I agree with most everything you said. Thanks you

I would say that cloud everything, is not quite right though. I see you work for a cloud company.   Streaming a Blu-Ray over the internet and watching one on a lossless media server or from the disc is a very different experience though.

Cloud is a beautiful and long awaited thing, but audio and video content is still compressed to the max and loses quality. I know the audio on VUDU HD drives me nuts! You have to turn things way up to hear speaking, but quickly turn it down before an action scene.

Just my 2 cents.

Chris

Couple of holes in that one, Daniel.  Not wasting any time beyond telling you comparing a bag phone to RS232 control… well,  as usual, you boys are wrong - not entirely, just mostly.    I could expand the rand, but I’ll let you get back to your Kool-Aid.

Daniel,

You must be a complete and total idiot! Did you not meet the monthly quota for lame stories? Please go back to your cubicle and refresh your resume so you can be a productive citizen of our society. It’s obvious you know nothing about nothing!

John

I expect all this depends on what market you cater to. If you’re bidding public projects such as schools (which is my market), RS232 and analog signal processing are specified because they work and are within the overall budget. Just because it’s old doesn’t mean it should be abandoned. RS232 has been around the block and back but it’s still supported by a huge amount of manufacturers mainly because; it works. Analog processing is intuitive in a way the cloud cannot be, immediate changes with no latency, never mind that DSP GUIs emulate analog counterparts.
That being said, perhaps architects and engineers should start updating their portfolios of available equipment. I still see specs calling for cassette decks although the CD has been around forever and MP3 players are everywhere.
What’s really needed are ways to integrate older equipment to the “cloud” in a painless manner so the customer / end user can still use legacy equipment with their modern components. This way they can see full life expectancy of their purchase rather than having to throw out a perfectly fine piece of older equipment or be forced to blow a budget on the latest and greatest.

Media Players and Servers.

Still a viable solution that works better that streaming from the ‘net.

Better Picture, Better sound.

The consumer takes the legality responsibility. Dealers cannot be held responsible for what the consumer does with installed hardware.

And for now a better source of income than a cloud solution.

Maybe in 5 years the cloud will be viable, not sure how we will all make money with that solution though!

Clearly you know nothing about A/V integration. It is a disservice to our industry to publish this drek. Do more research prior to spewing your misinformed opinion.

Based on the comments above I would say I have struck a nerve.

While I’m not sure this is a reflection on my IQ John, I would say that we are entitled to a difference of opinion.

Now, as the cheese keeps moving, will you be there to collect it.

And the whole…no money in cloud thing?

I would suggest looking at the largest and most successful integrator’s in every CI vertical.

They are already leveraging the cloud to offer services for Voice, Video, Security.  All cloud based.

Perhaps we should be careful not to misconstrue what we don’t know with what is real.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. 

Now back to my “cubicle”

Dan

Daniel,

I will refrain from attacking your IQ, mostly because its probably higher than mine, lol

I respectfully disagree with many points here and am formulating a detailed response, (I’m sure you can’t wait )

Hang in there, at least no one called you a “Pretentious Pejorative” yet, that’s what someone called me when I wrote something they disagreed with.  (I had to look it up honestly)

Mark C

Mark et al,

Thanks for the kind approach to rebutting my “non-sense.”

What I enjoy most about the world is we are all so entitled to our opinion.  Good, bad, or indifferent.

I happen to have “a little” experience in integration.  And while the world is rarely made of black and white, I will tell you that upon seeing other industries that are moving in on this one.  This industry is going to be in trouble if we continue to think people are going to pay for the technology of yesteryear.

Of course there are always circumstances where old technology is the only viable option.  Perhaps related to a cabling limitation or lack of wireless spectrum and so on and so forth…BUT…

The way companies are doing business is changing.  There need for presentation and collaboration spaces are changing.  The movement is toward consumerization and distributed workforce.  Which opens the gambit to many integrator’s, but not those selling customers on highly customized spaces.

There is what are called niche markets.  And therefore there will always be a customer for almost anything.  That is the very reason that the turntable is still being manufactured.  But it doesn’t mean that is the product our customers want.

More times than not our customers don’t know what they want and they lean on us to tell them.  I just hope the integrator’s of today are remembering that we are selling technology to solve business problems, not for the sake of solving technology problems.

Humbly, I will step aside and anticipate with great excitement the correction on my post. 

Thank you all for your candor   - I never miss a good debate!

Daniel,

I noticed that the site is commercial integrators. You also mentioned that you have happen to have “a little” experience in integration? Can I ask how one writes articles for commercial integrator if you don’t have any experience in the field? Not bashing commercial integrators site but whom proof reads these articles?

I would have to say if we as integrators design and install the latest and greatest for our clients we would be out of business in my opinion. We have done so several times and it has came around to “byte” us! An example was when first HDMI was introducted promissing an awesome 1080p picture over Category 5e at 100 plus feet. It ws hit and miss for us on the first few projects and we went back to the proven that works for us. We all would love to implement the latest and greatest but until things are 100% reliable or there is a more reliable solution then I digress.

John,

Thanks for the reply - the “Little” was my kidding based on being in the industry for more than a decade and having been CEO of an SCN Top 50 integrator.

I agree about reliability - I think the point is lost here in that there is a difference between having to leverage old technology when it is the only way vs. when you have control of the design.

Nevertheless, your comments are appreciated. 

I think the comments here in general prove my point regarding resistance to change.

Where there is controversy there is usually purpose.

Dan

A few points if I may..

