ddcmp Posted February 6, 2009 Posted February 6, 2009 One of my schools a few months ago had some guys in asking for a port to be commisioned in one of the classrooms, i asked obviously whats it for and they replied for LIFE Channel, obviously i went and double checked with teh headteacher and she said help them as required so i patched a port in and gave them the proxy. a few weeks ago i was invited to a training session for life channel, basically its a little box like the espresso box and all it does is stream video and images that the school put in via a CMS. i dont know how much the school are paying for this but im sure its a rippoff. the school didnt ask me else id say create your own videos and show them on the screen that il fit and cable for you!! right now the school are making things via photostory3 (just images) and sometimes adding mpegs/divx's which are being played on a small 40inch Plasma in a big hall (you can hardly see it from the back of the hall) do any of you have thins in your schools, apparantly life channel are quite big and are 'everywhere' (according to the rep!)
antoeknee Posted February 6, 2009 Posted February 6, 2009 We have Life Channel in our school, I wasn't involved in the procurement. Life channel produce subtitled short films on various topics, sexual health, healthy eating bullying, etc. These are sent to the PC's they install overnight and are then shown on a loop during the day. The school can add its own content to be shown in between each of the films in the loop. Or if necessary suspend the content loop and show their own 'important' content. We recently did this after a switch failiure, rather than try and get to everyone round the school we just had an 'everythings working' message shown on the screens around the school. Can't comment on pricing, as I said I wasn't involved in the procurement.
ddcmp Posted February 6, 2009 Author Posted February 6, 2009 you have a few screens? this school has ONE on one side and its a fairly big school! they dont stream the standard life channel stuff (they disable that) all they show is pictures and musing done on photostory, they would have been better off paying for a clean install of the server as someone totally bodged that up (begins with E and ends with E)
antoeknee Posted February 6, 2009 Posted February 6, 2009 Yep we have a screen in reception, foyer areas of the other buildings and in the student dining room. From what you describe they would be better with a stand alone PC (though networked would be better) and data projector. At least they would have a decent size image and there are plenty of different ways of creating the content. Would expect this to be much cheaper than Life Channel
TechSupp Posted February 6, 2009 Posted February 6, 2009 Glad to see some other views on this. One of my primaries nearly blew the ICT budget on this this year, thankfully I managed to persuade them that buying better PC's to replace the failing ones in the classroom was a better use of the money! Looked at the site and heard the approx costings and not convinced. If they want info screens then as someone suggested I would think streaming their own content would be better, bet even to be conviced on that yet as who is going to spend time watching it.
PEO Posted February 6, 2009 Posted February 6, 2009 waste of money, we got it installed. my self and the ict ict coordinator were kept out of the process. we have it but, its not used.
PEO Posted February 6, 2009 Posted February 6, 2009 one thing to remember... its not a digital signage system its just a expensive way to teach kids PSHE on a crap winters day
ddcmp Posted February 6, 2009 Author Posted February 6, 2009 lol im glad to know others feel the same way, it may be usefull in some scenarios but in this school they need more managed service time not life channel - they only have half a day every two weeks and when i get in theres a million issues in the book not counting the ones where they come upto me and ask me to do certain things which they THINK will take 2 mins!
Sylv3r Posted February 7, 2009 Posted February 7, 2009 We don't have it as we created our own digital signage system, it was mentioned by a deputy head to me but I believe it costs a fair few £'s.
IT_Guy Posted September 29, 2009 Posted September 29, 2009 Ditto. I'm sure we could have done our own system cheaper. I'm starting to see a pattern, why are we kept out of the procurement process? If you had a overpriced piece of junk to flog would you want to talk to the onsite IT guy who could create and install something similar for a fraction of the price or would you rather sweet talk the SMT with a powerpoint presentation and a free meal? Thought so.
