SANAKO Study 1200

[Norphy]

Is anyone using this? Is it any good? How reliable has it been for you?

 

Cheers,

 

Norphy

[gavtow]

We have been using Sanako language labs for about 15 years now, (I think they used to be called Tandberg), and we have nothing but praise for them.

 

What we like about the Sanako 1200 is that all we needed was the computers and headsets, in the olden days Sanako would install a whole dedicated hardware solution but as technology has improved Sanako have kept up to date and released this software only based system.

 

My major worry (as Network Manager of a school with over 2000 students) was that any solution we introduce doesn't cripple or slow down or network and that it doesn't keep crashing. I'm delighted to say that the Sanako solution doesn't do either, it is very reliable and stable and when we have had the odd problem their technical support was brilliant.

 

Gavin

[sjatkn]

We are looking as the Sanako 1200 for the summer. My biggest concern is the same as yours @gavtow. Did you put the main Sanako lab into a VLAN or doesn't it need it?

[gavtow]

We are looking as the Sanako 1200 for the summer. My biggest concern is the same as yours @gavtow. Did you put the main Sanako lab into a VLAN or doesn't it need it?

 

The main Sanako lab doesn't need to go into a dedicated VLAN, you can if you want create one but we didn't.

 

If you alredy have VLAN's then the Sanako software is smart enough to handle this, even if say the teacher is in a different VLAN to the students (you just need to enable multicasting).

 

Gavin

[Spangle]

We've had Sanako 1200 in since last summer, It took untill feb for sanaco to get it working correctly, First they blamed the switch, then the network cards. Finaly they suplied a patch and driver. The only issue I've have since is that the headphones are susceptible to break (we now have abox full for Sanako to replace) and once assigned to a usb port they are not hot plugable.

[gavtow]

We've had Sanako 1200 in since last summer, It took untill feb for sanaco to get it working correctly, First they blamed the switch, then the network cards. Finaly they suplied a patch and driver. The only issue I've have since is that the headphones are susceptible to break (we now have abox full for Sanako to replace) and once assigned to a usb port they are not hot plugable.

 

We also noticed that once assigned to a port that they couldn't easily be swapped, check with Sanako (that's what we did) and because of our support contract we were entitled to a newer version which fixed this issue.

 

Gavin

[Spangle]

Thanks for the heads up on the driver. Sanko are coming in tomorrow so I will get our Lab Technician to request this.

[Almu]

Hello! I know a different system that maybe can help you, it is called Optimas and belongs to Roycan, an enterprise specialized in language labs. It'a very good and useful technology for schools and universities and with it teachers can broadcast HQ video and audio in real time using only the LAN network! It's really amazing! Teachers can also work with groups and pairs, record dialogues, send and receive archives, launch and deany applications, etc. Check it, it can be very useful! Edited June 20, 2012 by Almu

[enjay]

Hi Almu. I can't find it online - do you have a link to it? (also, could you state whether you have any ties with the company/product?)

[Almu]

Hi enjay! you can find it in www(dot)roycan(dot)com in the products section. I know it because there is a language lab from this company in the university of Salamanca, where I studied, and it works really great.

[Max_Power]

Had Sanako lab for a while, but took them a significant amount of time to get it working similar to @Spangle they blamed everything apart from their own software, then suddenly offered us a patch and update and it appears to work as it should.

@gavtow you mention that headsets arent hot plugable. So if a student unplugs headset messes around with them, and then plugs them into a different USB port they wont work?

[Achandler]

Same as above, took a while then patched to fix, they to blamed everything else.

 

To make it worse they gave us version 5.00 then released another version called 5.00 and had a go at me, for being on the wrong version of 5.00, how was I meant to know it was a new release when they kept the same version number.

[sister_annex]

Just out of interest what sort of price were you looking at for 1200 install, also on the headset front, are there other options other than USB? I'm sure I have read somewhere that you can use different headsets?

[sjatkn]

We had a demo a few weeks ago and I am sure we were told that you can use any headphone / microphone on a standard sound card, and the minimum requirements state a PC headset whilst recommending the Sanako ones (Sanako UK / Products / Sanako Study 1200). However they did suggest and I think I would agree to some extent that their headsets were more robust than most. We currently have a Lab 300 and have had little problem with the headsets themselves, the worst we have had is the kids pulling the earpads off. The cables are a different story, the original RJ11 cables are very poor and quite expensive. The new USB ones are more expensive, but as we have not used them know if they are more reliable.

[januttall]

we have had sanaco for about 2-3 years, and had allsorts of issues. firstly it seems to jam the network we have had patches and engineers on lots of occasions and they do blame it on everything but the software. however without the software there is no issue. the main problem is it seems to be intermittent.

 

with headphones we have had loads of issues not all technical. from lots of broken headphones to sanaco having a fit and having to manually go in to set which headphones to use, or reboot the computers.

 

I have considered setting up Vans on our curriculum network and separating different areas from each other. at the moment the entire school of 450+ PC's is on one subnet.

[Achandler]

For your info, I have since moved jobs but when I left, Sanako was working as expected with very few issues. It had been fine for about 18 months.