Video Conferencing

Advantages of video conferencing are well known to all. Today, 'going green'

and 'cost cutting' are cynosure of all enterprises. Video conferencing is one

way that could help organization attain both.

When going for video conferencing can deploy a mix of solutions, such as

telepresence for top management who need to take business critical decisions

quickly. For middle management you can go for Web-based video conferencing,

where a small lag won't cause much of an issue. Another thing you need to keep

in mind is the number of conferences taking place in a single day, before fixing

on a solution. Accordingly buy equipments and make sure you have that much of

bandwidth available.

High definition video conferencing



When going for a high definition video conferencing, you would need to look

at things like Display/Monitor size, type of display i.e display can be a

plasma, or LCD or a rear projection, etc. You would also need to consider the

resolution of the display.

Here again the size of the display will depend upon the size of the

conference room and maximum number of people who can be present for a video

conferencing. Depending on the screen size viewing distance is suggested, e.g.

for 30” screen size viewing distance of 6.25 feet is recommended, for more

details refer to the table.

In case of high definition video conferencing you also need to figure out how

many displays would be required by your business. Most of the vendors support

upto two displays. This gives users advantage of showing full screen video or

data on both the displays as well as flexibility of how users want graphics to

be displayed on both the monitors.

Display types



As we mentioned earlier nowadays most vendors offer Plasma, LCD, and DLP

projection. For most of the video applications LCD monitor is a good choice,

especially if sitting arrangements are sideways or close to the display and

lighting in the room is bright. Lifespan of an LCD display is higher as compared

to other displays; it comes with average life of about fifty thousand hours.

Another advantage with LCD display is that they are less to burn-in as compared

to plasmas.

While the advantage plasma display gives is its widest viewing angle among

all types of displays. Benefit of wide viewing angle is that audience can be

seated anywhere in the room and they will still be able to view the video

clearly. One of the biggest disadvantages with plasma is burn-in, but to prevent

against this most of the vendors have a sleep mode option. Also plasma displays

have lesser life as compared to LCD displays and can be difficult to mount on a

wall.

Recommended Viewing Distance against screen size

Coming to DLP project displays, these have superior contrast ratios as well

as color reproduction qualities. However if the sitting area is too close to

screen, DLP projection is not recommended. Talking about their life, DLP

projectors come with a lamp, which might need to be replaced frequently around

after 4500 hours or so. However anyone can replace this lamp and it would not

cost much.

Tele-Presence



Sometimes also referred as visual conferencing, Tele-presence aims to

provide life-like images from a remote location to give a real-life experience.

This technology has been around for a while but finally enterprises are starting

to deploy it. Some vendors also offer telepresence as an end-to-end managed

service. When going for a managed service you will need to look into recurring

as well as upfront costs. A tele-presence solution comprises of very large

displays, so you'll need to ask your vendor for any hidden maintenance costs

involved. Images are captured using high-definition cameras, which are

strategically placed to create the appearance of direct eye contact. This, along

with surround sound speakers will make you almost feel as if you're sitting face

to face with all others in the conference.

One key point to remember while deploying tele-presence is that it's supposed

to give you the impression of a face-to-face meeting. It's the experience you

get from such a solution that really matters, and you have to ensure that the

solution you deploy provides you that experience. So many finer points need to

be looked into while deploying a tele-presence solution. One is the quality of

cameras and their placing. They should be placed so as to give you the

impression of eye contact. It should not appear that anybody is looking at the

camera. The cameras must be able to follow the sound, so the moment anybody

speaks, the cameras need to focus that person.

Sitting arrangements play an important role in performance of a video call, Many vendors recommend for how many participants their solution suits and how should sitting arragement like. In the picture Cisco's TelePresence 3000 solution.

If you really want to get the feeling of sitting face to face with somebody,

then the meeting room environment of both areas have to look similar. A tele-presence

system should be able to provide you this kind of a setup.

Web conferencing



If your requirements suffice from an eye-contact, face-to-face interaction,

then a desktop along with a webcam and codec will do the job for you. If it's

just the face that you want to see while conducting a conference and the

surrounding environment does not matter much, then for such a setup you can opt

from the following options:



Simple Desktop Video Conferencing: This type of solution is usually
present in notebooks having an an in-built webcam, though a webcam can be

mounted separately to notebooks as well as PCs to conduct video conferencing. It

is purely IP based and the video quality will be dependent on the codecs

packaged with the webcam and also on the bandwidth available. Business users who

carry laptops and are mostly on move can use this solution for video

conferencing, as the only thing that they will need would be a decent bandwidth.

If you want to have such a setup for your employees, a mounted webcam for PCs

will be the only expense as the employees can share the existing broadband

connection for conducting the online video conference.

Dedicated Standalone Unit: If you want to have a separate setup for video

conferencing, you can have dedicated units comprising LCD TV, higher megapixel

camera, microphone, etc. Though this dedicated setup is costlier, but it can

provide privacy and an ambient environment for the conference.

Desktop Video conferencing solution from TANDBERG's 1700 MXP can switch from a video call to XGA PC Display

Web Conferencing: While doing video conferencing, you want to share some data

like presentation, financial report, etc. then a Web-based meeting can be a good

option. All that is required will be a Internet connection of decent bandwidth

and a Web browser. The employees can log in and join the meeting using their

laptops and meetings.

If you choose such a solution, then your investment on equipments is minimal,

but the requirement that need to be satisfied would be of bandwidth

availability. There are several online collaboration sites that provide such

services. Acrobat.com from Adobe is one such site from where you can conduct

such Web meetings in a collaborative manner.

Bandwidth



Bandwidth is an important factor. Without good bandwidth, video conferencing

equipment is pretty useless. Now the question arises how much bandwidth is

enough. We spoke about this in our last issue also, in case you missed for a

conventional video conferencing solution, then here's it again.

You need 384 kbps bandwidth for a full-screen, jitter free video conference.

Similarly, high definition video conferencing would require at least 1 MBps,

while tele-presence would require 15--20 MBps. Not only that, video conferencing

traffic is also delay sensitive; so you need to configure QoS policies on your

network. In case of tele-presence, you need to even check your service

provider's network and ensure it's able to handle the load.

Many vendors offering network switches offer advance QoS features which can

automatically prioritize latency sensitive traffic such as voice and video

traffic. Enabling such features can also help in improving quality of a video

call.

Also in issues like how clearly you can hear the other person, microphone

plays an important role, always look for a solution which has advanced features

like echo canceller.