Steph Beckett (01:06)
Good morning everyone. Welcome back to a regular episode of Rave TV. We did like a lot of Rave TV last week and now we’re back to Wednesdays at nine Eastern. Joining me for this episode is Tim Albright. How are you doing?

Tim Albright (01:19)
I am fantastic. How are you? We did we did not text. We did not text. No.

Steph Beckett (01:21)
Good. We did not coordinate our outfits. We didn’t text about this.

I forgot that it was like ⁓ the mean girls Wednesday we wear pink. I just wear a lot of pink in my life. And I was like, that shirt seems good today and and w what what a serendipitous thing. Thank you.

Tim Albright (01:31)
Yes.

Very nice. It w you would

almost think that we spent too much time together last week.

Steph Beckett (01:45)
Yeah, exact we did see a lot of each other last week. We like every day, just about right. Cause if it wasn’t we did the technology and practice tour on Thursday, which that was like, you know, three or four hours of our days that we spent together. We I went to this CTI party on both Tuesday and Thursday. So we saw each other at that.

Tim Albright (01:48)
Yes we did. Yeah, I think so, yeah. yeah, no, it was every day actually.

Yep.

Yep.

W Wednesday

we we hit ⁓ every party together Wednesday night. So a

Steph Beckett (02:13)
Yes. Yes. We were on the party circuit

together Wednesday night. And then on Thursday, I came on AV week and then you recorded a podcast episode with me. So that was like another hour and a half, two hours. So we really saw a lot of each other. Whatever. I have a video of you, by the way. It is you in the pool at the Westgate on a little floaty and you were kind of zoning out and you were just like

Tim Albright (02:25)
Yep. Yeah.

It was a lot.

God.

yes.

Steph Beckett (02:43)
Living life on a pool floaty at the Westgate Pool as Van Halen softly sings in the background. Or sorry, it was the atomic punks, the f the Van Halen cover band.

Tim Albright (02:47)
Yeah.

It was the the the Van Halen tribute.

Yeah, whatever. Cover band. Yeah.

Steph Beckett (03:00)
Which by the way, I am a Van Halen fan. I don’t think a lot of people who talk to me know that. But I was raised by a single father, so guess what that meant? I listened to my single father’s music in the car. So it’s a lot of like Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, a lot of Van Halen, a lot of Sting, a lot of Deaf Leopard, a lot of Duran Duran.

Tim Albright (03:21)
Yeah.

Steph Beckett (03:27)
A lot of Boston.

Tim Albright (03:28)
Th these are all good things. I mean I I have no problems with it. ⁓

Steph Beckett (03:30)
Yeah. No. A lot of ooh, a lot of the who. He’s a big

the who guy. He loves Roger Daughtery. So of whenever someone talks, I mean, and that has given me a very good in with men of a certain age when I need to talk to them. Cause like, you know, like what what do we talk about? I can immediately talk to them about music. And that has

Tim Albright (03:36)
No.

Yeah, and especially

in this industry that is yeah. Yeah.

Steph Beckett (03:55)
That is everything. That has given

me a lot of like help in networking. Because networking is hard. Yeah. Yeah. It gives you straight credit with with the owner of CTI. How many of you have said that you have danced at the front of a Van Halen cover band concert with the owner of CTI? I have. I I added him on LinkedIn, he didn’t have me back though, so maybe one day.

Tim Albright (03:59)
Giving you street cred.

There is that, yes.

I I have not actually. I was in the pool apparently. ⁓

Steph Beckett (04:25)
⁓ but he did he did turn to me during one point and he was like, Do you know who’s do you know what song this is? And I was like, Yes, I do. ⁓ and it was the Eruption Guitar Solo, by the way, everyone. And so I do know what that is from Van Halen’s debut album from 1978. I am aware. I am with it. The only thing is they only sang David Lee Roth covers. It was only early Van Halen.

Tim Albright (04:37)
nice.

Yeah. And

and I and as somebody who who did grow up listening, I do have a a slight musical problem with that because I am more of a Sammy Hagar. ⁓ now the songs are great, right? You’ve got Panama, obviously, you’ve got Jump, you’ve got Hot for Teacher, you’ve got, you know, ⁓ the entire nineteen eighty four album. But just from a pure performance standpoint, I much prefer Sammy Hagar. And you can you can at me if you want and throw things at me, but that’s just personal preference.

Steph Beckett (05:01)
Yeah.

Yes. Jump. Yes.

I think that there is beauty in both. There’s beauty in both. And that is the perfect networking question to ask someone if they tell you like Van Halen, like, ⁓ Sammy Hagar or David Lee Roth. And they’ll everyone has an opinion. Except me. I just I see I see beauty like, you know, beautiful music is beautiful music. You know? And I’m glad that they went a different direction after David Lee Roth’s departure rather than trying to emulate.

