This blog post is being published on behalf of HP.
With the growing demand for technology in the classroom, HP is proud to be working with Windows technologies to address the need for affordable computing and expand the number of computer seats in schools.
Due to current budgetary constraints in education, schools are looking beyond the initial cost of technology deployment to total cost of ownership, maintenance costs and IT support. This focus is leading more schools to evaluate alternative options to bring true 1:1 computing into the classroom. From cost savings to simpler management to environmental impact, moving to shared computing makes fiscal sense and is a trend that will continue in education.
HP recently introduced MultiSeat to meet this paradigm shift in computing efficiency. Working together with Microsoft’s Windows MultiPoint Server 2010, HP MultiSeat is really designed to help turn schools with limited student access to technology into a technology-rich PC experience for every student in a classroom, lab or library. This is accomplished by leveraging the excess capacity of one PC to deliver dependable performance to up to 10 users with just the addition of a low-cost thin client, monitor, keyboard and mouse for each user.
Jefferson County Public Schools and Alvarado High School are already leveraging the value of MultiSeat to bring a key learning tool – the PC - into the hands of students. The best part is, schools don’t have to wait for additional funds to implement this solution – the money is already in their budget.
We’re hearing the consensus from students, administrators and teachers around the world to bring more technology into the classroom to better prepare for students for success in college and the workplace. Joining forces with Microsoft on the development of MultiSeat allowed us to deliver a fully Microsoft licensed solution that answers our customer needs by expanding student access to technology with lower ongoing operation costs.
We’re looking forward to a continued work with Microsoft products to bring affordable technology into the classroom.
Brian Becker Director, Education, Personal Systems Group, HP
I’m Kurt Brockett, Director of UX Evangelism at IdentityMine. We’re a user experience (UX) company specializing in Microsoft presentation technologies. In 2005 we hitched a ride on the Avalon train that morphed into Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) released in .NET 3.0. This is the technology root that has grown to include Silverlight, Microsoft Surface and most recently the preferred way to build touch applications in Windows 7.
Our foray into Sports & Entertainment started with a relationship we established with the New Orleans Saints. This past summer we created an application on Microsoft Surface that assists the team in searching and organizing stats and cross-referencing them with the vast video libraries they currently store. Our work with the Saints led to an introduction to the Miami Dolphins who were in the unique position of playing host to the Pro Bowl and Super Bowl this year.
As a host organization, Miami was interested in demonstrating leadership by using specialized technologies within Sun Life Stadium for these two high-profile events as a first step in a venue wide rollout strategy. Today, the pursuit of success in professional sports is to increase sponsorship revenue while providing an enjoyable and compelling fan experience. The use of digital signage within venues can only take a brand so far before it crosses the line into distracting from the sport. Additionally, the actual effect of that type of advertising is impossible to measure. To combat this, IdentityMine has created a portfolio of application experiences which compels fans to interact with team and sponsor content due to their compelling and intuitive nature.
These unique experiences require a complete package from the software, hardware, operating system, and physical environment. Identity Mine and Microsoft teamed up with HP to place 30 of their new TouchSmart PCs in numerous luxury suites. In addition, the Microsoft Surface team provided 5 units that were used in various high-traffic areas.
Here’s a picture of our team doing a bit of the setup:
Chad Brown setting up one of the Microsoft Surface units.
The experiences we built are all built utilizing Windows Presentation Foundation targeted at both Windows 7 and Microsoft Surface. Below is a quick tour of the software applications that were deployed.
Flashcards – Fans were able to play memory and matching games with NFL specific content. In the sample set below you will see that users matched logos to their favorite NFL Teams.
Super Bowl Highlight Reel: Utilizing touch, fans were able to search a library of Super Bowl highlight content and play their favorite moments in Super Bowl history.
Merchandise Selector: Fans discovered and visualized various Super Bowl XLIV and NFL team merchandise that was available for purchase in the Club Level during the game. This experience leveraged Microsoft Tag technology allowing fans to capture links to the products directly on their Mobile Phones for later purchase.
Digital Memories: A touch-enabled experience allowed team and league executives and marketing partners the ability to review catalogs of photos taken during the festivities leading to game day including the exclusive Commissioner’s Ball and owners pre-party held at the Viceroy in Miami.
Miami Beach Sand: A beach themed entertainment application that illustrated the unique touch and gesture-enabled properties of Microsoft Surface and Windows 7. This application became an entertaining way for fans to uncover unique sponsored tokens “beneath” the “sand”.
(Above far right) Mark Brown of IdentityMine with some younger fans digging into Miami Beach Sand.
The experiences were a hit in the suites and the attendees were able to relive the event through relevant and recent content available within 24 hours of an event, bringing a personalization aspect that can’t be achieve utilizing static technologies. Additionally IdentityMine, Microsoft and HP were able to demonstrate to all the franchises in the NFL the real business and entertainment value that touch enabled interactive experiences can bring the sports and entertainment world.
We’re excited by this initial rollout and are currently working with other franchises to bring customized experiences to many more fans. For more information on IdentityMine services visit www.identitymine.com and be sure to come see us in the Commons Showcase area at the upcoming MIX10 conference being held in March in Las Vegas, NV.
This week at CES, Ray Kurzweil (CEO of KNFB Reading Technology) revealed Blio, a free eReader application that we believe will transform the digital reading marketplace through significant advances in display and interactivity. The rich-media design will deliver a vast range of eBook titles, across genres.
