First off I just want to clear this up that I am not spamming or advertising
or endorsing a product, honestly or anything but am letting people know
about this product I heard about last year but there seems so little
advertising I am not sure people even know it exists and is physically on
the market to buy but imagine when you are speaking to your family or
friends over the telephone have you ever wondered how great to would be to
physically see your loved ones as well as talk to them on your home
television! and as easy as plugging it in and pressing a button during a
normal phone call!

The device I discovered on the Internet is called Beamer TV. Imagine having
one unit here in Ireland and the other unit in the UK (or any other country
that uses PAL type TV signal and 230v AC) and during your phone call if both
of you want to see a picture of each other all you had to do is both press
one button on your unit and within 60 seconds a colour picture came up on
your TV (portable or widescreen) and all this done with a normal telephone
line, with standard telephone call rates, no subscriptions and no PC
involved whatsoever - how cool does that sound. It sounds futuristic but the
fact of the matter is that these units are on sale from a UK distributor
available now to buy (well in fact I was enquiring last summer about them
they were on sale then). The price isn't too bad as well really they cost
149.50 UK Pounds Each - that works out to around 214.00 EURO (but you will
need 2 units to make it work) you imagine you could buy one and your
family/relations/friend in the UK could pay for the other unit or if you are
feeling generous you could buy the 2 units and ship the other one over to
them.

I was assured by the UK Distributor when I asked last year that the units
will work in Ireland with a UK to Ireland Telephone adapter and that if the
Telephone Call Quality is very clear (which it is normally when phoning from
Ireland to the UK) then the picture should be very clear.

Now, my predicament is this. I am quite excited about this idea and these
units but I am wondering about picture quality and how stable these units
are and how they really do perform on calls from Ireland to the UK but the
company (although ensuring me that they will work fine) will not sell on a
sale or return basis (understandably) and I am not in a (financial) position
to buy one of these units at the moment let alone 2 of them plus her indoors
is skeptical and cannot see the point in them so I cannot win her over on
getting one. So, is there anyone reading this who has a bit of money to
spare, and take a gamble and buy 2 of these units (one for them and one for
their mate/family in the UK) and try them out physically and then post their
comments on the product up on here? - sounds cheeky I know but if you are
into gadgets and can suffer a gamble on the price of these units I for one
would be very intrigued on how good these units are as would a lot of people
would be I reckon. All it takes is someone to make that initial first
purchase and see if they are as good as the manufacturers/distributors say.

If you fancy being a 'guinea pig' and want the website address of the
distributor of the Beamer TV units in the UK their address is:
http://www.qtsltd.co.uk/ the website for the manufacturers is:
http://www.vialta.com/beamertv.htm (ignore the references to NTSC because
that is on the American Models) and also I have sort of done a webpage with
a picture of the unit (which sits on top of your television) and have
included a downloadable Instructions of the unit in pdf format for people
who are interested to see how it all connects up etc.. my website address
is: http://www.beamertv.utvinternet.com

It would be great if someone did take the plunge and physically buy a couple
of these units and tried them out and posted their comments or produced some
kind of review on them on their personal website or posted the comment up on
here. Of course you don't have to use one in the UK and one in Ireland you
could use them both in Ireland if you wanted to. You could have one
stationed at your home in Sligo and the other one Stationed at your friends
house in County Cork and see each other should still work all the same. -

Thanks for taking the time reading this email and if you do decide to go for
these units the very best of luck to ye,

Andy. -
Who does not work for any of these companies but is really excited about
these little gadgets :-) and would seriously consider
selling/marketing/distributing them in Ireland if had the money to do so :-)

From:	Howard9
Subject:	Re: Seeing people as you phone them
Date:	Tue, 11 Jan 2005 13:45:29 -0000

In article <34bhofF49764bU1@individual.net>, andy@gofree.ie says...
> within 60 seconds a colour picture came up on
> your TV (portable or widescreen) and all this done with a normal telephone
> line, with standard telephone call rates, no subscriptions and no PC
> involved whatsoever
>

Firstly that would most definitely require a DSL enabled line. Secondly
..... 60 SECONDS ???? You must be pulling our legs !!!

