Back then, there was always the danger that the V-Tel system you just bought wouldn't work with the PictureTel you already had. And so far, that hasn't been the case with the new IP systems, but the H.323 standard was ratified only a year ago, so there are plenty of applications on the market that don't work well together. For professors who want to teach or students who want to attend classes remotely, the PictureTel, Intel ProShare and V-Tel systems on campus have worked fine. Particularly because the university's dedicated statewide fibre network gives stellar video quality to all of its campuses. So far, the collaboration capabilities have been most useful to research groups and their work with other universities and government agencies.
Video quality depends on the bandwidth of the network and the conferencing system itself.
And good quality requires high bandwidth at both ends of the connection, so Gump says to be sure the system's video is acceptable when connecting to a low-speed user. The codec takes all the video processing on to itself, which frees up the computer's processor. But those who ask for codecs at Maryland typically have never done videoconferencing, Gump says. Once they try it without the codec, they typically stop asking for it. ACE is a national network of independent plumbing and HVAC contractors, which has made a business out of providing technical and business training through desktop videoconferencing to its members.