Tim Albright (05:27)
Yes.

Yes.

yeah, absolutely.

Yeah, I could see that.

Yes.

Steph Beckett (05:49)
him

again because he’s like he’s original never to be emulated, never to be like someone else wearing what he wore or like trying to do that. It would just kind of be been cringy. So I’m

Tim Albright (06:01)
Yes. Not that it wasn’t

cringy ’cause he still wears that I think and he’s like seventy. Yeah.

Steph Beckett (06:06)
that is weird now.

After he went solo, wasn’t his album Chew up and spit out and then Van Halen’s like album after that was OU812. Huh. It was yeah, well. The boys are fighting. The boys were dramatic back in the day. I wish I missed that. We should make men in rock music fight again.

Tim Albright (06:13)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, i it

would be it would like the closest thing we’ve got is like when there was slight beef with one direction, right? That and it wasn’t like it wasn’t like knockdown drag out, but it was like yeah. And then when that when when Liam was it Liam di that died? Was it Liam that passed away?

Steph Beckett (06:36)
Yes.

No.

Yeah. But we need something else. We need something more dramatic. Like

Liam.

Tim Albright (06:50)
Yeah, when he passed away they all got together again and everybody’s happy, happy joy joy now.

Steph Beckett (06:54)
Yeah, yeah. Alright, I guess we should talk about A V. So we have a survey open. We opened it right before Infocom, so we’re keeping it open a little bit longer, everyone. Go and answer it. Is it our it is our June temperature check survey? And this is on the AVIT Convergence. So if you think that’s happening, if you don’t think that’s happening, if it’s happening in your day-to-day job, or if it isn’t, I am curious how much that

Tim Albright (06:58)
yeah, I guess.

Steph Beckett (07:23)
Like this is affecting you. If it’s just affecting you because of cloud management or AV over IP, you gotta put everything on the network, cybersecurity is suddenly your problem. These are things I want to know. And it takes probably like two minutes to answer it. So I would love it. And also, you if you answer, you will be entered into a drawing to win one of two $50 Amazon gift cards. So think that that is a very good deal.

Tim Albright (07:49)
Very good incentive.

Steph Beckett (07:51)
All right, so we have a special guest on today, but before we bring him on, we are going to go into a quick spot from our sponsor, Crestron. Check out this piece on Spotify Camp Nou, and we will be right back.

All right, let is let’s bring on our guest. Let’s bring on Chris from Crestron. Chris Scrow from Crestron. How are you doing this morning, Chris?

Chris Sgroe (09:18)
Hi Steph. How are you? I’m doing great. Thank you.

Steph Beckett (09:20)
Good. Welcome.

I hope you enjoyed our unhinged conversation at the beginning. Yes.

Chris Sgroe (09:24)
I did, I did. I I have a quick question for you.

Tim Albright (09:25)
And

Chris Sgroe (09:28)
Did you see the Prince cover band at the CTI party? ⁓ fantastic. ⁓

Steph Beckett (09:32)
No. Was Prince good? Okay.

Tim Albright (09:38)
That’s a

long story, Chris, because I also missed it ’cause I I I was actually with Steph at that time. ⁓ but but since we were talking about that, what w do you have a preference on Van Halen? Is it Sammy or is it David?

Chris Sgroe (09:42)
Fair enough for another day. Thank you.

Steph Beckett (09:50)
yeah.

Chris Sgroe (09:51)
I did I did hear you, you know. ⁓ I have to say my preference is David Lee Roth in the early days. Unchained being one of my favorites, you know. ⁓ I just I just can’t I can’t go further than that. I remember Sammy Hagar when he released his I Can’t Drive 55, you know. ⁓ so it’s a different, more poppy feel for me personally. But I understand that both of them have a place.

Tim Albright (09:58)
Yeah.

Steph Beckett (09:58)
I

get it.

Mm-hmm.

But

Tim Albright (10:16)
Sure.

Steph Beckett (10:19)
They do. They both belong in the lexicon, I get it. But you know, you c you can’t like Panama is also one that is very special to me. Like I tell people, because my dad played that so often in the car, that my first word was obviously mama, second word dada, third word was Panama. So so David Lee Rothie will always be special to me too. But speaking of Infocom, how did the show go for Crestron? Y’all were so busy.

Tim Albright (10:20)
They do.

Chris Sgroe (10:36)
Nice.

Steph Beckett (10:46)
That like we could barely get into y’all’s booth, so that is clearly a very good sign.