--
Howard

From:	Brian Boyle
Subject:	Re: Seeing people as you phone them
Date:	11 Jan 2005 14:05:03 GMT

On 2005-01-11, Howard9 wrote:
> In article <34bhofF49764bU1@individual.net>, andy@gofree.ie says...
>> within 60 seconds a colour picture came up on
>> your TV (portable or widescreen) and all this done with a normal telephone
>> line, with standard telephone call rates, no subscriptions and no PC
>> involved whatsoever
>
> Firstly that would most definitely require a DSL enabled line. Secondly
> .... 60 SECONDS ???? You must be pulling our legs !!!

It's perfectly feasable, but as you suggest, this is not going to be
anywhere near TV quality. It looks like it uses a buitlin 33.6K modem to
send the data over, so the quality of the image and the frequency of
updates will be low.

Brian.

From:	Andy
Subject:	Re: Seeing people as you phone them
Date:	Tue, 11 Jan 2005 14:30:33 -0000

"Brian Boyle" wrote in message
news:41e3dd0f$0$712$ba620d2c@reader.news.heanet.ie...
> On 2005-01-11, Howard9 wrote:
> > In article <34bhofF49764bU1@individual.net>, andy@gofree.ie says...
> >> within 60 seconds a colour picture came up on
> >> your TV (portable or widescreen) and all this done with a normal
telephone
> >> line, with standard telephone call rates, no subscriptions and no PC
> >> involved whatsoever
> >
> > Firstly that would most definitely require a DSL enabled line. Secondly
> > .... 60 SECONDS ???? You must be pulling our legs !!!
>
> It's perfectly feasable, but as you suggest, this is not going to be
> anywhere near TV quality. It looks like it uses a buitlin 33.6K modem to
> send the data over, so the quality of the image and the frequency of
> updates will be low.
>
> Brian.

Mind you, when you hook up using a webcam and a PC with a 56k modem you are
not really connecting at 56k are ye?

From:	Brian Boyle
Subject:	Re: Seeing people as you phone them
Date:	11 Jan 2005 15:56:45 GMT

On 2005-01-11, Andy wrote:
> Mind you, when you hook up using a webcam and a PC with a 56k modem you are
> not really connecting at 56k are ye?

Well, you get to use whatever your phone line and modem can achieve -
minus some bandwidith for protocol encapsulation. If you achieve a 44
Kps connection, then you need to subtract percentages for overhead of
IP packets, then whatever transmission protocol your webcam, uses (say UDP),
then subtract some more for the application protocol (say H.323). Keep
in mind that Beemer TV will need some similar overheads so it can combine
voice and video, and you probably still come out with a marginally better
quality with a reasonable set of webcams and regular internet connections,
but you'd have to experiment with both to get a definite answer. In
either case, I strongly suspect that the quality of the video stream you
get will be poor.

Brian.

From:	John
Subject:	Re: Seeing people as you phone them
Date:	Tue, 11 Jan 2005 16:09:27 +0000

On 11 Jan 2005 15:56:45 GMT, Brian Boyle
wrote:

>Well, you get to use whatever your phone line and modem can achieve -
>minus some bandwidith for protocol encapsulation. If you achieve a 44
>Kps connection, then you need to subtract percentages for overhead of
>IP packets, then whatever transmission protocol your webcam, uses (say UDP),
>then subtract some more for the application protocol (say H.323). Keep
>in mind that Beemer TV will need some similar overheads so it can combine
>voice and video, and you probably still come out with a marginally better
>quality with a reasonable set of webcams and regular internet connections,
>but you'd have to experiment with both to get a definite answer. In
>either case, I strongly suspect that the quality of the video stream you
>get will be poor.

I did a quick Google and there are reviews saying the picture quality
is quite poor. The camera resolution isn't great to begin with, but I
suppose that doesn't really matter considering the image is being sent
down a phone line.

Not to mention it being way overpriced for what it is.

