Audio and video collaboration tools

Telepresence solutions
When considering audio and video collaboration tools (also known as telepresence) in education, the following technical factors should be taken into account:

– The scale of the collaboration: How many participants are expected to collaborate at the same time in a session?
– The nature of the collaboration: if there are more than two participants per session, are the participants going to be interacting synchronously or asynchronously? For three or more participants to interact face-to-face synchronously, the software must support multipoint connections.
– What devices will participants be using? PCs, Macs, stand-alone video conferencing units, regular phones, tablets, etc.
– Will content be added to the audio and the video? Do participants need to share their computer screen, a document, a video or music file?
– Does the collaboration software require a server-side component?
– What kind of bandwidth does the collaboration software need?

An educational institution can, for example, need 6-12 simultaneous video calls in a single conference, with a mixture of standalone video conferencing units, Mac and PC computers. At some point during this multipoint call, the presenter may want to show a powerpoint. On the backend, the institution may prefer to have the server-side components hosted offsite. Ideally, the licensing for this would concurrent.

Some examples of telepresence solutions that match and exceed these sample requirements: Polycom CMA, Vidyo Panorama, Microsoft Lync.

In addition, Nefsis is a competitor to the above, however it has no Mac support at this point.

It is worth noting that WebEx, with their Meeting Center product, can support a video conference with up to 7 simultaneous participants (any mixture of Macs and PCs). However, there is no support for connecting from a standalone video conferencing unit. Similarly, ooVoo supports up to 6 simultaneous participants (any mix of Macs and PCs) but, like WebEx, offers no support for connecting from a standalone video conferencing unit. If no document or desktop sharing is required, then ooVoo is free for up to 3 participants. To add up to 6 participants and add document/desktop sharing, there is some added cost.

Webinar solutions
At the same time, the institution may be interested in hosting webinars where face-to-face interaction is not required or desired. In such a situation, a solution such as WebEx may be best suited. It would allow a few people to act as presenters, while allowing hundreds or thousands to act as viewers. The biggest advantage of a webinar-style solution is that it is very cheap compared to a telepresence-style solution, can be used ad-hoc and allows almost anyone in the world to listen to the webinar without needing any internet connection.

Dell Driver Packages

My colleague discovered a wonderful page from Dell that provides nicely-packaged driver download links:
http://www.delltechcenter.com/page/dell+business+client+operating+system+deployment+-+the+.cab+files

$99 smartboard and Chief’s interactive mount

After Johnny Lee (Carnegie Mellon Grad) came up with his $99 Wiimote-based interactive surface, several industry solutions propped up as well. The latest one is from Chief (we use their projector mounts): combined short throw mount and mac/pc compatible interactive bundle that can turn any board into a smart board:
http://www.proavmagazine.com/mounts/chief-ships-interactive-mount-bundle.aspx?rssLink=042711-Chief+Ships+Interactive+Mount+Bundle

Microphone Feedback

Aside from the cell phone-caused speaker interference, there are additional sources of noise/interference in an audio system, including mic feedback. Here are some more resources that describe ways to reduce feedback:
http://toonz.ca/bose/wiki/index.php?title=Microphone_Feedback
http://www.google.com/search?q=mic+feedback
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_feedback#Directivity
http://www.mediacollege.com/audio/howto/feedback.html
http://www.audiocourses.com/article113.html
http://proavmagazine.com/acoustics/designing-a-mix-minus-distributed-sound-system.aspx
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microphone#Microphone_polar_patterns
http://www.ccisolutions.com/worshiptools/learn-about-microphone-feedback

http://www.shure.com/idc/groups/public/documents/webcontent/us_pro_mics_for_music_sound_ea.pdf
http://www.shurenotes.com/issue23/article.html
http://www.shurenotes.com/issue27/article.html

http://www.dt4u.com/dtsystems/feedback.php
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/archive/index.php/t-34057.html
http://www.behringer.com/EN/Products/FBQ2496.aspx
http://www.mp3backingtrax.com/article56.htm