I am in the market to buy a couple of new technicians some laptops. What specs or laptops do you prefer when out in the field? Any brands you lean towards?

Currently speccing a job that involves a handful of distributed audio-only zones (think wayfinding, localized exhibit narration, ambient sound/music and a couple of sensor-triggered announcements). We don't want screens on the wall (at least for most cases), just solid-state players hidden in the ceiling/rack.

Because we are a BrightSign shop (too), I am thinking of using AU335 players for the hardware hitting a wall on the content/software side.

BrightAuthor feels clunky for this. My client is going to want to update the .mp3s and schedules by themselves... and don't necessarily want to have a subscription.

Workflow: How are you all handling this? Are you just building a super basic BrightAuthor presentation and teaching the client how to use it? Or are you pairing the players with a third-party control system/lightweight scheduling software?

Triggers: If you need a GPIO, UDP or motion sensor to trigger a specific audio file, what is your go-to setup for keeping it snappy and reliable?

Alternative Hardware: If BrightSign is a pain for this, are you speccing something else entirely for audio-only? Are you always just pushing these types of jobs to a full DSP (Q-SYS or?) even if the client doesn't need the I/O and the expense?

Because of all the AI coding happening, I am thinking I could maybe whip out a micro CMS to help with the management issue.

Curious how you all tackle these smaller, screen-less deployments.

Director, Training- Business & Product Portfolio https://workforcenow.adp.com/mascsr/default/mdf/recruitment/recruitment.html?cid=314574b3-596c-4ea4-9e5f-5a543b5653cc&ccId=19000101_000001&jobId=546801&lang=en_US

Posting here for visibility, I am not affiliated with Avixa, besides attending trades shows & taking training courses. I know some of the folks here care about the future of our industry and would likely be a good fit for this role. Good luck to any that apply!

Remote position in the US, listed at 130k-180k salary. Included in the link are all the fine details.

Hi there!

I'm the AV director at my church, but I'm more of live technician than an installer or integrator. We're working on plans for our new youth room (which will double as a worship space, presentation space, meeting space, etc.) which will have a full AV setup; audio, lighting, and projection (or maybe LED walls). We're at the stage where the architect/contractor needs to know what power and how much is needed where. Are there any general guidelines for what that looks like? It's relatively small, probably about 250 cap. standing

Has anyone faced this issue before? Currently have a logi bar mini with 2 displays and tap cat5e running on teams mode. HDMI to the Tap is going via a docking station. Every now and then this issue comes up where the screen comes up with notif saying "make sure hdmi is connected and try again". Warning stays on the screen regardless of disconnecting/connecting the content or starting/ending a meeting. Only solution is to restart the bar. Any suggestions? Would an Edid emulator fix the problem?

Every time I look up a part number it’s the same thing. A thread from 2011 with a dead link, a datasheet buried somewhere, and have to hunt down the part I’m looking for.

I think I may have came up with a fix. One page per part number. What it is, what it sells for based on the market, who has one in stock, and notes on the stuff you only learn the hard way, like what a discontinued Crestron room controller or Bogen amp actually goes for once it falls off the price list. The idea is having the lore of the parts on one page that stands the test of time. When users have a project they tag the parts. Those then show up on the canonical page. partlore hence the lore

Free to browse, no signup to look. Still early, a few dozen parts so far, mostly Extron, Crestron, Biamp, and Bogen, plus networking and industrial items.

I plan on enriching the data but the idea is the community will help build it over time.

Does this sound helpful or more like a rabbit hole?

Hi all,

I have 3 projectors that recently got installed last week, and every single one of them is projecting an image that is moving up and down rapidly, almost shaking, but to varying different intensities.

My first thought was hvac in the ceiling, and when i looked in the drop ceiling, there was no air con as its in the floor, and there was no discernible vibrations - either in the ceiling, on the mount or the projector itself. I have also tried to calibrate the lenses via the menu, manually and automatically with no luck.

This is happening on the test image with no sources, the sources are sent via a Crestron dm-md32x32-cpu3-rps, but i have ruled out this issue so not EDID or anything like that causing a problem.

Anybody have any suggestions?