From:	Andy
Subject:	Re: Seeing people as you phone them
Date:	Tue, 11 Jan 2005 14:35:30 -0000

"Howard9" wrote in message
news:1105451130.eba69ea7de52ba43f3ef464f1b2b7fd1@teranews...
> In article <34bhofF49764bU1@individual.net>, andy@gofree.ie says...
> > within 60 seconds a colour picture came up on
> > your TV (portable or widescreen) and all this done with a normal
telephone
> > line, with standard telephone call rates, no subscriptions and no PC
> > involved whatsoever
> >
>
> Firstly that would most definitely require a DSL enabled line. Secondly
> .... 60 SECONDS ???? You must be pulling our legs !!!

> Howard

According to instructions for it, it uses any normal telephone line and
video comes up within 15-60 seconds :
http://www.beamertv.utvinternet.com/BeamerTVUserGuide.pdf

From:	Brian
Subject:	Re: Seeing people as you phone them
Date:	Sun, 9 Jan 2005 03:51:26 -0000

"Andy" wrote in message
news:34bhofF49764bU1@individual.net...
> First off I just want to clear this up that I am not spamming or
> advertising
> or endorsing a product, honestly or anything but am letting people know
> about this product I heard about last year but there seems so little
> advertising I am not sure people even know it exists and is physically on
> the market to buy but imagine when you are speaking to your family or
> friends over the telephone have you ever wondered how great to would be to
> physically see your loved ones as well as talk to them on your home
> television! and as easy as plugging it in and pressing a button during a
> normal phone call!
>

Ever hear of a webcam and a headset?

From:	Brian
Subject:	Re: Seeing people as you phone them
Date:	Sun, 9 Jan 2005 03:53:19 -0000

"Brian" wrote in message
news:3T1Ed.45270$Z14.23795@news.indigo.ie...
>
> "Andy" wrote in message
> news:34bhofF49764bU1@individual.net...
>> First off I just want to clear this up that I am not spamming or
>> advertising
>> or endorsing a product, honestly or anything but am letting people know
>> about this product I heard about last year but there seems so little
>> advertising I am not sure people even know it exists and is physically on
>> the market to buy but imagine when you are speaking to your family or
>> friends over the telephone have you ever wondered how great to would be
>> to
>> physically see your loved ones as well as talk to them on your home
>> television! and as easy as plugging it in and pressing a button during a
>> normal phone call!
>>
>
> Ever hear of a webcam and a headset?
>
And there is also the advent of 3G which Vodafone have rolled out in most of
the major cities in Ireland. We all got 6630's in our office and the video
calls were great craic on NYE...

From:	Andy
Subject:	Re: Seeing people as you phone them
Date:	Sun, 9 Jan 2005 14:20:45 -0000

> Ever hear of a webcam and a headset?

Yep, as anticipated I knew someone would mention using a webcam instead.
Granted they do have a place when you want to see someone as you are talking
to them but in my experience in the past I have not been impressed myself
with webcams.

They are fiddly to setup, the cheap webcams on the market have poor video
quality with low resolution and focusing and they don't seem very good with
a normal 56k dial up modem, on broadband maybe its better. You have to make
sure you and the person you want to see are both on the PC at the same time
and have the same software. You get delays, choppy video & sound especially
at times you would have a lot of traffic on the Internet and echo's with the
sound even when using an headset.

Couple all that up with that to use a webcam you need a PC in the first
place (there are still some people out there without them you know and don't
have a desire to get one) and you need someone at each end with enough
technical savvy to get both webcams at each end working correctly to
establish a connection.

With this Beamer TV unit what could be more simpler. You plug the telephone
line into the beamer then you plug the telephone into the Beamer unit and
the video lead into your television or video recorder (yes you can actually
record down the pictures as well!!) either by scart socket or video in
socket and then power up the unit and leave it all connected. When you are
next in touch with your friend/family and you want to see eachother then a
simple press of a button and within 60 seconds a picture should appear on
the TV of the person you are talking too. Much easier to use than a webcam
and all this without using a PC too!

