Interactive Screens

[HazQuarts]

What’s everyone’s opinions on the current range of interactive classroom screens and preferred makes/models? We’ve recently upgraded some of our aging ones to “bigger and better” models from a relatively well known manufacturer but so far we’ve been plagued with issues and they’ve fallen short at every hurdle, leading us to reconsider our ongoing business with them across our trust. The problems have ranged from screens powering off during use, to firmware updates outright breaking functions including the well used screen freeze option. They’re also now outright refusing to support our use of WD19 Dell USB-C docking stations - which don’t cause issues with any other manufacturers, even when an issue is entirely firmware related and is present with everything unplugged. 
 

We’ve seen demos of some equipment offerings but figured the hive mind might have a better suggestion - especially for any providers that can provide a demo unit for teachers to try onsite so they can have a say. Thanks all

[3s-gtech]

Sam-Rockwell-Sung-Badly?

 

If so, yup. They’re crap. Awful software on them. Oh, and the audio stops working every few days and needs a hard reset.

Edited July 1, 2025 by 3s-gtech

[HazQuarts]

Not those ones, part of our fleet includes their “hospitality” screens though for where we don’t need touch screens and they’ve been alright other than the occasional HDMI controller failure. Hadn’t considered their touch screens but I’ll take your warning there and not bother looking at them

[3s-gtech]

Of the others we have, the Clevertouch ones have been okay. With docks, the HDMI signal strength is not strong (same  with any manufacturer to be fair) and I have had to start pulling out faceplates to reduce the number of joints.

 

Reducing resolution to 1080p 60 from 4k 30 works wonders too - in the advanced graphics settings/monitor section.

 

Our oldest ones, Newline made, have been good too.

 

I will add - my experience with any of them running Android is that it is an awful OS for that job. Slow to boot, bloated, clunky.

Edited July 1, 2025 by 3s-gtech

[NegativeKillDeath]

11 hours ago, HazQuarts said:

What’s everyone’s opinions on the current range of interactive classroom screens and preferred makes/models? We’ve recently upgraded some of our aging ones to “bigger and better” models from a relatively well known manufacturer but so far we’ve been plagued with issues and they’ve fallen short at every hurdle, leading us to reconsider our ongoing business with them across our trust. The problems have ranged from screens powering off during use, to firmware updates outright breaking functions including the well used screen freeze option. They’re also now outright refusing to support our use of WD19 Dell USB-C docking stations - which don’t cause issues with any other manufacturers, even when an issue is entirely firmware related and is present with everything unplugged. 
 

We’ve seen demos of some equipment offerings but figured the hive mind might have a better suggestion - especially for any providers that can provide a demo unit for teachers to try onsite so they can have a say. Thanks all

Sounds like Ctouch. Full suite of them here and have encountered the freeze bug in the latest firmware, that firmware seemed to deploy regardless of our settings saying not to which is annoying. Had a few reports of screens turning off but they coincided with requests for replacement remotes, we did track down a student who had pilfered one and turning screens off in lesson. Other than that the screens have been slightly better than the smarttech I have used in the past.

[HazQuarts]

18 minutes ago, NegativeKillDeath said:

Sounds like Ctouch. Full suite of them here and have encountered the freeze bug in the latest firmware, that firmware seemed to deploy regardless of our settings saying not to which is annoying. Had a few reports of screens turning off but they coincided with requests for replacement remotes, we did track down a student who had pilfered one and turning screens off in lesson. Other than that the screens have been slightly better than the smarttech I have used in the past.

You’re bob on there unfortunately. We’re been told to change every setting under the sun in the dealer menus but to no avail. The random shutdowns here seem to be getting worse since the newer firmware as well, whilst a teacher is tapping the board through a PowerPoint they get the shutdown counter pop up - first assumption was a little darling had gotten ahold of a remote, but we replicated it while no one else was in the building

[Andycat]

This sounds bad - we're having 80 Ctouch (i3Touch E-One) installed this Summer. Our older CTouch have been rock solid.

[AshHelm]

Hi @HazQuarts, happy to offer some assistance with Clevertouch screens if you wanted to take a look.

[STK91]

13 hours ago, HazQuarts said:

What’s everyone’s opinions on the current range of interactive classroom screens and preferred makes/models? We’ve recently upgraded some of our aging ones to “bigger and better” models from a relatively well known manufacturer but so far we’ve been plagued with issues and they’ve fallen short at every hurdle, leading us to reconsider our ongoing business with them across our trust. The problems have ranged from screens powering off during use, to firmware updates outright breaking functions including the well used screen freeze option. They’re also now outright refusing to support our use of WD19 Dell USB-C docking stations - which don’t cause issues with any other manufacturers, even when an issue is entirely firmware related and is present with everything unplugged. 
 

We’ve seen demos of some equipment offerings but figured the hive mind might have a better suggestion - especially for any providers that can provide a demo unit for teachers to try onsite so they can have a say. Thanks all

Hi

 

We've recently purchased a couple of the new Iiyama ProLite TE7513A-B1AG displays and have been impressed with the price point, functionality, warranty & the iiControl platform for remotely managing them. Looking at purchasing another 90 soon.

[yac2016]

If price point is important HikVision have some great pricing atm, both for the basic screen with Anroid and the premium screen.

 

65" with a wall bracket is like £750 ex VAT

[BenQ_Chris]

Hi @HazQuarts happy to advise on the BenQ side, we have a fleet of demo units, subscription free whiteboard software (EZWrite 6) which will open .iwb & .notebook files. Two main ranges; RE04 value led proposition, Google EDLA (Play Store), subscription free cloud services (including SSO accounts) and RP04 everything you get on the RE04 and NFC card sign on, integrated soundbar and mic, germ resistant glass and pens, integrated Wi-Fi and with the latest chipset; runs Android 15. All available in 65", 75" and 86".

 

We also have the RE7504A, still featuring Google EDLA, subscription free whiteboard software and cloud device management but is more value driven. Available in 75".

 

All our screens include, upon registering, a 5 year de/re-install warranty and also fixed wall bracket as standard.

 

Additionally all of our software is our own and developed in house, as opposed to using 3rd party software; meaning we continually develop it at no extra cost and can be very agile in terms of development and support.

 

I don't know enough of the detail on Hikvision, but I did see that yesterday that Canada has directed Hikvision to stop local operations citing national security concerns.

 

Any questions, please feel free to drop me a DM.

 

Thanks, Chris.

Edited July 2, 2025 by BenQ_Chris

[pete]

Current preferred model is the Iiyama Touchscreens mentioned up-thread.

 

Our estates team greatly prefer mounting them vs the (needlessly, stupidly, heavy) older Promethean touchscreens (3-person lift to mount) they replace.

[SamanthaD]

Iiyama has been our standard for around 6/7 years, recently we've been having weird issues which has mostly been attributed to the OS rather than the hardware. If only they made a display with touch capabilities, no OS, no buttons, one HDMI and an RS232 they'd fly off the shelves!