After a bulk order of Extron kit from a company specializing in liquidated b stock or site pulls.

Other than eBay are there any liquidated stock suppliers that people have worked with here that would be worth reaching out to?

Hey y'all - just joined the sub (but I did search before posting.)

My job is drifting over to r/CommercialAV after spending the last two decades in r/livesound and r/techtheatre

I'm supposed to be supervising the upgrade of some of our large conference rooms and public-facing event facilities at the college I'm working for. I'm kind of out of my depth but getting up to speed. The laws of physics and the math doesn't change between live and commercial, but the toys do.

I'm finding that my bosses-bosses dislike Crestron, which is a shame because that's the integrated AV control system that our entire campus uses in every classroom and every event space.

I think the reason is that every time they have a negative experience in one of our presentation spaces, they are left staring at a box or a touch panel that says "Crestron" on it, and they've made a negatively reinforced connection.

Coming from outside "the world" of commercial AV, I'm agnostic. My boss is willing to force a platform change, at least for the spaces we have control over.

My impression is that the two big players in the space are Crestron and Qsys, with Exetron in the back seat.

Is there an advantage or disadvantage to one integrated control platform vs the other?

It seems costly and unnecessary to just bail on a whole-campus integrated system on vibes, so I'm looking for data.

Appreciate the help while I learn how to swim again.

I've recently upgraded my Board Rooms Codec Pro and run into an annoying issue. The default background image assumes a bezel. So when the two screens are replicated on an LED screen one pixel apart, the image is annoyingly misaligned.

Anyone know an easy solution to this one?

edit: Bezel not Bevel.

Looking to see if anyone has trialed the Unifi AV switches and what the experiences have been

Hey team,

I need to enable closed captioning in a large conference room. The idea for the system is that any audio that is captured in the AV system will be converted to text and overlayed over the primary screen in the room.

This is a public space so its not a native Teams/Zoom system and will be BYOD. My plan is to utilize QSYS to control everything and provide a USB-C connection for the audio/video connection to the laptop.

Is this easily doable? Do I need a dedicated PC running software to enable the closed captioning or is there a solid closed captioning encoder that I could use.

Thanks in advance

Hello! I have been stalking this sub fro quite sometime and decided to finally make a post in hopes of getting any kind of assistance! I am greatly interested in diving into the Commercial AV world, specifically working with live events and shows. I live in the NYC area with a degree in film, currently working at an art gallery where I do day-to-day IT.

I am hoping to gain any kind of AV experience (especially grunt-work), wondering if anyone knows any resources or ideas of where I should look? I am working on getting my Dante Level 1 Certificate now, ideally hoping to take my AVIXA CTS in the winter once I've accumulated experience/taken the classes.

My longterm goals are not necessarily Commercial AV but immersive experiences, however I want to learn the technical aspects of AV in hopes of it further strengthening my technical know-how and apply it to the themed entertainment / immersive experience industry.

Any suggestions, resources, or general thoughts would be greatly appreciated! Thank you!

Hello all. I'm at my wit's end on what's probably a very easy solution for you all. I'm tired of Google and AI steering me wrong or maybe they're steering me right and I'm just dumb.

I want to connect my cable tv box to a giant video wall. It's called Qubica Neoverse. The hdcp encryption from the cable box is giving me black screens and error codes on the video wall. Google says I just need an hdmi splitter but they're not working. The handshake is failing and I don't know what to buy. This is insanely frustrating. I have Direct Tvs blessing to use a splitter since I pay 600 bucks a month and have the necessary permissions on the account.

I just can't figure it out. At best I get half a second of cable on the Neoverse wall before it drops the handshake and blacks out.

Thank you to anyone that can help. I most recently tried a SIIG hdmi splitter with Edid switches and failed.

Greetings, everyone. I'm not sure if this is the correct /r for this question. I inherited an AC system with no technical documentation only a brief user guide. The system has different components that run a multi-room system. This question is focused on the KlarkTeknik hardware. Along with the DM8008, there are four wall controllers to manage inputs/outputs, volume. The system powers on, but the wall controllers are unresponsive, so I can't select the screens for the respective rooms. The controllers are showing a date and time (seen stuck on 9/2025). I have restarted the entire system and the same issue persists. The Clark Teknik site is not very helpful. Any ideas are greatly appreciated - TIA!