Chris Sgroe (10:51)
Honestly, even this morning I woke up thinking it was still going. so you know, I have to say, what a show. ⁓ I’ve been going to these shows for, you know, a few years now, and our team I think nailed Crestron’s presence and delivered a world class booth, essentially to showcase the story and our innovations that we have, right? So yeah, it was

Tim Albright (10:55)
That’s her.

Chris Sgroe (11:17)
It was fantastic to to be with everyone, spend time with everyone. Thursday we had a full day of training over in the West Hall. went very well. You know, we covered XIO, NVX, and obviously our new collab compute ⁓ and started demonstrating some of those capabilities. but again, I think, you know, beyond the booth, you know, it was great to just spend time with everyone. ⁓ you can’t replicate that anywhere else. So overall I think that was it was great.

Tim Albright (11:47)
Chris, you you mentioned a full day of training. What’s some of the questions you got from both the integrators as well as the IT and the A B directors out of those education sessions?

Chris Sgroe (11:56)
Well, I think overall, you know, the the pro training sessions filled up well with all of the courses. We had six sessions going. but the two that drew the biggest crowds were DM and VX, right? ⁓ AV over IP at scale is really what they want to know. ⁓ and the collab compute design. So those were I think the most important. It kind of tells you where people’s heads are, right? Distributing AV over the network at scale and

how the compute and the UC platform actually live together in the room. ⁓ right behind that was of course the management question, right? I’ve got dozens or hundreds of rooms. How do I actually run all of this? You know, that’s where XIO Cloud comes up every single time, right? The conversation stops being about the box on the wall and becomes about provisioning, monitoring, standardizing across the whole estate from one place.

And ⁓ you know, the audio as well came up a lot. ⁓ now that AI transcription and translation are the baseline expectations, people are realizing that the meeting only works if the room hears clearly first. Right. So DMNAX, intelligent audio were front and center. ⁓ and then, you know, the I think this was a cool one that kept coming up. How do I keep my team current? You know, the pace of the change is a real pain point.

Steph Beckett (13:16)
Mm.

Chris Sgroe (13:20)
And which is exactly, you know, not to throw a selfless plug in there too early, but that’s the gap that modern work ⁓ was built to fill, you know. So

Steph Beckett (13:32)
Speaking of modern work, talk a little bit about how the conversations that you had during those trainings, how does that influence the modern work at Crestron Masters program? And if you could talk just a little bit about the program for those who might need a refresher on what that is, that would be great too.

Chris Sgroe (13:50)
Sure, sure. Well, you know, the conversations around training ⁓ particularly really reinforced exactly what why modern work exists today, I think. ⁓ you know, how do I keep my team current? You know, that question kept coming up. It’s the same instinct last year in Madrid, right? That’s what put end users on a plane and for a crestron training event, right, in Spain.

⁓ organizations overall need that practical hands-on training, not just the demos in the booth. ⁓ And modern work at Crestra Masters focuses on real-world deployments, the management and the operational best practices. So I think the cool thing is it’s designed for specifically for the people responsible for the workplace technology environments for deploying there, you know, but you know, the ones accountable for those rooms.

But it also gives pretty much anyone a solid understanding of our latest solutions and capabilities. So they can go away right away, like leave the room and start thinking about, you know, how do I work toward this end? Right. So

Tim Albright (15:03)
No. Chris, we we mentioned the fact that we all just got back from Infocom. That is a what I would consider a traditional, typical industry event. If somebody’s never been to to Modern Work Summit before, what makes that different than something like an Infocom event?

Chris Sgroe (15:15)
Hmm.

Yeah, sure. ⁓ you know, it’s interesting. So for this, last year we launched modern work in a totally different format than we had before in Madrid. So I think it’s important to let people know, especially stateside, that we’re bringing this format here now. This is a training event ⁓ demonstrating our latest latest technologies and those capabilities.

Now it comes to San Antonio in November. ⁓ and it’s a training program. It’s not a conference. Right? It’s not, let’s just come and sit around and and talk about what’s new in the industry and how we can help each other. We have plenty of opportunities for that at our master’s event, you know. But this is the key distinction, I think, right? It’s hands-on, it’s focused on today’s workplace technologies, and it’s built for everyone: sales teams, designers, IT managers, A V managers, consultants.

workplace technology teams. You know, I think ⁓ you know, and the and the the detail says it all, right? People are coming because they want to see what can I do going forward. I know where I am today, I know where our organization is struggling, I want to scale this. These should be easy. These workplaces should be easy to use, easy to deploy, right? And ⁓ help us do business every day.

Steph Beckett (16:40)
Absolutely. What are some of the topics that people can expect to learn about or cover at this year’s Modern Work?

