[AG-TECH] Equiptment ideas?

Tue Aug 12 09:31:30 CDT 2008

Hi,

Perhaps this could be of your interest:

We have a set of mobile nodes. In the design process, we used ClearOne devices (ClearOne RAV 600 and Converge 560) among others. The best results were with the system described as follows:

4/8-channel compact mixer (Alesis MultiMix 8 USB or Soundcraft Compact 4)
+ Equalizer with Feedback Detection Circuit.
+ Microphones (Audio-Technica AT849, Sennheiser e901, Shure SM58)

Pros

- Cheap option (in comparison with ClearOne system)
- Scalable sound system. We can use existing sound equipments (i.e. easy conection with the sound system in a class room or labs)

Cons

- The node operator needs a little knowledge for tuning the sound equipment.
- With ClearOne system, you have all in one. In this case you have everything separated.

If you need any additional information, please feel free to contact me with any questions you may have.

Regards.
William A. Romero R.

___________________________________
AG-MOX system manager

http://ag-mox.uniandes.edu.co
http://www.accessgrid.org/node/1074

Universidad de los Andes
Bogotá, COLOMBIA

----- Mensaje original -----
De: Andrew Rowley <Andrew.Rowley at manchester.ac.uk>
Fecha: Martes, Agosto 12, 2008 7:20 am
Asunto: RE: [AG-TECH] Equiptment ideas?
A: Douglas Baggett <dbaggett at nsf.gov>, ag-tech <ag-tech at mcs.anl.gov>

> Generator Microsoft Word 11 (filtered medium) Hi,
> 
> Just to add that the projects (there are two now) that use this 
> are Edance and CREW. We are using a custom user interface i.e. 
> not vic, because we found that vic doesn' t support firewire as 
> well as it could -  it tends to work fine with H261AS codec 
> so long as you set the size to large. If we tried anything else, 
> it would come up with a fuzzy image, as if it assumed that the 
> size was the size the codec supported (when it was more likely 
> to be four times the size). One other issue is that if you have 
> the frame rate at 25fps, vic will use lots of CPU (as does our 
> own tool -  vic at least allows you to reduce the frame 
> rate, something we have not yet implemented).
> 
> Optical zoom is usually very good (some up to 40x), and you can 
> get MotorPod interfaces to allow pan and tilt (or a motorized 
> tripod head). We haven' t tried pan and tilt so far -  we 
> just go and point the camcorder (especially as you get a preview 
> via the camcorder' s own screen).
> 
> Andrew J
> --------------------------------------------------------- Andrew 
> G D Rowley Senior Development Officer Research Computing 
> Services The University of Manchester Kilburn Building, Oxford 
> Road Manchester, M13 9PL t : +44 (0) 161 275 0685 e : 
> Andrew.Rowley at manchester.ac.uk w : 
> www.manchester.ac.uk/researchcomputing --------------------------
> -------------------------------
> From: owner-ag-tech at mcs.anl.gov [mailto:owner-ag-
> tech at mcs.anl.gov] On Behalf Of Ben Green Sent: 12 August 2008 
> 11:18 To: Douglas Baggett; ag-tech Subject: RE: [AG-TECH] 
> Equiptment ideas?
> 
> An AG related projecthere at Manchester uses 2 Sony 
> Camcordersconnected toa dual port firewire PCMCIA card, plugged 
> into a laptop. They're much cheaper than VC cameras with an 
> equivalent optical quality. In fact, I think the optical zoom is 
> even better with most camcorders. You'd have to use the IR 
> remote controls to zoom though, and wouldn't get any tilt/pan control.
> 
> Ben.
> 
> From: owner-ag-tech at mcs.anl.gov [mailto:owner-ag-
> tech at mcs.anl.gov] On Behalf Of Douglas Baggett Sent: 11 August 
> 2008 21:30 To: ag-tech Subject: Re: [AG-TECH] Equiptment ideas?
> What about a good high end Firewire video camera? I'm looking to 
> put one on a Mac Pro? Any ideas 
> 
> -Doug B
> OCI/NSF
> On Aug 11, 2008, at 3:53 PM, Matthew Leszczenski wrote:
> 
> I have looked at the RAV 600, and that is more for a full room 
> node, whereas this node is in a public space, so the table 
> microphones would not work as well to pick up just the sound we 
> want, compared to the ambient noise around it, and unfortunately 
> the RAV 600 has its own proprietary connection for its 
> microphones to the main system, so it cannot be expanded upon 
> except with other ClearOne microphones directly made for the RAV 
> systems. Thank you though!
> Matthew Leszczenski
> Technical Assistant and Eagle Scout
> Undergraduate NSSA Major @ RIT
> Collaboration Technology Developer @ RIT Research Computing department
> From:Tran, Quang V. [mailto:qtran3 at lsuhsc.edu] Sent:Monday, 
> August 11, 2008 3:06 PM To:Matthew Leszczenski;ag-
> tech at mcs.anl.gov Subject:RE: [AG-TECH] Equiptment ideas?
> Hi Matthew,
> Check out the RAV 600:http://www.clearone.com/revolutionary-
> audio-conferencing.html.
> Quang Tran
> LSUHSC
> From:owner-ag-tech at mcs.anl.gov [mailto:owner-ag-
> tech at mcs.anl.gov]On Behalf OfMatthew Leszczenski Sent:Monday, 
> August 11, 2008 1:20 PM To:ag-tech at mcs.anl.gov Subject:[AG-TECH] 
> Equiptment ideas?
> Hello all,
> One of my current projects is a public AG kiosk-like setup, in 
> which people will be able to walk up to the node, choose a 
> stream and start to talk directly with that stream. The area is 
> about a 12'  X 12'  square area, with drop-tile 
> ceiling, it will consist of 1x HD camera, 1x DV camera, 2x 
> 52"  HD LCD TV' s, 1x high quality microphone, some sort of 
> directional speakers, and an echo cancellation system. It seems 
> that I would only need one microphone input for this project. 
> However I have mostly worked with the ClearOne XAP400, which is 
> a dual line-in echo cancellation system, and the XAP does not 
> seem to come in a single line-in version. Is there some other 
> echo cancellation unit that people would suggest for a setup 
> like this? Or have I missed a single line-in version of the XAP? 
> Also any other suggestions for the node would be nice to hear, 
> in case others have ideas that haven' t been thought of, or 
> others are thinking of building a node such like this.
> As always all help is appreciated!
> Matthew Leszczenski
> Technical Assistant and Eagle Scout
> Undergraduate NSSA Major @ RIT
> Collaboration Technology Developer @ RIT Research Computing department
> 
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