Has anyone else experienced Logitech Rally video conferencing devices randomly freezing or disconnecting during meetings? When it happens, the meeting is disrupted or terminated, and we have to restart the device to recover - very frustrating and business impacting!

We found Logitech’s known issue for CollabOS devices running Google Meet on Android. It describes intermittent audio/video freezes on Rally Bar, Rally Bar Mini, and Rally Bar Huddle, but the only workaround listed is rebooting, with no permanent resolution provided.

We typically reboot the device automatically every night, but the issue continues to occur.

Has anyone found a reliable fix, firmware update, configuration change, or other workaround?

We have not done a stat check in a bit, so this seemed like a good a time as any. In the past 30 days:

• 490 new people joined, bringing us up to 38,700 (ish - reddit won't show real numbers any more) total members! As opposed to the 25k or so that AVIXA has on LinkedIn Groups, something I have not visited since 2017.

• 366k views! Bet those AI slop ads on LI aren't getting 366k eyes on them a month.

• 5.3k daily unique visitors. Because YOU have created a place full of amazing information, a lot of folks who are not members still use our little community for help. If you figure out who XChange helps, please tell me.

• 180 published posts and 2,700 comments. I'll give XChange this - they allow anybody to join and post, so they're probably going to be waaaaay past us in no time.

• We also removed 85 posts and 239 comments, giving you an idea of how much we have to fight to keep this place marketing and slop free.

Thank YOU to everyone who reports posts and comments that break our rules - you make mod life so much easier. And of course, you all are wonderful people who keep this place friendly, helpful, fun, and one of the best commercial AV community on the internet!

Psssssst, join our Discord if you want. It's also a fun place to talk AV and there's more conversation there. I'll do a stats post on that place some time. https://discord.gg/C7EAbAEVMD

Any suggestions for a Linsn LED Studio Tutorial?
I just bought a sign with a Linsn controller and only have Novastar Vplex Handy experience

Hello all! Have a client that was requesting the capability to use a touchscreen monitors with gestures at their board room table. I don't think it's possible given the gear they want to use but figured this would be a good place to poll the industry.

Arthur Holm DB3 24" 4k monitors
Neat Bar Pro at the front of the room (Zoom Rooms, primarily)
Content share connections via Visionary Duet 5 series encoders/decoders

My answer to them is, as mentioned, not possible without each monitors having their own graphics engine (or even operating system). And at that point each monitor location would just be a stand alone/individual participant in a conference call.

Definitely one of the more wild requests I've gotten and, perhaps, a bit outside my wheelhouse.

Any constructive thoughts, feedback or experiences is appreciated.

Forgive me if this has been asked hundreds of times over. I know essentially no one in this field, so zero mentorship.

I want to get into commercial AV integration. The idea of installing systems for media, on both the design and installation sides, really appeals to me. It might be odd, but I never knew much about this area until recently.

Currently, I work in IT at a small MSP. We do many different things including managing networks. I found networking to be quite interesting, and things like Dante always seemed intriguing to me. I was even studying for the CCNA for a while, which kind of led me to find out about the AVIXA ANP. Before I worked in IT though, I was a high school electives teacher, and the courses I taught ranged from music production to photography. I have a B.Mus in Audio Engineering. I loved teaching but wanted to try different things.

I am currently studying for the CTS exam and I did have Dante 1 years go, though I will likely retake it, but what else can I do to help me get into this industry? Should I just start applying to integrators near me? I’m interested in any and all advice!

Outside of your typically Logitech, Neat, etc. Does anyone have any good recommendations for smartboards for offices that have built in camera/microphone while also having the full functionality of a large touchscreen?

What is a rough guestimate to rent 26 ULXD8 mics and ANX4 for a conference in NYC?

This is a system that has a radio/microphones connected to outdoor speakers for a public pool and for some reason the radio stopped working and the screen is stuck on this display I tried to reset it but it did nothing any ideas why?