Chris Sgroe (16:48)
Well, I think as I mentioned, right, the pro training. ⁓ certainly we’re gonna lean into, you know, the two sessions that drew the biggest crowds at Infocom, right? ⁓ we will have NVX at scale. we’ll build bring in our collab solution. ⁓ they’re both right now core to our modern work curriculum. ⁓ if those were the conversations on the show floor, then this is where you have an opportunity to go deep on those, right? ⁓ in addition to that.

Steph Beckett (16:51)
Yeah.

Chris Sgroe (17:17)
you know, network infrastructure, obviously, right? Now we have the components. Now what do we need to do, right? We have a bunch of, you know, good network citizens, but let’s, you know, make them work together. ⁓ specifically the Netgear, right? How Netgear AV ⁓ networking and Crestron’s XIO Cloud Operations platform, how they work together. We’ll focus on that. again, we’ll talk more about intelligent audio with our DMNAX.

⁓ and paired with our Sennheiser integration. That’s a big one for us, you know, our AP 100. ⁓ and then intelligent video and one beyond solutions. ⁓ once again, you know, this isn’t going anywhere. It’s just growing and and getting better every day. You know, we’ll include the automated switching that scales from a huddle room to a large scale, you know, ⁓ conference space. I think, you know, again, we have to single out XIO Cloud.

Right, as the piece that pulls all of this together. And ⁓ because it answers that question that every IT and AV manager asks, right? Once the room’s installed, how do I run it? You know, so I think that’s essentially, you know, what you can expect. You know, if you’re coming in and you’re trying to figure out how to deploy spaces today, right, in a real world situation, then we’re gonna cover it all. We will show you every piece of the puzzle that is necessary to sit on your network.

Steph Beckett (18:29)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Sgroe (18:44)
Right, ⁓ deploy at scale and ultimately bring the business success.

Tim Albright (18:49)
Chris Chris, you kind of touched on this earlier, but I want to highlight something. I I actually attended the one in Madrid last year and had a chance to talk with a woman who’s in charge of of A V and IT for a financial institution. I talked with a number of higher education folks. From your vantage point, who should actually consider going to Modern Work Summit? Like what what what specifically whether that’s a title or it’s a it’s an organization, who who should who should look to go to this?

Steph Beckett (19:35)
Mm-hmm.

And you mentioned a lot of takeaways that attendees can expect to kind of bring from modern work, but if you had to pick one that you think is kind of like the most important thing that you want everyone to take away from this training, what would it be?

Tim Albright (21:40)
Yeah. All right, Chris, remind everybody the details again of of of Modern Works Summit.

Steph Beckett (21:48)
That’s okay.

nice.

Please.

Awesome. Well, Chris, thank you so much for coming on Rave TV this morning and for kind of talking to us more about this. I’m excited.

Tim Albright (23:24)
Thanks, Chris.

Steph Beckett (23:24)
Of course, of

course. Last question where can people go to find more about Crestron generally?

Awesome. Thank you so much, Chris. And we are gonna go into a quick spot from our other sponsor and partner, Shure Let’s watch this on Microflex Wireless Next Fusion Mode. So check this out. We’ll be right back.

Alright, let’s talk about the news really quick. So we have the Infocom wrap-up piece that I think just about every media outlet has published by this point. ⁓ so okay, let’s talk about how many people were at Infocom this year. This is how many attendees not like double counting them over the days, I think. So

Tim Albright (25:28)
Yeah, verified

attendees.

Steph Beckett (25:31)
Yes, total verified attendees. It was twenty-eight thousand one hundred and thirty-two, which by the way, I called. Almost exactly. Tim and I were walking on the last day and he said to me, How many people do you think came to this show? And I twenty eight thousand. He goes, No way. And then he texted me later that night and he’s like, I’m never gonna doubt you again.

Tim Albright (25:38)
Hundred percent. Hundred percent.

Yeah.

Never

doubt de Steph again, ever.

Steph Beckett (25:55)
Thank you. Thank you very much.

⁓ but I mean it I mean look, it is a little bit down because what was it last year, thirty-four?

Tim Albright (26:04)
No, no, that’s the thing is I I actually cause for for my piece ⁓ on Monday, I went back and I looked. It has hovered around thirty thousand since COVID. The only difference was two years ago. It was the first year the sphere was open. They hit thirty-six thousand last year. Everything else is hovered between that twenty-eight to thirty-two thousand range. ⁓ and I’m not gonna make any friends at a Vixa, but this was the line I said.

Steph Beckett (26:21)
Yeah.

Tim Albright (26:31)
I said, maybe this show is just a thirty thousand person show right now. And that’s okay.

Steph Beckett (26:39)
It’s just it’s difficult because people are like, Well, what’s ISC like? Look, ISC is an entirely different ball game because everyone international goes to that show. It’s not just Europe. And our show is pretty much I mean, we do have international attendees at Infocom, but it is mostly American. Like, you know, the the attendance is is very heavily American, of course.