HodgeHi Posted September 29, 2009 Posted September 29, 2009 We don't have it as we created our own digital signage system, it was mentioned by a deputy head to me but I believe it costs a fair few £'s. What did you use to create the digital signage, or how did you go about it? Our head has been in talks with life channel and i would like to have an alternative option to hand. There is a demonstration that i am attending on life channel and want to go in armed with as much information as possible although keeping an open mind. Is the content that they provide worth the additional cost over a standard digital signage system? Is the content easy enough to create? Is the content that you create limited by the system in place? Sorry for all the questions, just after some useful information about this Life channel. TIA
Pottsey Posted September 29, 2009 Posted September 29, 2009 (edited) “Is the content that they provide worth the additional cost over a standard digital signage system?” Yes more so if you are short of time. Do you really want to spends lots of hours a week making new content? I find it very useful to use there content and just slot its bits of my own when I get time. A lot of people saying they can do it cheaper in house with their own system don’t factor in the time and resources needed to make hours of content. If you don’t need the life channel content it’s not worth getting, but if you factor in all the content you get compared to making it all yourself it is reasonable value. "Is the content easy enough to create?" You are given no software to create content. How hard or easy content is to make depends on which software package you buy. You can send in a limited amount of content to them and they will edit it for you. You can also download extra optional free content. If you are skilled at packages like Pinnacle Studio 12 then content should not be hard to make but still time consuming. “Is the content that you create limited by the system in place?” Yes it’s limited compared to other digital systems. Content is pretty much videos and picture only although I recommend using pictures in video files. There interface is very unfriendly when it comes to pictures. Your limited by whatever your video editing package lets you do. With a few exceptions like a ticker, but it’s still a limitedsystem. Edited September 29, 2009 by Pottsey 1
HodgeHi Posted September 29, 2009 Posted September 29, 2009 I, personally would be using the iLife suite to create the content. Using the footage created by the kids could be a good way to show off their creative skills with the software that we have in school i.e. Stop motion animations etc. Hmm, it may have possibilities i suppose...
penfold Posted September 29, 2009 Posted September 29, 2009 As Pottsey has said I believe the reason your paying is due to the resources that are created. I was told that the content is designed specifically for pupils and schools and that there are lots of resources that the school can choose to download & use. From what I saw it looked quite good, I was quite happy to let the school go that way as I had too much work to do as it was. But like most things it never went any further than a good idea:rolleyes:
sahmeepee Posted September 29, 2009 Posted September 29, 2009 My last school has had it installed. Again, the IT people were kept out of the loop, management paid over the odds for it and it's been a pain in the backside. The people from life channel wanted some sort of remote access to it, so the box had to be firewalled off from the rest of the network. I'm not sure that prefab content has much impact on kids unless the production quality is truly exceptional and full of pizazz. Content relevant to the school is much more engaging IMHO so I'm pushing that as much as possible with our new signage. Currently it's only got photos and school news on (and, grudgingly, a BBC news ticker!) but we should have some pupils' videos on very soon. 1
csl6 Posted October 13, 2009 Posted October 13, 2009 We had this installed last year. I think we paid £5k for a ~26" LCD and for it to be projected in hall. Very expensive I thought and couldn't talk the head out of getting even though the salesman was pretty poor. I am not too sure how long the agreement is (I think it's three years) or how much it is per year. The loop gets quite annoying, but you do have the option of putting your own content up and downloading extra videos from their site which makes it seem less repetitive. I haven't bothered getting involved with it as I have left in the hands of the teachers, but it seems they are fed up with updating it as there is still frosty the snowman playing over photographs of the kids building snowmen. It would probably be better to use some old PC and get the kids to create some content. Downloading videos from various resources could be done but I don't know about that due to copyright etc.
