The 57″ MultiSync LCD5710 has been improved with higher display performance, including an 1800:1 contrast ratio.  

Tackle your biggest display solution projects with the 57” NEC MultiSync LCD5710, a large-screen LCD display ideal for digital signage applications. This model boasts the Digital Signage Technology Suite (DSTS), nearly 30 features that enhance display management, improve screen performance and lower total cost of ownership.

• High-definition display provides optimal resolution (1920 x 1080) for digital signage
• Display management controls lower energy consumption and save money
• TileMatrix™ allows you to build video walls (up to 25 displays in a 5×5 matrix)
• Rest easy with a 3-year limited warranty
• Optional speakers, stand and tilt wall mount kit available

To view the MultiSync Display Series brochure (.pdf) and full specs, click  here

For more information on NEC LCD Displays, contact us at info@advanced-inc.com, or 905-502-1110.

The Third Edition

At Infocomm USA 2008 WolfVision presented the third edition of the VZ-8 Visualizer series. As expected, the product launch was a great success and the new units were received very well by our customers.

As WolfVision’s popular VZ-8 series Visualizers have become a worldwide standard in a large number of universities, schools and enterprises in recent years, the names VZ-8plus and VZ-8light remain unchanged, only the suspended number changes from 2 to 3 (indicating the “third generation”).

The most important new feature of the “third edition ” is the upgrade to a higher resolution CCD camera with 1280 x 960 pixels and 30 frames per second (in every resolution). This is native SXGA- resolution with an aspect ratio of 4:3.

The camera also outputs native 720p HD (High Definition) with 1280 x 720 pixels at a widescreen aspect ratio of 16:9. The VZ-8plus³ and VZ-8light³ offer 750 lines of resolution. Naturally these 750 lines are visible in every part of the picture, including the edges, as WolfVision only uses high-end lenses.

An additional upgrade for the VZ-8light³, when compared to the previous model VZ-8light² is that it is now also equipped with a DVI port and can output some widescreen resolutions. Just like the previous units, the new VZ-8 series Visualizers feature a very sophisticated camera/light hinge which provides a large shooting area outside of the working surface. The total tilt range of the camera is 220 degrees.

Availability will start in September 2008.

Click here for detailed information

For more information on wolfvision visualizers or any other visualizers, email us at info@visualizerexperts.com or 1-800-436-6239.

Epson has announced the “Smarter Choices 3/7” promotion for its Brighter Futures™ education customers, offering school administrators added value when purchasing multiple Epson projectors for their schools.

• Purchase 3 each of the Epson projectors listed here and receive a FREE LAMP, a value up to $499
• Purchase 7 each of the Epson projectors listed here and receive an 8th projector FREE

Click here  or the picture below, for more information and the full list of projectors.

The Smarter Choices 3/7 promotion will be available June 15 through Aug. 31, 2008 to Brighter Futures program participants.  Brighter Futures is a unique initiative designed to help educators select and implement the most ideal products for their needs to reduce long-term costs and maximize technology budgets.  Educators can claim one reward – either the replacement lamp or spare projector – with select Epson multimedia projectors purchased at the same time, including the Epson PowerLite® 822+, 1705c, 1715c, 1810, 1825, and 6110i.

For more information about this special promotion, or other Epson brighter Futures program benefits, contact Advanced at info@advanced-inc.com or 1-800-436-6239.

Bar owners or operators who are not already in the process of investing in large format TV screens for their establishments should consider making the change very soon or they could risk losing customers to the bar down the street that boasts snazzy, big screen units.

However, once the bar owner does decide it’s time to make the switch to the new screen technologies, the first question they are faced with is whether to go for plasma or LCD units.

Plasma or LCD?

Like most technologies, there are positives and negatives associated with each type. For example, there is a consensus that plasmas are better at displaying blacks (resulting in improved contrast) while others argue that plasma is superior when it comes to viewing angles.

LCDs, on the other hand, have a higher native resolution which is a huge selling point for HD (High Definition) enthusiasts. As for the environmentally conscious, LCDs typically consume less power and are said to last longer, although plasmas do appear to have caught up in this regard recently.

The quality factor

Another important consideration for the bar owner is the quality of the units. While brand name units can typically cost 20% to 30% more than models intended for home use, they are much more durable and able to withstand the demands placed on them in a bar environment. Home units are typically intended to be powered on for around 4 - 6 hours a day, while the premium units are ready to go all day and night.

The professional units also come with superior warranties which will come in handy should maintenance or repair become an issue. Although prices on the high-end screens continue to drop, bar owners who wait for prices to fall further may already have lost customers by the time they finally get on board.

Atmosphere is key

Sean Russo, the Assistant General Manager at Toronto’s ‘Loose Moose Tap & Grill’, is extremely happy with his bar’s new audio visual implementation from AV presentation specialists Advanced Inc. The recently renovated bar boasts two floors that each showcase nine, flat screen 42″ seamless plasma sets. He says the clarity of the picture is amazing, especially for hockey. He says, “The ice just pops off the screen.”