Tim Albright (26:50)
Yes.

Steph Beckett (27:05)
So, and with Infocom changing location every other year, some people prefer to go to Infocom when it’s on the West Coast, like them, or if people are on the East Coast, they prefer to go to Infocom when it’s on the East Coast. And right now we are dealing with like some things that are outside of X’s control. We have some, you know, socioeconomic stuff going on, you know. ⁓ flying it it was very, very expensive the week of Infocom. So

Tim Albright (27:17)
Yes.

Very expensive. Yeah.

Steph Beckett (27:34)
You know, like this explains to me why it is a little bit down and picking up a show and expanding it post COVID is very difficult. So I think that you are right in saying that perhaps for now this is just a 30 this is a 30,000 person show. And that’s okay. It doesn’t mean that it’s never going to get bigger.

Tim Albright (27:52)
Yeah. It’s okay.

No, I mean even I mean I cause I I w I went back and looked and and and you know they they were trending ahead of infoc ahead of COVID, they were trending at like forty, forty five thousand.

Steph Beckett (28:06)
Mm-hmm.

Tim Albright (28:07)
⁓ I think twenty nineteen was forty five thousand and it was growing year over year, which was certainly a positive. COVID happened and and everything got thrown out of whack. And you’re right about all the other outside forces that they have that that Avixa has no control over. You know, the suicide the the economy right now, the war, ⁓ several wars, right? Yeah, you you’ve got you’ve got to take all those things into into consideration.

Steph Beckett (28:29)
into consideration. So they’re kind of the fact that I think that they’re hovering at this number is a good thing. Because it means that even though we have all of this stuff going on in the country and the world, like this, you know, the people are still wanting a show. We still want human connection. We still yearn for this. I just think that any American trade show, whether it be

Tim Albright (28:39)
Yeah.

Steph Beckett (28:57)
Infocom or any other industry in this country, it’s gonna, I don’t think any of them are super expanding right now in terms of attendance. So it has nothing to do with I think it has very, very little to do with the industry and more to do with like where we’re at in America right now. So that is what I will say about that. 2027 will be interesting because Avixa has announced a new portion of this show called Reside.

Tim Albright (29:14)
Yeah, I would agree with that.

Steph Beckett (29:26)
And also they acquired Lytapalooza. So we’re gonna see a lot more residential tech at Infocom next year in Orlando. So that will for sure be interesting, especially like I’m I’m are you attending Cedia Expo this year? I’m just gonna, I’m gonna, you know, I’m gonna attend both and I’m gonna cover both and you guys can read Rave to see how this is affecting everything. Like I’m trying, I mean, I don’t want to

upset either, you know, the Reside Show or C Dia Expo, but I wanna provide coverage of both because I wanna see where people are bringing their residential tech.

Tim Albright (30:07)
Yeah, and and I’m I actually but you know, follow follow along with your coverage as well when it comes to C Dia. We simply haven’t done CDS simply because, you know, with with Avi Nations focused strictly on the IT and the A V managers, they don’t typically care about the residential tech, the stuff that’s that that’s inherently resie.

Steph Beckett (30:17)
Yeah, that’s fair.

Yeah, that’s

fair. We yeah, our our residential side of our publication is a little bit smaller, but it’s been something that we’re trying to get get bigger. So I think that, you know, another residential show that we get to cover is only gonna be a positive for our coverage. So I’m look, I’m happy. There’s more more people reading rave, great. Uh-huh.

Tim Albright (30:42)
Yeah, absolutely.

Perfect.

Steph Beckett (30:50)
⁓ okay, so I wanted to bring up we have our best of Infocom 2026 winners. We announced these on the Wednesday of the show. We changed our award system this year. We had ⁓ a panel of judges and people applied for what award that they wanted, and basically the panel of judges ranked product by product.

Not based on the award they applied for, the judges were went in kind of like blind with it and they were just given the product ⁓ all of the information that people plugged in and ranked them one by one. This is how that went. we have I think about 50 winners, and I will say the the product that won the best new product of Infocom 2026, which is crazy, ⁓ was the Clever Charger Pro from a ⁓ kind of small Norwegian startup. So

Absolutely ins like I mean like it it is a great product, but it was really exciting for me to see that a startup won.

Tim Albright (31:54)
Not just a startup, but that you and I were were introduced to this at ISE d earlier this year, ⁓ through our our technology and practice tour. They were also on our technology practice tour at Infocom. B both of those tours, it was the favorite stop ⁓ of of the tour. And I don’t know about you, but I I’m like, okay, it’s a rechargeable battery. That’s I I get it, right? It’s it but it’s it’s one of those practical things that people have fallen in love with.

