Would You Like a Mac Dongle With That?

Macs and PCs can sometimes get along, sometimes not get along. Mac users swear by the stability and operation of their notebooks and PC users say they have more choice in software. Whatever the case may be, there are a few things to consider when using a notebook to run a slide show from.

Firstly, I like PowerPoint and I use it for my own presentations. I lecture about ten times per week and many times I use a PowerPoint slide show, when I need to show information. I have a Dell Inspiron 700m and it is a great little PC. I plug a VGA cable in, hit my 'Fn CRT' buttons and it works (most of the time). The PowerPoint comes up and looks great. I must mention that I don't use transitions, I simply do sharp changes from one slide to the next. I use custom animation to illustrate things and I embed AV, but that's about it.

So, I'll back up a bit to the last conference I was at (Las Vegas), taking care of AV. There was a problem with a Mac-produced PDF turned into a PPT. It didn't work on the PC. When I asked three (3) Mac users if we could try a Mac to run the slides from, not one of them were able to do it because they didn't have their Mac VGA dongle with them! It's just one more item to add to a checklist, but often forgotten about. I've seen three versions of this dongle/adapter - DVI, Mini-DVI and Micro-DVI! Which do you have?*

I'll back up a couple of years to AV in Washington, DC. A presenter wanted to run a show from his Mac, but didn't supply the notebook until just before he was going to present (maybe a half hour or so before). I asked about the dongle and he didn't have one because he didn't realize he would need it. Off he went to the nearest Mac store in a nearby mall to buy one. The time slots changed and there was very little time to change over when he got back, but I had him up and running, even with the multimedia playback (on-the-fly audio level adjustment, resolution changeover, etc).

There were a few other times that this sort of thing happened as well, but those two situations got event coordinators and AV staff pretty nervous. I must mention that I like Keynote as a slide show program because of the slick transitions, and I am not saying the Mac is a bad choice, but one of the caveats of owning a Mac is the dongle situation.

I try to carry as many small connectors as I can, but I don't have everything ever invented at any given time. So, Mac users, you need to carry your accessories with you. PC users, you don't have to, but please find which 'unique' key combination you need to press in order to display your slide show. In Mac, it's 'detect display' and in PC, it can be 'Fn CRT' (F5 or F* or even F7, I've seen) and when that doesn't work, try to right click on the desktop to see the graphic output options. If that doesn't work, you may need to re-boot (in this day and age? Yes!)

The DVI vs VGA topic can be found in a google search (mini DVI - Mac, VGA - PC).

* "...it might make sense for Apple to standardize on fewer laptop display connectors." (from: http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=477977)

Cheerio! Stay tuned!
Buck Moore
Presentation AV Specialist
Public Speaker

Audiovisual Field Testing: Projection.

Report on AV Technology: What Works Well in the World of Multimedia Presentations (and What Could Work Better!).

CONTENT ASSESSMENT - PRESENTATION TECHNOLOGY - LIVE EVENT MULTIMEDIA

In my travels as a presentation AV and multimedia playback specialist, I continually face AV challenges and offer solutions during live events. During the last twenty years, I've been performing live, presenting material in front of groups and running the technical side of live performances, public speaking, multimedia playback and I know what works and what doesn't work.

Over these years, I've worked on many film and video projects as writer, director, camera person, actor and editor, and that experience has made me very interested in helping people assess their live presentation content. Whether it's a business presentation, live performance or film screening, I am very interested in what the end user experiences. In AV planning and content assessment, I am not a critic, I am the ultimate end user and I tell it like it is.

I'd like to start this AV field report with my technology choice for projectors:

Canon LV-7255 (and others in the LV series): This is my projector of choice. I've used several LV projectors and I like them all, especially the newer ones. The brightness is great for presentations of up to 150 - 200 people (with stereo screens on Dalite FastFold 7.5' x 10', front projection screens). I use longer VGA cable runs of 25 - 50 feet, so I use a Kramer D.A.(distribution amp) for the stereo display, but I have even run these projectors through a daisy-chain (one connected to the other) and a 50 foot VGA cable with no D.A. and I get great results every time.

I've really put these projectors through the paces and two of the reasons I rely on them are because of the manual zoom and the manual focus. It would be nice to have a horizontal keystone control, but the vertical control, especially auto-keystone, works very quickly and well.

Like many projectors I've used, when computer inputs are hot-swapped, you may end up with horizontal sync issues that result in the side of a presentation being cut off, but that is easily correctable with the 'auto PC' button on the top of the unit. I know it would be best not to hot-swap and have all computers hooked up to a seamless switcher and ready to go, with all resolutions set to the default 1024x768, but I am talking about the real world, where things are set up and swapped at a moments notice. Therefore, I need a projector which does not give me grief on the road.

Stay tuned for more!