According
to the salesman, FuzeBox licenses from Vidyo its SVC (which he called Scalable
Video Codec not coding) but uses something different for audio. That was
immediately apparent because there were no audio issues during the call and I
used my webcam’s microphone and desktop speakers.
Ease of
use
Unfortunately,
I was not given Host rights so I was just a user connecting to a meeting hosted
by the salesman. I connected via an email link and that took me to Fuze’s
website for an 8mb download. Note that once the Fuze Meeting program was
installed, it was not automatically put in my computer’s startup routine.
That’s always appreciated, especially if you are dealing with not-so-power
users. Connection via iPad required downloading the app and input of a meeting
number and user name. That’s it.
Quality
of product
Due to
SVC (as I was told), there is no ability to change bandwidth based on
connection speed or quality. This absolutely wasn’t needed though as the video
and audio quality was both excellent over the 30 minute call. There were no lip
sync issues, even on the iPad. Nor was there lag between the image on the iPad
and the image on my desktop. If there is significant lag on any of the devices,
there is always the problem of people talking over one another. Not an issue
here with my setup.
Pricing
FuzeBox
has a couple of versions of FuzeMeeting listed on their website. The website www.fuzebox.com/pricing also has pricing listed for each
version. Anything above Pro would be overkill for me as I wouldn’t see myself
in meeting with more than four people on video. At $49/month it is about the
right pricepoint. I was told by the salesman that it is not sold monthly
though, only yearly and that’s a bummer. The host is only required to have a
license so you can email invites out for meetings and the other parties only
need to perform the install and they are ready to go. The Business version
allows for twelve people on video and adds a couple other features not
available on the Pro version as well as a couple of enhancements.
One item
of note: Salesmen frustrate me. Typically, I like talking to support staff,
engineers or owners because they understand that I am looking at products both
subjectively and objectively and won’t buy a product because of (insert
marketing speak here). He automatically assumed his product was the best out
there because it is the most used and even compared the product to Cisco, Polycom
and Lifesize hardware endpoints. When I first got connected to the call (I was
early, salesman was late) the salesman said “You have 10 minutes!”. I thought;
“Seriously?” and went about the demo. Sales tactics aside, their product is top
notch in both video, audio and data sharing. I would recommend it.