Steph Beckett (31:58)
Mm-hmm.

Tim Albright (32:23)
That it’s a rack mounted, rechargeable battery system. It is it I mean it it is pretty powerful in in and all the things, but it’s a rechargeable battery. Okay.

Steph Beckett (32:33)
Yeah, yeah. But it’s

like, ⁓ I met up with one of our judges at the show and I was like, Can you this is product one? Like, my gosh. And he was like, Well, it wasn’t something that was like, my gosh, this is gonna change the world, but this is something that solves a very clear problem. And one of the questions on each of the products that we asked the judges was, like

You know, is there a clear problem that this is solving for either integrators or end users? And I think that that is why this ranked so high.

Tim Albright (33:05)
Yeah. Does double A and triple A. I think that that is part of the part of the the attraction as well. It’s not just one form factor or one type of battery either.

Steph Beckett (33:11)
Mm-hmm.

Yep, and it I think it holds up to like 48. So yeah, very cool. ⁓ this next story we talked about on Rave TV at the show. ⁓ this is from AVI SPL. They launched this autonomous freight operation with Volvo’s autonomous solutions. This is so interesting because basically this is supposed to be freight from Dallas to Houston, and it uses these Volvo VL autonomous.

Tim Albright (33:17)
Yeah.

Steph Beckett (33:41)
Trucks powered by the Aurora driver, and this is going to support AVI SPL’s transport of these AV electronics, including new products, end-of-life equipment, which they’re gonna reclaim the precious metals as part of their recycling program. ⁓ so it is very interesting, but I talked to Jeremy, who was the one who sent me this release.

And he says that this is not going to fully replace like their you know drivers that drive cross country, that this is just made to augment that business, not replace it.

Tim Albright (34:19)
So

like like local local in-between location deliveries? Because yeah, Houston and and Dallas, right? So interesting. Now I I I will say b ⁓ SPL has done ⁓ a lot when it comes to ESG, right? ⁓ and and environmental ⁓ things like that. I I am gonna see c interested to see, you know, kinda how this plays out because certainly, I mean number one, they’re the they’re the biggest integrator in the world, so they certainly have probably the biggest

Steph Beckett (34:23)
For now. Yeah.

Tim Albright (34:45)
biggest ⁓ bill when it comes to transportation. So see how they they they lay this out, but see w where they they expand this ⁓ on that local in-between delivery, right? Because they’ve got locations all over the states. Certainly Houston to Dallas is not the only the only track that they can they can lay this out.

Steph Beckett (34:48)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Exactly. So we’re gonna if you wanna see our conversation with Jeremy about this, ⁓ I believe it was on Friday’s episode of Rave TV, so go check that out. ⁓ Jeremy’s lovely, he’s really cool, so you’ll enjoy hearing from Jeremy Cotaroli. So go and check that out. ⁓ other news, everybody brought their DVLED to this show.

Everybody brought everybody’s got DV LED right now. It is Yeah, even Epson. Everyone has DV LED right now. Pro so if there’s a company that doesn’t have it, chances are next year they will. ⁓ so L we’ve talked about a lot of the DV LED releases, but another one that we haven’t talked about was one from LG. ⁓ they expanded their DV LED portfolio. They got five new ⁓ solutions.

Tim Albright (35:33)
Yes. Everybody has D V and even Epson has DBL.

They will.

Steph Beckett (36:00)
That are supposed to be very easy to deploy while also like giving the classic LG experience. We got a new ⁓ LG Magnet Gen 2, the LG Magnet Active Micro LED, LG Magnet Essential, LG Magnet Essential All in One, and LG Magnet Gen 2 AIO. And of the essential, the ones that were from the essential line.

They’re like supposed to be very entry level for just getting into D V L E D. So

Tim Albright (36:36)
It it L L G I mean and e everybody that’s got D V L E D is making some interesting expansions here. ⁓ certainly with with LG, they’ve they’ve also got some integrated all-in-one systems which are becoming very, very popular because of the simplicity of installation and maintenance on those.

Steph Beckett (36:46)
Mm-hmm.

DB LED is is really really taking over in a lot of areas of the market. And the great thing about everyone having one is there are a lot of options. And with a lot of com competition on the market, you get to kind of pick, like, okay, what’s gonna be right for my installation? Which pitch? What amount of contrast? ⁓ what price point is right for me? Because with a lot of options on the market.

There are a lot of options in terms of price point. And competition drives the price down a little bit because everyone wants to be competitive. So I see this as being a good thing. You know, it’s kind of like everyone having a video bar. You get to kind of pick which one is right for your space. You have literally limitless options. So you get to be picky about what’s gonna be more important to you. Is the audio more important to you? Is the video more important to you? Do you want five cameras in it? Do you want one? You know, like you

Tim Albright (37:36)
No, not video bars.