RS-232 is the most reliable communication avail.  jumping to IP control has some appeal, however the downsides far out-way “throwing away rs-232”  Network architecture plays a pivotal roll before one should even consider using an IP control to a device.  Correct me if I am wrong but we are in “Commercial Integrator” not “Home A/V for the Amateur”.  Our stuff must work ALL THE TIME.  so then, why would you subject your self to outside problems e.g. frozen network switch,  router shutting down port by mistake, commands getting lost in a slurry of broadcasts from the ever increasing apple products, or one of the other many network challenges that can and do exist.

Then the “Cloud”  Lets promote Lower Quality, Less Control, Less Privacy, Less Ability to Wait for the Disc, and the Demise of Affordable Hard-drive space.  Are we “smoking crack” here?  Clearly people have never been in the position where the internet connection is not an option.  And let me tell you it is the worst (and most angry customer) who calls you because they are unable to connect to the internet to get to their contact list that is on the VPN at the office (acting like a cloud, so to speak) and they now do not have access to the contact info they need.  The cloud should be used only to augment the “sharing of data” between your devices and/or remote backup.

Next, You think your 1080p TV is something great…Did you know that the majority of manufactures ship the illustrious 1080p sets to default in a mode that causes over-scanning that makes the TV unable to accurately resolve 1080p…pretty much makes act like a 720p, except with a bunch of artifacts, but you don’t really know that unless you actually calibrate the set.  Or how about this, put a small square test pattern with one white pixel line next to one black pixel line (one-on-one-off) and tell me if you can see individual lines at your viewing position….90% of the time the answer is NO, just a grey box.  But that’s OK….4K is on its way, right?!!  How about we work with Less Compression, and better color depth then trying to up-sell mega-pixels.

I don’t mean to be terse, I just expect to be “learning” something when I read articles in my trade magazine

Robert ???,

I am so appreciative of your comments.  You make many good points.

You come here to learn, so class is now in session. Ready?

I’m going to ask a question for each of your points.

1.  IF RS-232 is the only reliable way then why do companies, government agencies, and every other organization on earth run the vast majority of their critical infrastructure over IP?

2. Did you know that If the application is running in the cloud, then VPN can easily and in fact almost always be eliminated.  Did you also know that the market for cloud based collaboration is growing annually at a rate larger than the CI industry?

3.  Did it say anywhere in the article that you have to utilize the television in 1080p mode?  Does it make sense just because at this moment in time that 1080p may not always be the best option to sell a product that won’t be capable of it in the future.

4.  Just for the heck of it.  I’ve never been a resi or home guy that you speak of above.  Do you think that technology in the workplace is being driven by commercial use case or consumer use case?

As I’ve mentioned above, everyone’s points are taken as there are certainly use cases for old technology. 

However, the fear of the future shouldn’t be a reason not to embrace it.

Best of luck to you!

Cheers.

DN

@ Robert
@Professor Newman.

Professor, Robert was talking about the default way a TV handles 1080P from an input perspective.  He was saying many products even rescale 1080P native sources, instead of just passing them through, which degradates the quality.

If you are telling him to just turn off that setting if he wants to, then I take no exception.

However, your comment to not “utilize the television in 1080p mode” made me want to interject here.  It drives me crazy, and it is a fallacy I’ve heard repeated many times, so for anyone reading who doesn’t know. . .

A 1080P TV has 2 million pixels.  A720p TV has 1 million pixels. They are “fixed” pixel devices.

A native 1080P Display CANNNOT be “turned” into a native 720P display. 

It can display a 720P source only by scaling those 1 million pixels up to 2 million pixels, and the scaling chips in TV’s leave a lot to be desired, especially on the low end.  This is why 720P still makes a ton of sense in arenas where the inputs are HDTV based, as 1080P does not exist there except in rare PPV scenarios.  Watch an SD channel on a Westinghouse 1080P TV and see how “nice” it looks. (Then take some Tylenol for the headache you just got every time something moved)

If quality of picture is any portion of the job’s requirement, eliminating the TVs upscaling of 720P sources to a 1080P fixed pixel device is not a disservice or a technology dodge.  Its good practice, good science, and proper math.

Further into the posts, people got into a lot of what I want to say - but here’s what I’ll add:

Sometimes large scale adoption doesn’t come because something is best, but because it’s easiest for the people building it.  Take for example your comment about moving from RS232 to IP - That’s something so many naive people say.  In a large scale enterprise where I’m controlling something from 3,000 miles away, of course I want some sort of IP access - but if I’m in a conference room or theater or opera house - I don’t need the “benefits” of TCP/IP.  What I need is the rock-solid reliability of RS232.  It’s even better than USB… it’s a direct communications path between two devices, which doesn’t depend on outside resources; isn’t affected by network outages or problems; takes much less knowledge to support, etc.  The only way TCP/IP would ever compete in a commercial install is if it was on its own network completely separate from the company/homeowner/institution/etc’s own network and staff of network engineers.

As for moving to the Cloud - part of me agrees - I’m tired of dealing with manual discs - but, even with some very reliable internet service, I found that when it would drop was in the last 15 minutes of a movie in the middle of the night when I was having trouble sleeping!  Don’t get me wrong - absolutely love what Apple’s been doing with iCloud, making sure everything I’ve ever purchased is available anywhere for instant streaming - but one thing is clear to me - should the day come that I “make it”, my goal will be to find a place to live where civilization AND internet connections haven’t caught up yet.  Those are the places my clients go to unwind - they don’t have cell service or an internet connection - so they’re free to tune out and enjoy the most perfect tube-amplified LP in their collection, or their giant in-home movie theater playing a digitally remastered version of their favorite childhood movie.  For them, the cloud isn’t an option.