Hiding Amplifiers & Speakers

Grant's Perspective on ...

Last weeks short blog post on hiding cables was straight forward - keep cables out of sight.  This post is about what I call making a "clean" installation.

For example, take the basic ceiling mounted projector installation.  The projector becomes a fixture within the room once it's installed. I strongly believe it's important any additional peripherals take the same route and become "built into" the room.  An audio system (amplifier and speakers) are common AV peripherals  included on many projector installations.

Utilizing a very small sized but powerful amplifier that can be tucked up onto the projector mount hardware eliminates a wall mounted audio rack within the room, or a mixer amp placed haphazardly on a table, filing cabinet or hidden in a credenza under the coffee mugs.

There are many options when selecting speakers.  A pair of speakers can be wall mounted on either side of the screen, one or more flush-mounted speaker(s) in the ceiling, or a speaker designed to look like a ceiling tile (usually used in boardrooms for aesthetics).  These speakers are all driven from the small amp located on the projector mount and therefore the cables are also hidden above the ceiling. See a photo of a ceiling tile speaker below.

Another neat & tidy peripheral is a simple control system.  The keypad and controller are both housed as a single device and is flush mounted in the wall similar to a light switch.  The controller eliminates the need for the projector's remote control (which ultimately gets lost) making it easy for presenters to locate the controller on the wall and take control of the primary control functions: projector ON/OFF, input selection (COMPUTER, DVD, LAPTOP, etc), VOLUME UP / DOWN; and perhaps a few more: VIDEO MUTE or SCREEN UP / DOWN.  They may even perform an auto-shut down of the projector and more sophisticated systems can control lighting and HVAC.  This saves lamp life and energy - how green is that?! See a picture of a simple Extron wall plate style controller below.

These inexpensive solutions both contribute to a "clean" installation.  Basically nothing is loose in the room. You could remove all the furniture to create an entirely empty room yet still have a presentation!

Grant

Cable Clutter on the Table

Grant's Perspective on ... Cable Clutter on the Table

My previous post was a bit of a rant about people who spend a huge sum of cash on their boardroom aesthetics and almost nothing on the room's communications system. I'm following this up with another pet peeve; a great looking room and a great AV system but with cables everywhere.

Consider connecting a laptop on a boardroom table or a lectern when doing a presentation. You'll need to at least connect the computer video, possibly power, and potentially computer audio and a LAN connection. So often this means the aesthetics of the room and presentation is marred by a tangle of cables.

There are a few options when it comes to table top cable management. By that I refer to the connection points where a user will plug-in their equipment to an AV system. Not to a traditional wall plate loaded with connection points located far away from the boardroom table, but a place conveniently right on the table.

On a boardroom table you may find connection point devices that are either pop-up, tilt-up, flip-open, or well style. There may be more than one per table and when in the closed state they hide the connection points while providing an elegant solution to a well designed AV system.

A pop-up, when activated, will elevate itself above the table to expose the connection points. A tilt-up is very similar but a tad more discreet. A flip-open is simply a lid that when open allows access to the connection points recessed below the level of the table.

All of the above require interconnect cables. These are the cables that connect your device to the connection point. I personally don't like the fact that the excess cables lay on top of the boardroom table cluttering up the area, which looks unkempt and may be a distraction.

My preferred method is the cable well where the required interconnects already exist within the well and can be extracted when required. This way the user simply pulls out only the desired connection point to the required length to their laptop.

To do one better than that, there are wells available that also include a keypad in the lid (see the picture at the top of this post). This provides the user with control of the AV system right at the location where they connect their device. How cool is that? No more searching for the projector remote or walking across the room to a wall mounted controller and an audio mixer located in a credenza. A common example of this would allow the meeting chairperson to connect their laptop, turn on the AV system, and throughout the course of the meeting adjust the volume and select any of the other connected laptops to be displayed.

The goal is to provide a reliable AV system that is very easy to use while keeping the room looking neat and clean.

Grant