Yeah.

Steph Beckett (37:50)
Have so much power now with how to outfit your space with all the options that are on the market. and speaking of that, like you know, ViewSonic got really popular from you know their personal displays, you know, like your your little computer monitor ⁓ and big ones, they have a ton. But did you know ViewSonic is very heavily in our industry? They have a ton of really good DV LED options. In fact, they’re all in one, won an award from us.

And their mobile all-in-one is one of my favorites on the market. It’s very cool. So check out this spot from ViewSonic on their pre-configured all-in-one DV LED, and Tim and I will be right back.

All right, let’s do the last. am I I’m he’s okay. Okay, great. Let’s do the last few stories before we continue. ⁓ we got some rebrands that were announced at Infocom. Rebrands can go one of two ways, in my opinion. We’ve got a branding problem in this industry. We’re not good at it.

Tim Albright (40:07)
Yep.

Steph Beckett (40:17)
Not good at it. As an industry generally, no Tino shade to any company in general, but like as a people, we are not good at branding. so I don’t I don’t know yet. This but Bose Professional is ⁓ unveiling this new global brand identity 802 Labs. And they are going to start the transition of all of their which of course like Bose regular Bose, like the the consumer Bose is going to be the same.

But Bose Professional is a completely separate business entity. And I think this is them trying to further separate themselves from that consumer brand. So yeah, this is gonna start next year. Tim, what are your thoughts? What are your feelings? What are your vibes?

Tim Albright (41:03)
I will e I will

I will echo your your statement that we don’t do this well. the here the I I understand that the thinking behind this because a year or two ago the professional ⁓ arm was sold off from the consumer line. ⁓ I don’t know if it many people know this, but the consumer arm is actually owned by MIT, that MIT, right? Because Dr. Bose gave it to them as as part of his will. And

Steph Beckett (41:19)
Mm-hmm.

Tim Albright (41:33)
So that was the professional side was spun off. So I understand trying to s you know, wanting to separate yourself from an entity that you’re no longer legally attached to. I don’t know that I would do eight two labs though.

Steph Beckett (41:42)
Yes.

Yes. I don’t know where it’s because of the original eight two f loudspeaker. That okay. I was missing that. I was like where

Tim Albright (41:59)
Yes. Yeah, okay. And and and how many in this room

remember that speaker?

Steph Beckett (42:05)
I wasn’t alive, so.

Tim Albright (42:07)
I I I probably was, but I don’t remember it, so

Steph Beckett (42:09)
⁓ nineteen seventy eight. Were were you alive then? Okay, well I mean look, I don’t know. I and you know, I it is not my job to come up with company names. And I’m glad ’cause I d I but we’re just as an I don’t know. We’re gonna see how it goes. But again, like you, I understand they wanted to separate themselves because they are no longer legally.

Tim Albright (42:13)
I was I was four years old, so yes, I was alive.

Steph Beckett (42:37)
Owned or legally a part of the same thing. So they had they probably were like, we’re gonna have to change this eventually, and eventually is now. So 802 Labs, and I’m guessing we will see them debut this at ISE, probably. And later at Infocom. So we’re gonna we’re gonna keep our eye on the situation there. ⁓ all right. We got a couple more stories here. Planar’s Cobra series. Did you see that?

Tim Albright (42:40)
Yes.

Yeah.

At at Infocom. at I C, yes, yeah, yeah, probably, yeah. Yeah, that’s fair. Yeah.

Yup.

I did. It was frickin’ amazing. Yeah.

Steph Beckett (43:08)
Looks good. Looks really

good. Planar is kind of they’re kind of doing it different than everybody else. Like I said, everybody has DV LED. They have, you know, Planar has everything. But they have this new proprietary Ever Pixel and true micro LED technology that is built upon their Planar LED platform.

Tim Albright (43:14)
Yeah.

Yeah, this was ⁓ one of the most talked about when you’re when you talk to people on the show floor and and even getting text messages and and DMs from people asking if I had seen this, right? So i e even if I had never seen it, right? And it was over in the Central Hall, ⁓ and I I had walked by by it a couple of times and and stopped I think on Thursday, it was one of the most most popular things that I personally was was like, Hey, you gotta go see this if you haven’t yet. Yeah.

Steph Beckett (43:34)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Absolutely. So Ever Pixel incorporates pixel level redundancy directly into the display. ⁓ and then true micro utilizes LEDs as small as twenty micrometers is in as like an effort to enable that that true micro LED performance. That is what that means. So

It is now available for order. Go get you one. Yeah.

