At 11:21 15/07/03, you wrote:
>Hello everyone
>
>One option mentioned was to use video conferencing - has anyone got any
>experience of video conferencing is it a viable option with a diverse
>(varying levels of disability) group of up to 20 located throughout the UK.
>
>Is it widely available easy to access, affordable and does it work - is
>it an option?
>


It all depends on how much you are willing to spend and what sort of ISDN
or broadband connection all your committee members have. We have been
using video conferencing for some years now to support students, parents,
teachers, therapists etc. in schools around the country. We are currently
using it to support local teams involved in the CAP project and it is very
effective.

There are two main option of which the most cost effective is to use IP
conferencing. There is a firm called Avvid - and there are others - which
can provide the facilities to conference a number of different modes of
communication in one conference ('Click to Meet' an update of CUCMe). This
can include both ISDN and IP connections. They charge £5 per user per half
hour.

If you are using ISDN then the base service uses ISDN2 at 128K and is
acceptable but not wonderful, if you can find facilities at higher rates
then the quality improves remarkably. Bridging services for ISDN are quite
expensive - you are looking at about £100 per hour and the phone charges
are quite high as well The quality of the IP conference depends on the
connection speed but if you are on JANET then this should be excellent.

Base prices for IP conference can be very low as all you need is a computer
and a web cam. You get much better quality if you use a 2GHz + machine
running Windows XP. Stand - alone phones start at about £600.

Mick Donegan at the ACE Centre has carried out extensive research on the
use of video conferencing at the ACE Centre - contact him for more
information, There is a report available.

Contact Mick Donegan direct at [log in to unmask]



David Colven
Technical Advisor

The ACE Centre Advisory Trust
92 Windmill Road
Headington
Oxford OX3 7DR

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