EduTech and the New Polycom Office in Moscow

The EduTech conference in Moscow was a gathering of representatives from schools, universities, and corporate training organizations in the Russian Federation to discuss new technologies and methods for teaching and training remotely. Understandably, this topic is very hot in a country that stretches over 9 time zones (11 before the reform in 2010) and that requires a lot of communication between Moscow and the regions.

I had the pleasure to present on my favorite topic "Music Performance and Instruction over High-Speed Networks" (in Russian "Видео для музыкального обучения и трансляции концертов"). The presentation was part of a session dedicated to video technology for education, and resulted in many questions and discussions during and after the session. Did I mention that I enjoy presenting in Russian?

While in Moscow, I also got an early peek of the new Polycom office and Executive Briefing Center that officially opened on October 4. The office is located at the Paveletskaya Square which makes it easily accessible from the Domodedovo International Airport (DME) – a non-stop train connects the two - and through the Moscow subway system. The Business Center "Paveletskaya Plaza" is a beautiful 26-story tower visible from afar, and has a modern lobby with well-organized security.

Polycom has the entire 23^rd floor of the building which results in spectacular views in all directions.

The new office is not only home for the Polycom employees in Moscow but also has the latest Polycom technology, including RPX 400 and OTX 300 immersive telepresence systems, all connected via high-bandwidth networks to other Polycom offices. I could not resist the temptation and placed a couple of telepresence calls across the Atlantic. The picture was crystal-clear and stats showed 6Mbps network bandwidth with no packet loss.

Followers of Video Networker in the Russian Federation, I would highly recommend making an appointment (otherwise security will not let you in) and visiting the new Polycom office in Moscow.

How the Migration to IP Improves Voice Quality

Back to the early years of Voice over IP, the quality was not great in comparison to TDM systems. Since IP networks did not have enough bandwidth and quality of service, voice had to be compressed a lot to be sent over the IP network. TDM solutions by contrast did not compress voice and since there was a physical connection between the TDM system and the TDM phone, they did not need to do much packetization either. The result was better voice quality on TDM phones than on IP phones – up until the advance of fast IP LANs and wideband audio codecs in the 2000s entirely changed the balance.

Most VOIP phones shipping today have some sort of HD Voice support. Polycom has been shipping HD voice for 10 years, starting with 7 kHz voice, then moving to 14 kHz audio in 2003 and 20+ kHz audio in 2006. While the voice industry as a whole is only now moving to 7 kHz voice, Polycom has moved further beyond – to support 14 kHz and even 20+ kHz audio (with Siren 22 and G.719 codecs). It is not just about "voice" anymore but rather about "audio" - the technology has gone beyond speech/voice transmission and allows for high-quality music and mixed content.

HD Voice is not only about better quality codecs. The acoustics of the handset were improved while microphones and speakers have to be modified to capture/play higher quality voice and audio. Echo cancelation and other algorithms have to be adjusted to support the wider frequency band. The challenges around transmitting high-quality audio are described in a joint white paper of Polycom and the Manhattan School of Music. The paper highlights our focus on audio quality and demonstrates our capability to meet the requirements of the most demanding users: musicians. The technology developed for this high-end application trickles down to room and personal telepresence systems and telephones, effectively spreading across the entire Polycom portfolio.

So how does a communication system capture the value of high-quality audio now available in VOIP phones? The key is migration to a distributed architecture that routes voice streams without transcoding them back to the TDM format (G.711 codec). If audio is delivered without transcoding between two communication partners on the system, the quality remains the highest (assuming that both partners have high-quality VOIP phones). The matter gets a little more complicated with multipoint calls because most voice conferencing servers embedded in enterprise voice systems support only G.711. If a video conference server such as Polycom RMX is part of a Unified Communication solution, the unused video ports on this server can be configured to support audio (up to the highest audio quality of 20+ kHz). Audio requires far less performance than video; therefore, one video port becomes 40 audio ports, and that is enough scalability for an enterprise deployments. Long-term, however, wideband audio will be gradually supported on all conference servers in enterprise systems, starting with the 7kHz G.722 wideband codec which is widely supported in newer IP phones.