Tim Albright (44:28)
Which is remarkable in itself, by the way. I

’cause ’cause I am again ⁓ old enough to remember that there was a time at InfoCom where vaporware was ⁓ up ⁓ was abundant and when you ask people when it was available, ⁓ you know, next quarter, next quarter, next quarter, and the fact that us as a quarter never comes, right? and as an industry, the manufacturers have gotten the memo Hey, don’t come to the show unless you’ve got an actual ship date and preferably

Steph Beckett (44:41)
Yes.

The quarter never comes. Yeah.

Tim Albright (44:57)
Yeah. ⁓

Steph Beckett (45:01)
Absolutely.

So planar they’re doing it different. ⁓ last release, Epson has a new 30,000 lumen 4K projector. ⁓ this has a three chip, three L C D color, it’s got enhanced black levels, ⁓ 4K detail up to 30,000 lumens. yeah, is it looks really good. They had this at Infocom. it’s got crystal motion technology.

Tim Albright (45:04)
Yep.

Steph Beckett (45:30)
⁓ and also it’s pretty small for how much it can do. And that is that’s the theme with Epson recently.

Tim Albright (45:38)
That is

That is my most that is my favorite thing about this. So good Lord, fifteen, twenty years ago, I I was when I was a tech manager, I was responsible for installing two 20,000 lumens projectors. That that part is important, right? 20,000 lumens. Those suckers were a hundred or a hundred and fifty pac a hundred or hundred and fifty pounds each, right?

Steph Beckett (45:56)
Okay.

Tim Albright (46:02)
And we had to mount them ⁓ like really high up. So it took me and another guy ⁓ on two separate ladders to walk this sucker up, right? Like it was it was w one of the scariest things I’ve ever done in my life. Because first of all, they weren’t cheap. So if we dropped it, that was that was a lot of money. ⁓ but yeah, that’s super, super heavy. And the fact that the technology has gotten to the point where I could probably pick that thing up by myself now.

Steph Beckett (46:18)
Mm.

You’re cooked, yeah.

Tim Albright (46:33)
⁓ and and mount it wherever. Yeah.

Steph Beckett (46:35)
Yeah. ⁓ it I think ⁓ I had an interview with Chris Tegoo yesterday and I’m pretty sure he told me that this is like seventy-six pounds.

Tim Albright (46:47)
Okay. I mean not light, but st still not yeah.

Steph Beckett (46:49)
No, not light,

but like thirty thousand lumens, seventy six pounds, is pretty good. And Chris, if I am wrong, please feel free to correct me. I’m very sorry.

Tim Albright (46:53)
Yeah. It’s a good ratio.

Steph Beckett (47:00)
but that’s I think for what it does, I think that that is light in relation. When you think about how long ago was it that you were up on that ladder?

Tim Albright (47:06)
Yes, it is. A hundred percent.

Fift

fi no, good lord, sixteen years ago now. Yeah. Yeah.

Steph Beckett (47:14)
Okay, yeah, and we’ve shaved

off, you know, we’ve we’ve given it ten thousand more lumens of brightness and we’ve shaved off half the weight. So I was like, Okay, so next year it’s gonna be ten pounds, is what you’re telling me, Chris? And he’s like that’s the engineer’s problem, that’s not my problem.

Tim Albright (47:21)
Yep. Big fan of that.

Steph Beckett (47:33)
So hey engineers Yeah, hey engineers at Epson next year make it 10 pounds. Make it happen. Just, you know, get in there, bend physics around. It’s not hard. Lock in.

Tim Albright (47:33)
This is why we’re not in product development, by the way.

Make it happen. Just do it. No.

Steph Beckett (47:49)
man. Okay, last thing from me is a reminder to join replay Infocom 2026. It’s gonna be July 2nd at 2 p.m. Eastern. It’s worth one CTS, CTSI, or CTSD. ⁓ and this is gonna be like our favorite parts from Infocom. We’re gonna review some of our ⁓ we’re gonna gather some of our videos that we got. We got like 1800 at Infocom this year, which I think is a record. I don’t think we’ve ever gotten that many from Infocom, so.

Amazing. ⁓ and I know that most of you are not cannot watch 1800 videos in your spare time. So Gary and I are gonna pick our favorites and the things that we think you should be paying attention to. And we’re gonna kind of review those for you over the span of an hour and a half. It should be a very fun time and we hope that you will join us.

Tim Albright (48:40)
You should join him. I I I’m gonna join him. I mean re remotely, not like I’m not doing this. I’m I’m I yeah, I’m good.

Steph Beckett (48:41)
You should join. ⁓ great.

I mean you you can come on if you want to, but Alright.

Well that is that’s our show. Thank you guys so much for watching another episode of Rave TV. I’m Steph Beckett.

Tim Albright (48:58)
I’m Tim Albright. Bye.

Steph Beckett (48:59)
Bye.