Road Test: BOSCH DICENTIS Conference System

With over forty years in the AV sector including import, Russell Williams is Sales Manager at NZAV, a company founded after the first lockdown to provide customised systems installation to the commercial sector.

The BOSCH DICENTIS Wireless Conference System is fast becoming the number one choice for Councils across New Zealand. There’s a number of reasons. Pacific AV’s reliable supply and support is definitely a factor, as is the flexibility, simplicity, ease of installation and support for the product.

Taking flexibility first, in many areas of the country Councils utilise their Council Chambers as Emergency Response Centres in the event of a crisis. The rooms very swiftly need to be reconfigured and wired solutions are not only difficult to change up, but they are also notoriously unreliable once cables have been messed with. The wireless DICENTIS System solves this problem.

The DICENTIS uses an open API control platform and natively offers easy integration with supporting systems to provide features such as automatic camera control, a must now so many Councils are streaming their meetings. As part of a recent installation at Waitaki District Council, we teamed the conference system with a Lumens PTZ camera and LC-200 video capture and streaming system. This ticked every box, providing the public with good quality audio and a clear picture as the camera tracks the active microphone. Within an hour of going live, the Council received Facebook posts commenting on the improved quality and outstanding audio and video.

Clients can also select from a number of models, with the option of a touchscreen, futureproofing their purchase should they decide to use it for voting in future. The touchscreen shows the queue and who is currently speaking. Councils can also opt for card access, so users don’t have to log in; they just use a card linked to their personal details.

Secondly, my clients love how simple it is to use. Council IT staff have a network log-in to a web page with an easy-to-navigate user interface. Basic discussion settings can be defined for whichever device is being used. The meeting can be managed by an operator or chairperson, who can open or close a meeting, decide which participant can speak and how many people can speak at the same time. The chairperson can also use the priority button to override all participant microphones whenever necessary. Participants are automatically queued, and limits can be set to the numbers in the queue, with operators able to manually re-organise the queue or change the limit during a meeting. They can even delete people or quickly turn them off, a useful function now content is often live streamed. That the system eliminates people talking over the top of each other has been positively received by Councils who have said it supports adherence to meeting protocols.

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Thirdly, from the integrator side of things, the open platform means it is not only flexible for the client but also cost effective to install and maintain. It provides an out-of-the-box solution with no bespoke customisation required. You can pretty much send it to customers, with only one piece of equipment requiring physical installation – the WAP – and this can be installed anywhere in the room. The integration mentioned above, with the camera and the video system, was absolutely straightforward. Working as I do across the South Island, we have clients three hours’ drive away or more. Not being a bespoke system, we can remote access it, isolate the problem and troubleshoot from our office.

Of course, the quality of the audio is critical too. The clarity is such that older chambers with no sound reinforcement have found the DICENTIS system solves a lot of problems. The stations provide individual councillors with a speaker directly in front of each person, a big help for those hard of hearing. To supplement this, each station has two headphone sockets for those that need extra hearing assistance.

I have predominantly been installing them in Council Chambers and in meeting rooms at conference centres, but overseas they are used in a variety of locations including convention centres.

The system has all the security bells and whistles too, but I’d be lying if I said that was what our clients are after. It is the flexibility of set up and the simplicity of use that wins them over every time. There is an increasing level of familiarity with the system now amongst Council and Regional Authorities across New Zealand. Other installations, in addition to Waitaki District Council that I have been involved with, include Environment Canterbury, Timaru, Selwyn and Ashburton District Councils.

Pacific AV have consistently been available to answer any questions. They have a dedicated DICENTIS system that we use for demonstrations, which supplemented with our camera and other equipment gives clients the full experience of the conference system as part of a streaming and video conferencing solution.

Product Info: www.boschsecurity.com

Distributor New Zealand: Pacific AV www.pacificav.co.nz or (09) 947 5230

BOSCH DICENTIS – Overview
• Open platform based on the OMNEO media networking architecture for system flexibility and cost-effective installation and maintenance
• Easy integration with supporting systems to provide features such as automatic camera control
• License-based expandability for a future-proof system that can easily take on new functionality
• Optimised user experience to maximise meeting efficiency
• Simultaneous interpretation of up to 100 languages
• Cable and power supply redundancy to ensure meetings are held without system interruption