Once the multipoint problem is solved, the only one remaining is connectivity to other systems across service provider networks. Most voice systems today still use TDM connection (such as T1, PRI) to connect to service providers. This TDM connection takes the voice quality down to G.711 due to physical limitations. Newer systems however support the so-called SIP trunking standard (specification is managed by the SIP Forum) that allows connecting the enterprise voice system with a service provider using an IP connection and a virtual trunk with SIP signaling. This virtual trunk does not impose any physical limitations on the voice streams (it is just IP packets crossing the network); therefore, any voice quality can be supported - as long as both the enterprise and the SP systems can handle it. SIP trunks enable wideband voice to travel among enterprise communications systems around the world without any transcoding and quality loss.

Will wideband voice make its way to wireless handsets? The latest generation of wireless handsets – for example Polycom Spectralink 8400 - already support wideband voice (7kHz, G.722, G.722.1), and as long as the voice stream can reach the destination in its original form, the receiver enjoys the clarity and superior understanding of wideband voice communication. The challenges related to multipoint conferencing and SP trunking apply equally to wireless phones, as they are treated as any other phone in the IP communication system environment.

In conclusion, voice technology has made an amazing progress over the past decade. The work of researchers and engineers is now finally finding its way in enterprise communication solutions that provide better quality, reduce misunderstandings and fatigue, and in general, makes human interactions over distances more natural and effortless.

Focus Webinar “The Truth about Unified Communications for SMB”

I got invited to speak about UC and video in a Focus webinar for the Small and Medium Business Community. Since I usually talk to larger organizations, this webinar was a great opportunity to evaluate how the solutions available in the UC and video space apply (or don't apply) to SMBs.

First of all, SMB definition varies by country, for example, the US Government define companies with less than 500 employees as SMBs while in Germany it is companies with less than 250 employees. Since the audience of the webinar was mostly in North America, I created a story around a fictional SMB with about 300 employees distributed across three larger offices and several small sales offices.

The webinar had two parts. In the first 30 minutes, I covered definitions of "collaboration" and "communication", UC scope and market size, and talked about the real value of UC to SMBs. Then I described the types of UC solutions, the value of video as part of the UC solution, and finished by dispelling the myth about superior single-vendor solutions, which also directly relates to the trend towards UC ecosystems, and the increased importance of standards and interoperability.

In the second part, I focused on what SMBs should consider when deploying video. The presentation basically led the audience through the steps of building a video network from scratch to a fully functional multi-site network that spans across geographies and connects to partners, suppliers, and customers. The extensibility and scalability aspect is very important because many SMBs are growing fast and want to make sure a video starter kit can later be expanded to support more users.

I was able to cover not only video fundamentals but also IP network readiness aspects - when connecting distributed offices external organizations.

Webinar attendance was great, and resulted in many questions, some of which I answered in the Q&A session and some online. I am getting a lot of follow-up questions and it looks like the webinar had a huge impact.

If you want to watch the webinar recording, please click here.

“Music Performance and Instruction over High Speed Networks”

I have written many white papers but the one that elicits the strongest emotional response has always been “Music Performance and Instruction over High Speed Networks” which Christianne Orto and I wrote back in 2008. This paper tells the fascinating story of collaboration between Polycom and the Manhattan School of Music to enable remote music performances and instructions.

A lot of things have happened since 2008, for example, Polycom introduced new technologies in the area of voice and video communication while MSM found new applications for the technology. Few weeks ago, Christianne and I talked about the need to update the paper in early June, just before the International Society for Technology in Education (ITSE) conference in Philadelphia and the Network Performing Arts Production workshop in Barcelona. The updated white paper has just been posted here. Please have a look and send us your feedback!

How Will the Migration from IPv4 to IPv6 Impact Voice and Visual Communication? Take 2

The “World IPv6 Day” (June 8, 2011) was the first global test intended to help service providers and vendors prepare for the inevitable migration to IPv6. How is IPv6 different from IPv4? Why is IPv6 so important to the Internet and private intranets? What is driving IPv6 adoption? How will the migration to IPv6 affect voice and visual communication? Is Polycom ready for IPv6? Find answers in my new white paper.