Located near both the Rogers Center and the Air Canada Center in downtown Toronto, the Loose Moose is a favorite watering hole for both the pre- and post-game crowd. Russo says that the new TVs have been so popular that he’s also retaining a large portion of the crowd during games.

While sports is obviously one of the best ways to get a good return with these screens, it’s not the only way. Russo says his in-bar DJs can mix music videos on the screens as they spin tunes, something they like to do when a key sporting event is not the focal point on the televisions.

Great sets for the great outdoors

And what about unit that work just as well outside? A new product that addresses this untapped market is the AQUiVO weather resistant LCD unit. Andrew Salamon, general manager for Advanced Products Group, is really excited about the revolutionary television. “Owners and operators are now able to entertain their patrons on the patio without the fear of compromising the technology due to the weather. Our displays can be left outside in cold or hot temperatures.”

The all-weather unit can operate in temperatures ranging from -40 degrees Celsius to 40 degrees Celsius. It is 1080p, meaning the high definition picture is crisp and vibrant, while a tempered anti-glare filament is able to absorb bright sun rays.

Salamon adds, “The return on the investment will be noted immediately. Having a sporting event playing in an outdoor atmosphere, close to the food and drink, is a highly desirable situation.” In summary, he says that, “Almost all bar and restaurant owners that have a patio and make use of the AQUiVO displays, will find their patrons will stay longer, spend more, and continue to come back time and time again.”

Inside or outside, for bar owners and operators who are still ’sitting on the fence’, this is an investment they probably can’t afford to ignore.

If you’re a bar owner or operator and are considering leveraging the power of top quality audio visual systems for your business, contact the specialists today or call Advanced Products Group on (905) 502-1110.

Excerpts taken from Etobicoke - The Guardian (June 12, 2008)

The popular TV game show Deal or No Deal is making math fun for Grade 5 students at an inner-city north Etobicoke school thanks to interactive technology.

The ooohs! grew louder and louder as the banker’s offer to North Kipling Junior Middle School student Gurleen Saini reached $122,000 before it plummeted to a mere $3,000 as the 10-year-old tested her probability of winning $1 million on a SMART Board Tuesday afternoon to an audience of more than 100 students, teachers and school administrators gathered in the library of West Glen Junior School. 

The cluster of seven Etobicoke schools shared their successes with the SMART Boards at West Glen Junior School earlier this week.Outfitting seven schools in its cluster with two portable SMART Boards each is how Kingsview Village Junior School used part of its first $1 million under the Toronto District School Board’s (TDSB) Model Schools for Inner Cities initiative.  

Model Schools is a three-year project that focuses parents, teachers and the community on the needs of children inside and out of the classroom. TDSB trustees will decide at a meeting later this month whether to fund Kingsview and the three other Phase II model schools for another year.

SMART Boards are an interactive whiteboard with a touch-sensitive surface that controls a computer, and allows teachers to create interactive presentations with text, pictures and links to the Internet.

Mississauga-based Advanced Presentation Products supplied the seven schools with the SMART Boards, developed by Calgary-based SMART Technologies Inc.

“I’m big on student engagement, student dialogue, teaching moments between kids and teachers, the interactivity,” said West Glen principal Jeanette Lang. “It’s a teaching tool that makes learning fun. It builds self-esteem by role modeling that mistakes are good. Mistakes are what foster learning. We create a climate that allows risk-taking and how to problem solve.

“SMART Board lesson software encourages students to try again if their answer is incorrect in a safe way that builds confidence and promotes group discussion. Special-needs students receive particular benefit from SMART Boards because they learn best from hands-on learning, Lang said. She believes the technology could have far reaching implications for the Game Boy and iPod generation.Click here to read the full story.  

For more information on SMART Boards, contact us at 905-502-1110 or info@advanced-inc.com

With LifeSize Conference, Advanced Inc. can now offer a high definition video communications platform and comprehensive design guide to create telepresence solutions that are best suited to our customers’ environment.

Telepresence technologies are revolutionizing the way in which many companies now conduct business. There is a growing trend to hold meetings and exchange ideas by leveraging advanced methods of video conferencing that utilizes life-size, high-definition images and crystal-clear audio with fluid motion to produce a totally absorbing and engaging experience.

LifeSize Conference from Advanced Inc. delivers the following key features:

• An immersive telepresence quality with high definition video, lifesize images, crystal clear, wideband audio and camera placement for natural eye contact
• Unique flexibility to deploy telepresence tailored to the customer environment
• A superior telepresence experience supporting 3 x video displays and a data display
• An unmatched price-performance at a fraction of the cost of other telepresence solutions
• A lower acquisition cost and lower total cost of ownership that makes LifeSize the telepresence solution of choice for our customers.

This new release symbolizes yet another milestone for Toronto-based Advanced Inc., leading specialists in audio visual (AV) solutions for business.

For more information on the new tailored telepresence suite or any of our comprehensive range of audio visual products and services, contact Advanced Inc. today.

