| Product: |
Microsoft Netmeeting 3 |
| Date: |
28/09/01 (675 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Advantages: The concept can replace the phone call in the long run, it’s free; all you need is an internet PC with a soundcard and microphone. There is no advertising, it’s easy to use
Disadvantages: Sound quality through slow connection. Sometimes not too obedient, open to potential unwelcome people, troublesome to find IP if MSN is down, time lags.
>What’s Netmeeting about?<
Mention videoconferencing and men in dark suits appear into your mind, or maybe lots of nudity if you read some of the other opinions around here… Well this opinion is going to try to guide you through this innovation without trying to sound like an instructions manual, and hopefully enable you to let your computer achieve its potential. Apologies to Ash for ripping of their song lyrics in the title, but it’s so appropriate.
To me Netmeeting is about using the internet for two parties to communicate usually with vision and audio. And this is what this programme is capable of, but it can do so much more…
If you have not used this before, look at the graphic at the top, and imagine communicating through that medium...
>What is Netmeeting then?
Netmeeting is a Microsoft programme that lets you video conference and communicate, with the needs of the businessman/demanding net user in mind. This is not your conventional ICQ or MSN messenger, it is the perfect partner! Not only can you video conference, you can also share a whiteboard with your partner, and even share a programme with them, more on that later.
This programme come as standard with Windows 98 and above and is downloadable from the Microsoft website (it’s a very small file) for free and should also come with your webcam. In order to use the basic features of this, you need an internet connection, a microphone and a soundcard. But to be honest, you also should have a webcam too if you are half serious about using this as a communications tool, preferably one with a microphone. The other compulsory thing is that you need a friend that has the equipment.
>Not just for people in dark suits
You may know from another of my opinions that I have a webcam, and this programme I can say is what made getting my webcam worth it. This programme really unleashes the potential of your webcam, especially if it
has a microphone. Remember, there are no costs to this service, all you pay for is your internet connection, and if you are reading this, and other opinions, I hope you have a 24/7 one, not least because of how long this is going to be!
>>The functions
>Call
This is basically the core function, you need to call someone in order for the rest of the features to work, calling establishes a connection between you and the other party. This automatically initiates the audio and video connection between the users.
So how do you call? This is the main problem with this programme, as far as I know, there are 2 ways:
Log onto MSN – now there are 2 ways to do this, but with this method you must have a Hotmail (or equivalent) account. The first way is to long onto your messenger and then click “call”, “new call” and select the address book where after a few seconds, you’re online contacts will show, just click their name and this initiates a call and if configured correctly, you will receive a “waiting for response” window and within a few seconds, you can hear them, and if they have a webcam, you can see them, and vice versa. NB, both parties do not need a webcam to initiate a “call”. If your MSN messenger is not on then do the same as before and it will get you to sign on via Netmeeting.
Lately MSN is always down so it is impossible to use this method, and it is such a shame really. The alternative method is more efficient, easier, but you need to work to get the information.
Find their IP – An IP is a number, it is unique to you when you have logged onto your ISP. It’s in the form of something like 217.116.27.97 and this allows someone to identify you, for example, if you submit something to this website, no doubt they know it was from your IP, and using this they can trace you, unless it is a fake one. If you know the other party’s IP then
simply choose “New Call” and enter their IP, and you’re off, simple as that.
But how does the ordinary person get an IP? Well a lot of the people I communicate with use IRC and this it is standard practice to show an IP, all you need to do is type /whois NICKNAME and their address is shown, if it isn’t in the form of an IP then type /dns ADDRESS and you will have their IP, et voila. If you don’t like IRC then get them to send an email to your hotmail, and make sure you have your message headers setting set to a high level, that way you can find it too, but far less elegant. I am sure there is an easier way, but I never had the need to find out.
Alternatively, you could play hard to get and let your friends do the inviting. Once you are connected, in theory there is nothing you can do that you can’t do if you are phoning, one day, in the internet age we are living in, this could replace the telephone, but we are far away from that, and theory is not practice here, as you shall see later.
