ViewSonic and Newline ViewBoard

[glenmansbridge]

Hello everyone

 

One of my primary schools is looking at purchasing either a ViewSonic ViewBoard (the IFP5550-5) or a Newline Lyra Pro 5523QA. This is for a foundation classroom where they have been using a ceiling mounted projector to project from the teacher's laptop onto an old Smartboard that is purely used to provide a white surface! The projector has finally packed up, and the teacher would like something that is more intertactive for the children. I only have experience of SmartBoards so am finding it difficult to advise the school as to whether one of these cheaper displays is worth considering. Does anyone out there have direct experience of either of these devices? In particular, do they work in a similar fashion to SmartBoards (e.g. include software to enable people to write on the screen, etc.) and how about robustness?

 

Any comments would be really appreciated!

 

Thank you

 

Glen

[KarlGoddard]

I can't comment on NewLine kit, but I went down the Viewsonic route and I can't recommend them highly enough.

 

I bought around 80+ Viewsonics of varying sizes over the past 9 months, - a few 65" in our smaller 6th form rooms, 75" in all of our senior school classrooms and a 98" for presentations. We had one dead out of the box but that was dealt with almost immediately. Apart from that all have been well received by staff. The built in ViewBoard software is decent, but we've directed staff down the MS Whiteboard route so we disable most of the built in apps / software. The screens are robust - no physical issues so far - and the screen quality and accuracy of the touch is excellent. Our models didn't come with wifi modules, so that may be an added expense if you want to network them for centralised management or use them as emergency notifications etc.