches with budget restrictions, doing their best to keep up.
  2. COVID-19 changed the church livestreaming game. It used to be an afterthought or was for churches who couldn’t afford to be featured on broadcast TV. Not anymore!
  3. Almost every house-of-worship facility at least starts in a lecture hall configuration.

Episode 9: “It’s 1:00. Do You Know Where Your Network Is?”

I would like to say before continuing on that I definitely had to Google what this episode title was referring to. But, in my defense, I wasn’t alive then. Yeah, yeah I’m too young for the PSA about curfews for minors.

ANYWAY.

DO YOU know where your network is?

Kennington said, “20 years ago, when the screen went black, we knew where to troubleshoot.”

It’s a little bit harder to do that now. Never fear, #AVtweeps! Dodd, Kennington and sales engineer Alesia Hendley are here to help you understand the tools and techniques to help troubleshoot network problems as they arise.

First thing’s first: The SDVoE Academy offers two courses on troubleshooting a network. Check both of those out! They’ll tell you a lot more about the single biggest cause of network failure — people.

“This doesn’t mean we can automatically blame the customer for anything going wrong,” said Dodd.

It instead reinforces the idea that the network in which you deploy your SDVoE system must be thoroughly designed and documented.

A couple of common network problems:

  1. You’re in a network loop. (Some AV-over-IP endpoints include two or more network ports. One for attaching to the network, and the other for attaching other devices. If both ports are connected to the switch, a loop may be created which can shut the network down.)
  2. Devices aren’t being detected properly.

sdvoe live av is it

These seem — from the surface — to be IT problems. Shoutout to Kennington and Dodd for discussing rAVe writer Scott Tiner’s column on why he thinks AV is IT. You don’t have to completely agree, but according to Kennington, it’s important to understand that the AV industry is a subsection of information technology.

With that, the pair brought on Alesia Hendley, a sales engineer and industry journalist and personality. She immediately jumped into the conversation about AV and IT.

“I realized if I was going to grow in my career I needed to pivot to marry these worlds together. You have to understand both. You can’t have one without the other,” she said.

My biggest takeaways from this episode:

  1. Designing the network upfront is the first step in not having problems later.
  2. Make sure things work ahead of time and make sure the network was designed to be a proper foundation for whatever system you’re installing.
  3. Having conversations with a network engineer and being able to understand that information and relay it back to a client is critical.

What to expect from SDVoE LIVE! for the rest of April:

SDVoE LIVE! is ProAV’s only edutainment (education + entertainment) program and it takes place every other Tuesday at 1 p.m. Eastern Time. Episode 10, “Network Safety for AV Pros” can be found on the Academy website and YouTube. The next episode, episode 11, will debut April 20 on SDVoE’s site, YouTube and Twitter. (The aftershow is available exclusively on the SDVoE LIVE! page.) Our next recap will be up by the end of the month. See you then!

P.S. Check out the new QR Code feature when you watch live!

Catch the next SDVoE LIVE! episode by visiting SDVoE.org/Live. By clicking on the link, you can sign up for email reminders or download the event to your calendar. Don’t have an SDVoE Academy account yet? Use this link to make a free one before the next show: https://bit.ly/3oO1kWu.

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