The Blio development team was able to take advantage of the .NET 3.5 Framework, WPF (Windows Presentation Foundation), XPS file format, Microsoft Speech API and UI Automation for accessibility, all of which have native support in Windows 7 and are core Windows technologies. In addition, Windows Touch in Windows 7 and support for small netbook form factor will be utilized by Blio to improve usability for Windows 7 users. These technologies have enabled our team to streamline the creation of the application and provide seamless integration into Windows 7 devices.
The free Blio eReader application provides a superior way to view and interact with electronic versions of books, newspapers and magazines. Blio preserves a book's original layout and color images, enabling image-rich titles to be as vibrant on screen as they are in print, for the first time. Blio users can now enjoy a full-color display, embedded multimedia, and a 3D virtual book mode for an entertaining and intuitive reading experience.
We are excited about this close collaboration with Microsoft in redefining the digital book experience, and we appreciate the Microsoft team's close cooperation in our development process and their ongoing support. The application will be released in February, and you can find out more on our website: www.blioreader.com.
Forrest Dobbs Vice President, Sales and Marketing
Greetings, I’m Tony “Frosty” Welch - Community Manager for HP’s The Next Bench. I’m posting here (thanks to the Windows Team) to give fellow CES attendees and enthusiasts a heads-up on some goings-on at the event. First, you’re all invited to a Tweet ’n Greet we’re hosting at the Microsoft booth (Central Hall #7133) Friday.
For those of you “tweeters” at the show who are interested in seeing the latest HP products with Windows 7, come by between 2:30 and 3:30 p.m. Meet us in the Windows Demo Area and get a hands on demonstration of the HP TouchSmart, Envy 15, the Envy Beats, and the HP Pavilion DM3 Notebook – all running on Windows 7.
Have a Windows 7 or HP question that you’ve dying to ask? You’ll also be able to chat with Microsoft and HP spokespeople directly. After grilling them, tweet your experience directly from the booth and you can win some cool prizes! If you want to make even a bigger splash in the “twitterverse,” wear your Twitter name somewhere visible and we’ll announce your presence over @HP_PC in the most aggrandizing way we can think of. Internet fame is fleeting, but you know you want it.
If Friday can’t come soon enough for you, though, you can stop by the Microsoft Booth at any time to check out the HP products with Windows 7. And while we are excited about the Tweet ‘n Greet, that doesn’t mean we’ll be sleeping the rest of the show. Check out the HP at CES video series that will be delivering exclusive interviews and more from the event over our YouTube and Twitter channels. Is there something you want to see? Direct our video crew where to go and what to shoot to via YouTube and Twitter comments and we will do our best to oblige.
When it comes to optimizing and really advancing the personal entertainment experience on the PC, Microsoft and Dolby Laboratories share a history of improving the integrity of audio playback. The collaboration between the two companies started when they began working together to enhance audio delivery for the Xbox in 2001. After this design was completed, Microsoft extended its usage of Dolby audio technology in Windows Media Center. This work continued with Windows Vista, which was launched worldwide in January 2007. The evolution of these shared efforts is realized in Windows 7 today.
Windows 7 builds on past collaboration by adding next-generation Dolby Digital Plus technology to offer high-quality multichannel audio. Available in Windows 7 Home Premium, Professional, Enterprise, and Ultimate, Dolby Digital Plus brings home theater–quality audio to the PC, improving the listening experience of music, movies, and TV.
When it comes to the small, discreet speakers built into a PC or laptop, how can audio really be optimized? Dolby Digital Plus, a multichannel audio standard for DVDs and select HD broadcasts worldwide, is a high-efficiency, next-generation audio codec that maintains the quality of Dolby Digital at a lower data rate and is fully compatible with all current Dolby Digital A/V receivers. From the movie and music producer point of view, this means that Dolby Digital Plus offers more channels and better compression, making it easier to create higher quality content at lower bit rates to experience on the PC.
Dolby Digital Plus is already the broadcast audio standard for HDTV services in Europe. France is currently using Dolby Digital Plus, with Poland and other countries following closely. Users in these countries watching streaming broadcast content on their computers get to experience next-generation sound.
Microsoft’s diligence in working closely with Dolby engineers to fully enable the PC to be a more sophisticated, dynamic entertainment device is evidence of the company’s broad vision and steadfast commitment to revolutionizing the role of the PC. The next generation of PC enthusiasts can enjoy their computers as their primary home entertainment device—and Dolby Digital Plus will play an important role in that experience.
Spinal Tap fans will recall the restaurant scene in which David St. Hubbins’s interfering girlfriend, Jeanine, informs the band that their album wasn’t “mixed right” because it wasn’t mixed in “Dob-l-ey.” We may be biased, but we tend to agree with that statement. Content is never quite right without Dolby audio technology. Fortunately, PCs with Windows 7 will never have that problem.
To check out the latest on Dolby Digital Plus in Windows 7—including Dolby videos and a dedicated Windows 7 web page—visit Dolby.com and Audiodolby.com. For a complete Dolby PC demo and other PC videos, visit www.audiodolby.com/#/motion/pc. For press releases and news about Dolby technologies, visit investor.dolby.com/releases.cfm.
Robin Selden Senior Vice President, Marketing, Dolby