Digital signage systems

[SteveLemin]

Hi all,

 

I have been investigating digital signage systems to run signage around an Academy. We would be looking at around 7-10 TV's and was wondering what the good people of Edugeek recommend?

 

Many thanks

Steve

[smoothwall]

Hi Steve, i use trilbytv in our Academy its very easy to setup and maintain.

[ITGuyNW]

Or if you don't want to spend £1000 a year, Xibo does the trick for free.

[SteveLemin]

Thanks for the reply, and in terms of equipment, what do you run it from? A PC connected to Internet enabled TV's or amazon Firesticks etc or is there a master device that controls all the screens.

[timbo343]

Watch these videos to give you an idea of Xibo works:

[LeMarchand]

I've used Xibo and had a look at Rise Vision, but the biggest hurdles are finding something easy for others to contribute to and getting content.

 

Some more suggestions here: http://www.edugeek.net/forums/av-multimedia-related/201735-digital-signage-phobic-staff.html

[jdear]

We are using Xibo in the cloud and costs about £15 per year per screen. We are using a mixture of older SFF and windows 10 https://www.amazon.co.uk/Beelink-x5-Z8350-Processor-Graphics-computer/dp/B07FYYZBV8/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?ie=UTF8&qid=1545400691&sr=8-1-spons&keywords=beelink&psc=1 with no issues.

[DrBeaker]

We are using Xibo in the cloud and costs about £15 per year per screen. We are using a mixture of older SFF and windows 10 https://www.amazon.co.uk/Beelink-x5-Z8350-Processor-Graphics-computer/dp/B07FYYZBV8/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?ie=UTF8&qid=1545400691&sr=8-1-spons&keywords=beelink&psc=1 with no issues.

 

How have you found it being hosted in the cloud?

 

How fully-featured is the CMS in the cloud compared to a local server install?

 

Have you run into any bandwidth limits on the cloud version?

[NotSoFast]

We're very happy with Yodeck. Easy to set up and use on some old Raspberry Pis we had lying around. Very flexible and relatively cheap.

[jdear]

We have had no issues and no bandwidth issues. We chose the cloud, because we didn't want the hassle of setting it up locally. The cloud appears to be the same and they keep it up to date as well.

 

We are now using the following devices minipc device https://amzn.to/32mD438 to run our signage from the cloud

 

 

 

How have you found it being hosted in the cloud?

 

How fully-featured is the CMS in the cloud compared to a local server install?

 

Have you run into any bandwidth limits on the cloud version?

[DrBeaker]

We have had no issues and no bandwidth issues. We chose the cloud, because we didn't want the hassle of setting it up locally. The cloud appears to be the same and they keep it up to date as well.

 

We are now using the following devices minipc device https://amzn.to/32mD438 to run our signage from the cloud

 

 

How many displays do you have on it now? Do you use many display slots?

 

How does it work on the cloud versus a local install? Does it download media from the cloud and cache the media e.g. MP4 files, locally on the device like it does with self-hosted Xibo? So it can still play in the event of a network outage?

[EssentialRug]

Would recommend using a Google Slide which can be easily edited by users that you choose (assuming your academy has a G-Suite environment all set up). You would only need to pay for the hardware of a Chromebit/Chromebox. Very cheap solution, looks great and staff love how easy it is to edit.

[DrBeaker]

Would recommend using a Google Slide which can be easily edited by users that you choose (assuming your academy has a G-Suite environment all set up). You would only need to pay for the hardware of a Chromebit/Chromebox. Very cheap solution, looks great and staff love how easy it is to edit.

 

We've done layouts with permissions within Xibo etc before but staff "don't understand it" despite us doing instructions, showing them etc. So it ends up IT doing it which is the opposite of what we intended.

 

Best solution we came up with was exactly that - using an embedded Google slides doc.

[MarkSixsmith]

We use the digital signage in our estream -works well for us with no per screen costs and the easy screen designer.

[DrBeaker]

We use the digital signage in our estream -works well for us with no per screen costs and the easy screen designer.

 

Never heard of them to be honest.

 

What's the 101 on it?

How do you find it?

Pros/Cons?

 

I've used Xibo before and got some pretty clever stuff on it, but it was all in-house. I just don't have the time to manage yet another server updates etc for what is really a non-essential system. Only catch with the cloud version seems to be the bandwidth, but others say they've not hit that limit it seems.

[mavhc]

Considering the amount of smart TVs, there should be some way to use the computer built into them these days, probably best to get one with a web browser and the ability to control it via LAN

[robyholmes]

We use Xibo and V2 has really helped with an easier layout editor. However a lot of our content is pulled from the school website. We have a WordPress website which staff can submit posts too (News) and our head approves. Once on the website, it shows on the digital displays as we iframe (Using Xibos built in tool) a page from the website. The page has the header removed so only the content we want to display is shown. These pages are public but not shown in the website navigation.

 

Along with some RSS tickers for events and Datasets for day periods, weeks and assemblies and you end up with a very nice display system which is easy to keep updated.

 

The hardest bit with Xibo is working out Docker! Go with a Linux VM for this I find.

[keyboards]

We just run chromebits with Google slides, once the intial install and setup is done, we don't touch them the relevant staff just edit the google slides, pretty painless for us.

[mavhc]

We just run chromebits with Google slides, once the intial install and setup is done, we don't touch them the relevant staff just edit the google slides, pretty painless for us.

 

£100 each though? RPi is 1/4 the price