The Device I Want
I want a really specific device for our meeting rooms, I don't know who will make it, and I don't know how nobody thought of this yet, but here it is:
A flush-mount box sits in the middle of the table, it is lined on either side with USB-C ports, next to each port is a button. At one end of the device are two similar buttons with icons on them: Display, USB. Both backlit in a dull white.
People gather in the room, they connect their devices to the box, on each port where a device is connected the ring around the corresponding button glows blue.
Jason wants to present from his screen: he taps the Display button, it now glows red, then he taps the USB button, it also turns red. He taps the button corresponding to his device: the ring now glows red. His device recognises an HDMI connection to the screen at the end of the room and he can now present on it. Simultaneously, his device is also connected to the meeting audio device (maybe a Jabra Speak 410) via an unseen USB hub.
A few seconds following this interaction the two icon buttons return to dull white, and Jason's button remains red.
Later Aria wants to present, she just wants the display, Jason will handle audio. She taps the Display icon which again switches to red. She then presses the button next to her USB-C port, at this Jason's switch turns amber, and Aria's turns red.
After a few seconds the Display icon button returns to dull white, and Jason's button turns red again, and Aria's remains red.
This is a meeting device that solves a group of problems without finicky and fidgety wireless setup. Every device has USB-C now, and they all (pretty much) can get everything they need from it.
If you want the display you 'enable' the display option and tap your button. If you want the USB hub (typically for audio) you 'enable' the usb option and tap your button.
Features I would like:
- Every device gets power over USB-C
- There is a network switch built into the device, all connected devices are also connected to the network (this isn't enterprise friendly, but it is 'small-shop' friendly), really you shouldn't connect this to your corporate network anyway, it should be an internet-only guest network. Bonus points if you configure your router to refuse to route between devices.
- Multiple devices should be daisy-chainable, so for a big meeting room you can put two or three along the table and they all give the same display. Bonus points if it expands to tens of devices, you could manage a huge round-table meeting with just these!
- Perhaps an administrative mode (accessible from the network side) that allows you to restrict audio or do some other configuration. I suppose an 'enterprise friendly' version of the device would include managed switches so you could do VLAN and certificate based network access (al a Cisco's ISE)
- Another 'enterprisey' feature would be to include the conference audio interface in the devices themselves, so they would have fancy speaker + echo cancelling microphones built in.
- For a large installation you really want one 'master' device and the rest to be 'slave' devices. The master has HDMI and USB, and the others do the rest.