Toronto-based audio visual (AV) specialists Advanced Presentation Solutions and Advanced Products Group have delivered a sleek, custom design project to brand new city centre bar “Four”.

The new Bay Street restaurant, where everything on the menu is fewer than 650 calories, is one of SIR Corporation’s (Service Inspired Restaurants) ‘signature’ branded restaurants. These type of restaurants are typically one-of-a-kind that range in offerings from fine dining to active sports bar.

Located on the concourse level in Commerce Court South, “Four” holds up to 176 people (including 27 at the bar) and was recently opened by SIR Corp. CEO Peter Fowler who boasted that the restaurant “redefined the meaning of indulgence”.

A significant contribution to the ambience of the venue was provided by Advanced whose custom design and installation of four screens set beneath smoked glass provided a unique and stylish focal point at the back of the dining room.

Effective internal collaboration between Advanced Products Group consultancy service and Advanced Presentation Solutions project installation specialists, resulted in a successful, custom design solution for this venue in which the following specification was implemented:

• 11 x 22” HDTVs around bar area
• 4 x 40” NEC HDTVs in a line showing special digital signage videos
• Up to 8 different sources can be show on TVs via 8×8 matrix switcher
• All sources either HD or scaled up to HD
• 10 audio zones throughout restaurant with 37 speakers and 11 sub-woofers resulting in over 7000 watts of audio power
• Auxiliary DJ input into audio system for guest DJs
• All controlled by dual, Crestron touchpanel controllers (1 x wired, 1 x wireless).

For more details on audio visual consultancy, design and installation services for corporate, government or education, contact Advanced today.

Photos courtesy BizBash.

Infinite plasma technology from Advanced Products Group helped showcase the clothes that will be worn by Canada’s Olympic athletes at the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing.

Themed “The Olympic Games, Stylized”, this recent event took place at Muzik Nightclub on Exhibition Grounds in Toronto and took the form of a fashion show organized by APG’s client Hudson’s Bay Company to launch the Olympic athletes’ apparel - including the official Team Canada uniforms.

The show was greatly enhanced by an array of visually stunning audio visual effects including a highly visible backdrop provided by Advanced Inc. created using 36 seamless Infinite plasma panels wired with over 900ft of cabling. The panel display took around a day to set up. Placed at the top end of the stage, the display had a live HD camera feed of the catwalk models as well as pumping out custom-designed HD video material created over a two year period. Input was provided in HD-SDI format from ‘front of house’ and converted to DVI prior to being fed into the wall.

The over-size screen created a highly stylized atmosphere built like a sports stadium with the screen as the ‘scoreboard’. The stage resembled a figure-8 running track with the audience were seated on industrial, unfinished stadium bleachers and the floor covered in astro-turf.

The event passed off flawlessly which can be attributed to a dedicated sales team, impeccable project management and a skilled technical support and installation team willing to go over and above to make every request of the client a successful and stress-free reality.

For more information on large format / Infinite plasma audio visual (AV) solutions, contact Advanced Products Group today.

The company have introduced the Video Border Proxy (VBP™) 4350W and 200 EW appliances, the first network appliances of their kind for small office and home office environments that combine NAT/Firewall traversal, wired and wireless routing, gatekeeping, traffic shaping, and bandwidth allocation capabilities that together can dramatically improve the quality and security of, and simplify the connections of, visual communications between different organizations and networks.

Polycom also announced new software for its popular Polycom VSX® and V-series group and desktop video conferencing endpoints that delivers breakthrough Lost Packet Recovery™ (LPR) technology to minimize the impact of common network congestion and packet loss, providing more consistent, high-quality video calls over IP networks. First introduced on Polycom HDX high definition telepresence solutions, the patent-pending LPR, which masks up to 10 percent of network degradation, is now extended throughout Polycom’s portfolio of video endpoints.

The Polycom VBP 4350W appliance is designed for small office environments, offering 3 Mbps throughput for video calls. The VBP 200 EW appliance is designed for home office environments, offering 1 Mbps throughput for video calls.

To find out more about Polycom video conferencing solutions for your office, contact Advanced Presentation Solutions. 

A microfibre cloth is the ideal cleaning implement since they don’t attract dust and leave zero lint behind. They can be effective at wiping a surface clean and are also good at picking up oil residue that tends to stick on the screen surface when grubby hands make contact.

Start by gently cleaning along the edges of the screen, corner to corner. Then use the same pattern until you get to the centre. If there’s any leftover dust or blemishes, gently rub over those areas again until you get the desired results. Fingerprints and other marks can sometimes be a nuisance to eliminate but just be patient and rub them off in slow, deliberate swipes. You can dampen the cloth a little bit with warm water, if you want, but not too much or excess water could affect the screen.

From there, it’s usually best to use the other side of the cloth to wipe down the rest of the TV, including the stand. After you’re done, put it in a glass of hot water (with no soap) and leave it there for an hour or so. Take it out, rinse the excess water and hang to dry. When it’s ready, it’ll be exactly as it was before and ready to use again.

Adapted from PC World Canada