Integrating any A/V component or system onto the IT network is bound to trigger issues, both for end users as well as the integrators helping them. Technical issues may arise that leave integrators scrambling for solutions, or cause end users to shift their expectations. Timeframes and budgets may be impacted. With VoIP implementations listed as the top IT initiative, driving enterprises to improve performance by 64 percent of respondents, more companies are bumping into the challenges that integration presents. And because there are stumbling blocks on both sides, we’ve put together a handful of pain points that crop up regularly to show how they can affect everyone involved.
When Plano, Tex.-based Denbury Resources selected their A/V integration solution, they discovered the need for more infrastructure segmentation than they had originally planned for. “We found out that we had to reserve nearly five VLANS to keep traffic separated off our general data and VoIP network,” says Steve Shanks, CTS-I, DMC-E, the independent oil and gas company’s audiovisual specialist. “This was simple to do, but unexpected.”
Sometimes unexpected issues come as a complete surprise, and sometimes they’re something you were just hoping to avoid. Misunderstandings in how seat licensing is managed and purchased (most often encountered in VoIP and telepresence environments) often produce budget headaches. Occasionally, an enterprise will discover that a critical or expensive component can’t be added to a service contract because it’s near — or past — its planned obsolescence date. Existing firewalls may block the traversal of A/V traffic, something