Netmeeting, as the name suggests, is not just restricted to twosomes, more than two people can join in a meeting, but I’ve never tried that before, and I feel it would be unfair to review this.
There is also a Microsoft internet directory, and this can be use to begin calls, find people, groups etc, but personally if I had young children, I would keep them away.
>Sharing
This is an interesting function. “Shared programs allows meeting participants to view and work on files simultaneously. For example, you may have a Microsoft Word document that several people need to work on. You can open the document on your computer, share it, and then everyone can provide their comments directly in the document.” (from the help file). A real innovation, that can get quite complicated.
>Chat
This opens up a standard chat applet so you can type messages to the other user, it’s n
ot the tidiest of chat applications, not recommended.
>Whiteboard
This is pure genius, if you select this, a window, reminiscent of Paint opens (it says you are not sharing initially), and whatever you draw, the other person can see, and if he/she joins, you are connected. The first thing I did with this feature was play noughts and crosses and doodle, I am sure you can think of something more constructive.
>File Transfer
Well, nothing special, you can do this better with ICQ or IRC. IT is simply a function to send files around, like pictures, documents, mp3s, etc, but an essential element nonetheless for successful meetings.
This in a nutshell is what this can do, of course like with most decent programmes, there are a whole host of functions that tailor this programme to your preferences, such as a DO NOT DISTURB function, an ACCEPT ALL CALLS function and what functions you wish to see on the console, and of course the size of the window. The functions you are most likely to use are the audio/video tuning wizards and selecting seeing your own face too during the conference.
>>The XPerience
It’s all fine writing about the functions, but what do I think of this? After all this is my opinion.
>The layout
This is essentially fine, you can choose what buttons are on the console and the most important functions are there, it’s only when you wish to do something more complicated that matters begin to get confusing.
The console is dominated by the scree, the size of which is adjustable, have having a larger screen obviously means a poorer picture as it is formed with the same amount of data. When conferencing you can choose to view yourself in a window inside the other party’s window or as a separate window, this is clever I think.
>Ease of use
Assuming you have the works, setup is easy, within 2 minutes everything was set up on my computer, my webcam was instantly recogn
ized and I was ready to conference straight away.
As I said in the how to call section, calling someone can be easy or complicated. But once a connection is formed, you need patience, everything is slow (maybe because I am on a modem connection).
>Quality of conferencing
This I feel is the most important thing in judging this programme, but if you are a Dial-up account user like myself, then the performance is restricted.
Visuals – If you and the other party are devoting your whole (dial-up) internet connection to Netmeeting, then netmeeting can perfectly accompany a 6cm x 7cm screen on a 17’ monitor. By perfectly, I mean get a good quality picture with about a 10 frames per second frame rate.
Sounds – With a Dial-up connection, audio is poor, sounds are distorted and arrive in “packets” it’s very poor, if you want to use it as a phone, turn your cameras off and that way you have more bandwidth for voice.
Delays – Is the picture/audio live? In one word no, there seems to be like a 5 second delay and as one would expect, but it seldom gets frustrating. You will find yourself saying pardon.
So don’t despair if you do not have a broadband connection, it works fine, but you will find yourself on Easyjet rather than BA World Business Class.
>Relaibility
I guess connecting is the difficult part, there is an 80% chance you will connect to your friend first time. And once connected, rarely do you get cut off or lost the connection in another way. However slowdowns either due to your PC or some kind of server flood is more common, but this is free, and IRC server flood is worse.
The programme itself has only crashed once, so I give it full marks here, but it really depends on your computer and maybe your webcam.
>>Conclusions
Well this programme in theory should be part of the Office suite because it is so helpful and clever, but it isn
’t, it’s free! If you have a webcam, please give it a go, not just because you can save money on phone bills, but you can also realise the potential of your computer. If you don’t like it, then that’s fine, it doesn’t take long to try, and you must have a friend that is curious also.
For more information, open this programme and consult the help file or go to the Microsoft website or leave me a comment. Join the revolution!
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