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Presentation Systems
Control Freak
6/1/2007
To Centralize, or Not?
One trend that seems to be contributing to the evolution in both whiteboards and AV controllers is the move in a growing number of schools to a centralized content-management architecture.
"They're looking at standardizing the technology so they can grow and add capabilities as they need them," says AMX's Carter. "The concept of a handful of classrooms with AV control technology in them is a thing of the past. Now it's virtually every classroom on campus. At larger schools, you're talking about hundreds of classrooms." Though Carter would of course be thrilled to see his company's products in every classroom on every campus, he is not exaggerating the campus interest in centralized control. In fact, for Ernie Bailey, director of audiovisual services in the Office of Academic Services at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences in Little Rock, the most useful AV controller innovation of recent years is remote administration--a feature now offered by both Creston and AMX.
"Remote access to the equipment allows me to better manage the technology," Bailey says. "I can check how many hours [the control podium] has been turned on, which buttons are being pushed, and which features are being used. I might notice, for instance, that none of the presenters are using the VCRs, so when I design a new room, I might leave that piece of equipment out of the mix."
FOCUS ON CONTROLLER STANDARDS
Cornell's Greg Bronson is one of the driving forces behind an InfoComm-sponsored Dashboard for Controls initiative to encourage system integrators to provide AV controller interfaces with a consistent look and feel. Supporters believe that operation of a professionally installed AV presentation system should be as easy as driving a car. 'Why should AV controller interfaces be any different?' he asks.
For its part, Crestron offers the RoomView software package with its systems. RoomView provides remote control, monitoring, and resourcemanagement capabilities; it presents a "big-picture view" of a campus' entire presentation setup. Administrators and support staff can use it to perform remote system diagnostics, track the usage of projector lamps, log network activity, and automate tasks through event scheduling. The program even allows administrators to lock out selected rooms remotely, to prevent unauthorized use of TVs, CD players, and other AV equipment. Crestron systems now come with a basic version of RoomView, which supports 25 rooms; an enterprise edition, available for a fee, supports hundreds of rooms and unlimited users.
For system monitoring and maintenance, AMX's Resource Management Suite software includes the Classroom- Manager application, designed to provide real-time system monitoring of equipment status, power usage, and projector lamp hours.
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