MGC-100

[MarvinK]

My organization is thinking about purchasing the Polycom MGC-100 to handle our current video needs. We plan to implement approx 10 to 15 conferences per week. A major issue with going this route is that our boss is a major audiophile. We're wondering if the MGC-100 has audio adjustment capabilities that can meet fairly stringent fine tuning. We also have several sites that can't connect at any higher speed than 128k and 2 sites that cannot dial out. Can the MGC-100 dial other sites into the conference fairly easily or does that require external purchased equipment?

Any help would be greatly appreciated. :D

P.S. Great site! Hope it stays around!

[mazzarak]

Well, if you've experienced point-to-point conferences in the last few months, the standard is G722 (though there are a multitude of lesser algorithms most of which don't get used very much).

The G722 standard is maintained by the bridge so the quality is effectively the same. However audio is not my forté, so you might need further evidence on that. Besides, your audio quality is only as good as your speakers.

So far as your 128k systems go, you can easily transcode on a MCU between your 3 sites at 384 and your 1 at 128k.

On the subject of remotely dialling your equipment in, I've never seen it done using MGC manager. Depending on the equipment there are ways of remotely managing your kit. If you have a Viewstation you can use a LAN connection to get to the embedded Browser. From there you can make calls. Likewise with the iPower. Depends on the kit really. There is also GMS which is like a hub where you can see all your endpoint statuses at once, but I'm guessing Polycom don't just give that away.

Hope that's good for starters... B)

[MarvinK]

First of all, thanks for taking the time to reply to my request :) From what I understand the 2 sites that can't dial out, can't dial out at all whether you dial out using the browser or from the machine. I think it's a technical issue with them. It may just be a settign so they're working to figure it out. The reason I mentioned it though was because it still poses the question that even if we fix those 2 sites, in the future we might want to connect another site that can't dial out so we're wondering if the MGC series has that capability.

[pbraatelien]

MarvinK,
The MGC100 does have that capability as do many MCU's. It just depends on what version you are on and what software package (option) you get. Quite a few MCU vendors create a low capabilty package that allow only Ad-Hoc conferences (no advance scheduling) and then you have to buy a scheduling package to do the fancy stuff. Even with those options not enabled, however, most of the ones I have worked with allow dialing out even in the base mode.

[pbraatelien]

As an add-on to my previous message, I have come across a new MCU that has a low price point (for a hardware MCU) and many features that you pay higher prices for as standard. I believe is comes as only IP now (I am not sure what the future specs are), but they have a great demo and website set up so you can test it (sometimes you even will catch one of the principles popping into your conference to help you-they are pretty small).
Go to www.codian.com
Not only can you test their MCU, you can create a conference dial into it, have your friends dial into it, and control it. Pretty slick.
Paul

[mazzarak]

Hi Marvin

sorry, think I might have gotten the wrong end of the stick there. If you mean that the systems can't make calls, but they can receive them, then this is not a problem for the MGC100. In fact, I see a lot more dial out conferences than dial in.

Dare I say it, but I know a very reliable provider in this area of expertise, so if you want to chat offline, then I'm sure you can get my email address off here somewhere :blink:

Andy

[MarvinK]

OK thanks. Anyone else want to chime in on it's Audio capabilities?

[VidCritter]

Okay, I'll bite. The MGC family has some interesting capabilities that were not mentioned- the first one that comes to mind is support for the Siren 14 audio algorithm. This is proprietary (for now) to Polycom endpoints like iPower and the new VSX family, and provides wideband audio frequency (14Khz) for a much better experience. It also supports G.722.1, which is a standard that grew from another proprietary code known as Siren 7,(7Khz) which Polycom opened up to the public.
An interesting fact that seems counter-intuitive is that the audio quality in a videoconference is more important to the experience, than the video quality.
As far as the flexibility of the bridge, you can schedule conferences up to about 99 years in advance, or create ad-hoc multipoint calls very easily. You can change the on-screen layout of the call on the fly, either for yourself or for the entire conference. You can mute any or all participants with the included client-based MGC Manager, or purchase the server-based WebCommander if you need Web-based access to scheduling and conference control.
And no, I'm not a salesman, although I play one on TV.

[danasp]

I can recommend the MGC MCU. We actually have a MGC-50 but except for fewer slots and only 1 power supply it is the same. And it is working great!
Before the MGC-50 we had an Ezenia MCU and I would not even call that a MCU if I compare with the Accord MGC bridge. When we were searching the market for a new bridge it came down to two systems, Accord and Tandberg. But with our demands with high reliability and flexibility the choice was easy. The Accord MGC is a much more complete product and the functions we were looking for we could not find elsewhere.

I have not been able to test the Siren 14 algorithm as I don't have an endpoint supporting Siren14. We mainly use G.722 but I'm more than satistied with that.
At 128Kbps we get a noticable poorer sound as the audio algorithm is then G.711 or G.728. The G.722 takes up too much bandwidth to be used at 128Kbps.

[JNicotina]

I am the bridge admin of two MGC-100's and have worked with them for years....

One thing I want to mention that I have not yet seen mentioned is you have to be very weary of licensing and harware upgrades. I have always been a PolyCom advocate but their model of conducting sales business in regards to their bridges gets very expensive and very burden heavy on your budget.
Before you make any decisions, inquire about licensing...

For instance, there is continuous presemce and TRANSCODING license required in order to have those capabilities. As you mentioned, transcoding would be a requirement for you.

Also in regartds to hardware upgrades...if you purchase your MCU with the older audio 16 boards you will have less capabilities in regards to quality and capacity than you would if you purchase the new audio 48/96 boards. Now my two bridges were purchased about 2.5 years ago with the audio 16 boards (Due to the fact the 48/96 were not out yet), although PolyCom offered a trade up program it was extremely costly to upgrade the hardware to gain the anticipated feature sets.

All I'm trying to say is look into other vendors before you make your committment with the PolyCom MGC line.
For instance, companies like Tandberg and Compunetix have bridges on the market that offer many of the same features sets as the accord as inclusive packeges for far less money. In addition to this, their upgrades are mostly software based (Due to the fact they do not use slot card aka blade technology for their cards) which will eliminate te high costs of having to swap out hardware.

[mazzarak]

I agree with you on the money front J, but thankfully finance is not something I need to concern myself with (not important enough, dontcha know). The MGC100s that we use (we have 9) are far more functional than the now defunct Ezenia Videoservers. But from a service provider point of view, it is always worth retaining them. There are a multiptude of occasions where we have had to connect via Videoserver, because the client equipment is so old and doddery that it needs an old a doddery bridge to reach it.

One thing that has puzzled me is how Polycom never seem to get the complete interoperability sorted on a single release. I think I'm right in saying that the VS FX doesn't connect at 512k ISDN to the Accord V5, though it will at 384k. You'd think they look at all the scenarios for their own equipment at least. Or perhaps there are so many different connection speeds and manufacturers that it isn't possible to check everything. Thank goodness for understanding customers... B)