A couple of us here at AV Specialists, were recently were given the opportunity to take a trip to Binghamton NY and tour the McIntosh Audio factory. Being able to see how this product is made as well as formal training on how the circuits work was eye opening indeed. Also valuable was the explanation on why they have so many different models.
When you design a video conferencing room, your main focus is probably the functionality of the room. But that doesn’t mean the room can’t be as comfortable and welcoming as every other room in the office. Integrating the video conferencing equipment into the room design will take attention away from the equipment unless you’re using it, elevating the room to more than “just” a video conferencing room, but one that offers a multi-function space that incorporates the overall design concept of the office and even your company’s branding.
The unauthorized use of popular music has been put under the microscope from a legal standpoint, more now than ever before. If you own a company that plays music within your establishment, you may be subject to significant fines contingent on the size of your business. There are helpful websites that will allow you to determine if you are in violation. Recently, a Tampa Bay area bar was subjected to tens of thousands of dollars in fines because of consistent violations. There is another well know Tampa business that was fined over $90,000 for playing unauthorized music. Unfortunately, for unaware business owners, these are just a couple of many examples of the financial hardships that can occur from not acquiring the proper licenses or subscriptions for the music they play.
It's not a Boardroom (too elaborate), it's not a Conference Room (too big), it's a Huddle Room. A huddle room is the name that's been given to a small meeting room where a lot of the "real" work at the job actually gets done.
Home AV Systems are becomming a major staple in homes and residences today. Audio video equipment is vastly improving through technology. Televisions can now access the internet and provide life-like images, and audio systems are becomming even more resilient and realistic. Having a home audio video system professionally designed for your home or residence can provide an entertaining scene where movies are like the theaters and music is like a concert.
There is nothing worse than welcoming a new or current client into the boardroom only to find out that something is not quite right with the technology that will be used to make the important presentation. Quality A/V installations take the needs of the particular room into consideration, which means everyone can hear and everyone can see.
Over the last year (2012) we have seen a shift back toward AV installations that are based more on quality and much less on price. Since around the fall of 2008, there have been a few rough years for most everyone in the AV business. Actually that's probably everyone in business in genaral. However, beginning in the fall of last year (2011) our installation jobs definitely took a turn for the better.
Of all the music services I have Songza is favorite. They have in my opinion the best selection and most tailored genre playlists. Every time I go to listen to music they have the ability to get me more closely to what I am looking for than the other lists. For example, the other I was looking for something lively as we were headed to the Eric Church concert here in Tampa. So I went to Songza, Genre, Country and here's a sampling of what was available:
I've heard a lot of people say or imply that Steve Jobs and Apple have ruined music. One of the more famous people being none other than Jon Bon Jovi himself, who is attributed to this quote, "Steve Jobs is personally responsible for killing the music business." - Bon Jovi.
Back in the Stone Age – and by that, we mean the 1970s – the idea of speaking to another person with a real-time image was just a dream for the average business person. Sure, there were some huge corporations that could accomplish this by having TV cameras set up, but the reality was, most well-heeled business organizations could not really afford to have real-time video conferencing. Still, as technology progressed, modern video conferencing systems became an affordable, real-time way to communicate with employees and clients. And today, the newest technology surpasses expectations by turning any video conference into an online video collaboration.
For many businesses that rely on the distribution of HD or "High Definition" video content, there is some potential bad news coming. That "bad news" in my opinion will affect Sports Bars and Restaurants more so than any other industry.
At the risk of oversimplifying this, I will attempt to breakdown what this means to our customers over the next few paragraphs.
With all the new TV technology trends out there, it's easy to get caught up in the hype. When you're looking to get the most out of your home entertainment system, having the ability to stream content can be convenient, but there are several options from which to choose.
With the birth of some exciting new TV technology trends and the likely death of others, 2014 is set to be a year of great flux for home entertainment. The AV industry is shaking off dead weight technologies, such as 3D televisions, that didn't end up being as revolutionary as some manufacturers expected, and replacing them with some truly innovative technology.
Last week Apple released the latest update of the operating system iOS 8. With that update as well as other updates in the past, there may be potential issues for your AV system. More and more it seems AV technology depends on network connectivity for both delivering music and video content as well as for control of the entire AV system. Each update or even the neglect of doing updates has the possibility to affect your experience.
With 2014 upon us and a whole host of new conference toom technology continuously being released, we thought it would be a good idea to look at some of things you should be thinking about for your business conference rooms.
Even if they relied on acoustics alone, century-old places of worship have some kind of sound system to engage the participants and lead them through the service. But since audio products don’t age quite as gracefully as the stone and marble of ancient cathedrals, what was once considered state-of-the-art no longer meets the needs of today’s congregations. Of all the church sound systems we’ve done, we’ve found two extremes. Either the system is completely outdated and prone to failure, or we uncover a collection of obsolete components cobbled together with electrical tape and a prayer until something better can one day be implemented.
In life we sometimes get caught up in the everyday happenings and forget to enjoy things along the way. This is probably even more true at work. Being in the AV business, I sometimes get so caught up in things like client scheduling, finding the right dimensions to fit our recommended equipment and various other minutia that I forget why I got into this business to begin with, that being the enjoyment of music. I have been after better sound since when I was a young kid. Today I was reminded of this and thought I'd share my experience with you.
When you want to use your brand new home theater system at its fullest potential, finding some good movies to take advantage of your surround sound is a great place to start. With a professional quality receiver from Marantz paired up with some Totem speakers, the only way to totally experience the system is to find a movie that was designed for thrills in the theater.
When purchasing a TV, you want to educate yourself on the latest TV technology trends, so you can invest in the features that will get the most use in your household, and will be compatible with your favorite content, programming subscription(s), and devices. In our last blog post, TV Technology Trends: The Death of the 3D TV, we discussed a TV trend that we believe is on its way out. Now, let's talk about two trends that we expect to gain popularity in 2014.
So you've got your home theater set up perfectly; impeccable surround sound speakers, first-rate audio receiver and amp, and integration with all of your input sources. But with every high quality component that you've purchased comes a remote. It's not uncommon to have more than five electronic components that are remote controlled, so if you're using five different remote control devices, you’re likely feeling frustrated and annoyed.