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
------

"Brian" wrote in message
news:3T1Ed.45270$Z14.23795@news.indigo.ie...
>
> "Andy" wrote in message
> news:34bhofF49764bU1@individual.net...
> > First off I just want to clear this up that I am not spamming or
> > advertising
> > or endorsing a product, honestly or anything but am letting people know
> > about this product I heard about last year but there seems so little
> > advertising I am not sure people even know it exists and is physically
on
> > the market to buy but imagine when you are speaking to your family or
> > friends over the telephone have you ever wondered how great to would be
to
> > physically see your loved ones as well as talk to them on your home
> > television! and as easy as plugging it in and pressing a button during a
> > normal phone call!
> >
>
> Ever hear of a webcam and a headset?
>
>
>

From:	Brian Boyle
Subject:	Re: Seeing people as you phone them
Date:	11 Jan 2005 10:24:08 GMT

On 2005-01-09, Andy wrote:
> Yep, as anticipated I knew someone would mention using a webcam instead.
> Granted they do have a place when you want to see someone as you are talking
> to them but in my experience in the past I have not been impressed myself
> with webcams.

The quality of the webcam does make a huge difference, and as usual, the
more expensive ones tend to perform better. For the price of the Beemer
TV thing though, you could get a very good webcam.

> They are fiddly to setup, the cheap webcams on the market have poor video
> quality with low resolution and focusing and they don't seem very good with
> a normal 56k dial up modem, on broadband maybe its better. You have to make
> sure you and the person you want to see are both on the PC at the same time
> and have the same software.

Well, there are some reasonable standards for IP video conferencing
these days (H.323), so its getting a lot easier to find interoperating
webcams and software (or indeed, you could use the less than standards
compliant but still really useful Skype). With a normal phone line, the
quality of the video will defintely be quite poor, but this is a feature
of the amount of data you can stuff down the phone line per second -
I think the TV Beemer product is not going to outperform webcams in any
signifcant way. Indeed, the specs indicate that it runs at 33.6Kps,
so the overall throughput is slightly lower than you might get with a
webcam/modem setup.

> You get delays, choppy video & sound especially at times you would
> have a lot of traffic on the Internet and echo's with the sound
> even when using an headset.

I'm willing to bet your last experience was a few years ago - while
choppy video and sound are still a feature of congested connections,
if both parties are using decent ISPs, then Internet congestion should
not be a problem, providing you dont try to make a call using more
bandwidth than your modems/connection throughput can handle.

> Couple all that up with that to use a webcam you need a PC in the first
> place (there are still some people out there without them you know and don't
> have a desire to get one) and you need someone at each end with enough
> technical savvy to get both webcams at each end working correctly to
> establish a connection.

I think you've got the precise market the Beemer TV product could reach
- people who dont have, and dont want a PC. Unfortunately, at EUR 428.00
for a working pair of devices, I think you may be looking for volunteers
in the wrong forum - Usenet. Its a lot of money by anyones standards,
given the functionality, and lets face it, most people in ie.general
have access to a PC (anyone out there with a teletype?).

Brian.

From:	Andy
Subject:	Re: Seeing people as you phone them
Date:	Tue, 11 Jan 2005 14:03:22 -0000

"Brian Boyle" wrote in message
news:41e3a948$0$714$ba620d2c@reader.news.heanet.ie...
> On 2005-01-09, Andy wrote:
> > Yep, as anticipated I knew someone would mention using a webcam instead.
> > Granted they do have a place when you want to see someone as you are
talking
> > to them but in my experience in the past I have not been impressed
myself
> > with webcams.
>
> The quality of the webcam does make a huge difference, and as usual, the
> more expensive ones tend to perform better. For the price of the Beemer
> TV thing though, you could get a very good webcam.
>
> > They are fiddly to setup, the cheap webcams on the market have poor
video
> > quality with low resolution and focusing and they don't seem very good
with
> > a normal 56k dial up modem, on broadband maybe its better. You have to
make
> > sure you and the person you want to see are both on the PC at the same
time
> > and have the same software.
>
> Well, there are some reasonable standards for IP video conferencing
> these days (H.323), so its getting a lot easier to find interoperating
> webcams and software (or indeed, you could use the less than standards
> compliant but still really useful Skype). With a normal phone line, the
> quality of the video will defintely be quite poor, but this is a feature
> of the amount of data you can stuff down the phone line per second -
> I think the TV Beemer product is not going to outperform webcams in any
> signifcant way. Indeed, the specs indicate that it runs at 33.6Kps,
> so the overall throughput is slightly lower than you might get with a
> webcam/modem setup.

