All Blog Posts (9)

BEAVERTON, OR — October 14, 2011 — CompView, a leading audio video consulting, design and installation firm, teamed up with NBC’s George to the Rescue to makeover the cafeteria at tornado-ravaged Sojourner Truth Academy in North Minneapolis, MN.  The goal of the cafeteria makeover was to give the kids an exciting place to nourish both their bodies and their minds.

In just three weeks George and his team remodeled the cafeteria into a multipurpose space for lunch and…

You know you're onto a big project when you have to open a new office just to service it. Today I'm out visiting the new headquarters of Audio Video Systems (AVS) outside Washington, D.C. But that's not the new office I'm talking about.

AVS is in an envious position because it has carved out a healthy niche in government work. It recently won a $20 million contract from Harris Corp.'s IT division to handle all the AV at U.S. Army Materiel Command (AMC) and the U.S. Army's Security…

Back when I was editor of Hanley Wood's Digital Home, one of the first stories I assigned was about Best Buy's foray into new home systems integration. Not Geek Squad; Best Buy for New Homes, it was called. It had the CEDIA installers talking. So I didn't really blink when news came out that Best Buy's Magnolia division is getting into commercial AV integration. But it's got InfoComm installers talking.

Earlier this month, word got out in the blogosphere that Best Buy's…

I am the Owner of a A V services Compnay, Wire Wizards Integration, and the Chair of a newly forming InfoComm group looking for new members. We are a group of A V companies who Do Not Sell equip., We specialize in providing Install Technicians, Rental / Events Technicians, and Designer / Engineers, etc., for projects. We contract mostly to larger Dealers, Vars and the like, as…

And so it begins. Around this time of spring, the phone starts ringing and companies begin asking various versions of the question, "So, whatcha doing for InfoComm?" Half the fun of InfoComm is catching up with AV manufacturers on all the new gear they're introducing. The other half is everything else.

Now, InfoComm lasts longer than four days. Heavy-duty education from groups like NSCA and Syn-Aud-Con start up the weekend prior, June 5 and 6. But with apologies to United…

In prior years when I attended the NAB Show in Las Vegas, the broadcast industry's annual confab, I'd meet with product manufacturers who, upon learning I edited PRO AV, would say something to the effect of, "We don't have anything to show you." That was because until recently, broadcast and pro AV were fairly distinct. This week I'm here at NAB 2010 and guess how many vendors have said they have nothing for pro AV. That's right. Zero.

Follow the money. Find it, seize it, move on to the next place it sprouts up. That, apparently, is the education market. According to InfoComm's latest Market Definition Study, the education market in North America is poised for 13 percent annual growth between now and 2012. Manufacturers are responding with repeatable solutions AV pros can use quickly and readily to light up…

This week we're putting the finishing touches on the latest issue of PRO AV and it's got 3D written all over it, from 3D at the movies, to 3D audio, to 3D in public displays. You can't escape this stuff! It's that third one that shows the most potential for our industry, but also raises the most questions—for me at least. For 3D to work in public displays, such as for digital signage, it can't require glasses. And to hear people talk about it, so-called autostereoscopic 3D…

Last week in the newsletter we reported that Extron had bought the products division of Electrosonic, the latter both a manufacturer and an AV integrator until the deal went down. On the one hand, Extron's move to snap up good, solid video streaming technology seemed like a great move. On the other hand, members of…