Alis_Klar Posted June 6, 2012 Posted June 6, 2012 (edited) “Is the content that you create limited by the system in place?” Yes it’s limited compared to other digital systems. Content is pretty much videos and picture only although I recommend using pictures in video files. There interface is very unfriendly when it comes to pictures. Your limited by whatever your video editing package lets you do. With a few exceptions like a ticker, but it’s still a limitedsystem. How much locally produced content can you insert into the life channel content? Can the playlist contain as much or as little of your own content as you want or is there a limit of 50% or something imposed? We already have 3 screens here that we run powerpoint content on. Only just put up the last 2 in reception entrance!!!! Now the SLT want the life channel. They have got to want it in reception area needing to pull down my work. GRRR. Again no joined up thinking from manglement!!! Edited June 6, 2012 by Alis_Klar
Pottsey Posted June 11, 2012 Posted June 11, 2012 (edited) How much locally produced content can you insert into the life channel content? Can the playlist contain as much or as little of your own content as you want or is there a limit of 50% or something imposed? We already have 3 screens here that we run powerpoint content on. Only just put up the last 2 in reception entrance!!!! Now the SLT want the life channel. They have got to want it in reception area needing to pull down my work. GRRR. Again no joined up thinking from manglement!!! We no longer use life Channel. As we mostly used our own videos I figured running VLC on an old PC would be a more cost effective solution. I would estimate we ran 95% our content, 5% them. There is a limit but it’s not that bad, at the end of your play list one of life channels videos plays but you can make your playlist as long as you like and have more than 1 playlist. We had two playlist each around 7 hours and randomised. 1 random life channel video played between playlists and a few selected life videos within the playlist. Edited June 11, 2012 by Pottsey
Linfit Posted June 11, 2012 Posted June 11, 2012 (edited) We had this until our new build was finished. It always seemed to be a bit flaky, and I was never very impressed with the content. I must say the kids weren't that impressed either, and after the first few days just ignored it. We had 4 screens in the dining hall reception and library. It seemed an expensive gimmick to me and there are far better things to spend the money on. Since our new building went up we have had a new digital signage system and we just junked the Life Channel box, re-used the screens for the new system, and no-one has missed it, except the DH who insisted we buy it originally, who eventually got me contact them. I said to them if they could get it all working on our network without messing up our switch configs or running any cables (can't just lift the ceiling tiles, all has to be firewalled and certified) they were welcome to try. Guy came in, looked at our building, said he would get back to us, and we have heard nothing since. Edited June 11, 2012 by Linfit
Chris_in_notts Posted June 11, 2012 Posted June 11, 2012 Waste of money! the content is dull and boring and they only change it once a month, the price is rediculous for what it is install xibo and make your own content.
Alis_Klar Posted June 11, 2012 Posted June 11, 2012 (edited) Since our new building went up we have had a new digital signage system and we just junked the Life Channel box, re-used the screens for the new system, and no-one has missed it, So you now own the hardware? I thought i was on lease or something? Was the cost of hardware detailed on the invoice or was it subsidised by the subscription? What screens do they use? Did you then connect your own PC's to the screens or is there some intelligence in the screen that has an ethernet port? Edited June 11, 2012 by Alis_Klar
Chris_in_notts Posted June 11, 2012 Posted June 11, 2012 we supplied our own screens and they supplied some cheap small factor dells running XP and the life channel software
gillop Posted June 12, 2012 Posted June 12, 2012 We had it, but did not renew, not all of the content changed each month, and some videos were on for 3 or 4 months, also it was great that they started to add the Teachers' TV content, but it doesn't have subtitles, which wasn't very useful on the screen in Reception that always has the sound off.
Linfit Posted June 12, 2012 Posted June 12, 2012 (edited) Alis_Klar, they put in a small server - actually a rather underspec Dell workstation, and some screens when it was first fitted. Our building was demolished - the screens we re-used, the computer wasn't any use for anything so we junked it. There was never any suggestion that the hardware was not ours. The system we had there was no intelligence in the screens - they were bog standard TV's with point to point VGA using signal boosters. I don't think this is the only way they do it though, as when they came to look at our new building, as I mentioned previously, they were talking about video over Cat 5, although they also talked about a system with a small PC at the screen end, so they may use a variety of different approaches. Edited June 12, 2012 by Linfit 1
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