Yes, its a shame they didn't make the units with a 56k Chip in them.

>
> > You get delays, choppy video & sound especially at times you would
> > have a lot of traffic on the Internet and echo's with the sound
> > even when using an headset.
>
> I'm willing to bet your last experience was a few years ago - while
> choppy video and sound are still a feature of congested connections,
> if both parties are using decent ISPs, then Internet congestion should
> not be a problem, providing you don't try to make a call using more
> bandwidth than your modems/connection throughput can handle.
>
> > Couple all that up with that to use a webcam you need a PC in the first
> > place (there are still some people out there without them you know and
don't
> > have a desire to get one) and you need someone at each end with enough
> > technical savvy to get both webcams at each end working correctly to
> > establish a connection.
>
> I think you've got the precise market the Beemer TV product could reach
> - people who don't have, and dont want a PC. Unfortunately, at EUR 428.00
> for a working pair of devices, I think you may be looking for volunteers
> in the wrong forum - Usenet. Its a lot of money by anyones standards,
> given the functionality, and lets face it, most people in ie.general
> have access to a PC (anyone out there with a teletype?).
>
> Brian.

Yes 428.00 EURO sounds a lot for the two units, Sounds a bit better in UK
Pounds (299.00 UK£) shame that the prices are not cheaper but maybe they
would be if they became popular. If you were going to get a pair of units
one for yourself and one for your friend/family/colleague then you could
share the cost of the two units to make it cheaper.

I don't see why the telco's like eircom in Ireland and BT in the UK don't
get in on the act and start renting these units out to their customers might
be a good idea.

From:	Brian Boyle
Subject:	Re: Seeing people as you phone them
Date:	11 Jan 2005 14:20:06 GMT

On 2005-01-11, Andy wrote:
> Yes, its a shame they didn't make the units with a 56k Chip in them.

Actually, now that I think of it, they cannot make them work with 56K
technology. All 56Kps modems require a digital exchange on the far end,
with ISDN delivery to 56K capable modem banks. If both ends are analog
modems, the old max of 33.6Kps applies.

> I don't see why the telco's like eircom in Ireland and BT in the
> UK don't get in on the act and start renting these units out to
> their customers might be a good idea.

I do - the equipment is low cost from a telco perspective - not much
different to a DSL modem (maybe +/- EUR 70). Why manage rental contracts,
with all their headaches (depreciating assets, repair and replacement
responsibilities, etc) for such low value, low volume stuff? If they got
involved at all, they'd only be interested in sales, not hiring, leasing
or some combination.

Brian.

From:	John
Subject:	Re: Seeing people as you phone them
Date:	Sun, 09 Jan 2005 16:14:25 +0000

When you say "a picture" do you mean just a still image?

From:	Andy
Subject:	Re: Seeing people as you phone them
Date:	Sun, 9 Jan 2005 17:20:56 -0000

"John" wrote in message
news:b2m2u0posje7o8fqaod5nl6sj4c1dob59r@4ax.com...
> When you say "a picture" do you mean just a still image?

This Beamer TV Unit I am referring to will give you moving images and in
Colour it may be a bit choppy though because of the frame rate of video it
uses I think it uses up to 15fps frames per second where TV pictures has up
to 30fps but even so the novelty/satisfaction factor of it is that you can
actually see people as you are talking to them and imagine seeing your
newborn grandchild or a friend you have not seen for years or a wife still
being able to see her husband whilst he is away on business when she phones
him!! - the choppy video might not be too much of an issue and also there is
an adjustment on the beamer to make the motion more 'fluid like' and degrade
a bit on the video quality or more jerky but clearer picture.

You can also chose to just send a high quality 'still' picture of yourself
to the other person to view whilst you are having a conversation and when
you are ready to start 'moving' video you just press a button again to start
it.