Comment by casca | Hacker News Reader

Comment by casca | Hacker News Reader

The Jamboard is a collaborative whiteboard that costs $5k for a 4k 55" screen plus $600/year ($300/year for early adopters). It's similar to Microsoft's Surface Hub[1], Cisco's Spark Board[2] and SMART Technologies SmartBoard[3].

Pricing seems about normal for products in this space, even a little low. I'd think that the big question that anyone considering buying this should be asking is around Google's history with hardware support and service. This kind of product will often be expected to be used for 5+ years and the dependency of a non-core service from Google could affect that.

As I'm looking to purchase one of the products in this space, here is a little more comparison info in case anyone else finds it useful. Only Google will sell you one of their devices, everyone else goes through resellers with opaque pricing and unpublished RRPs.

Microsoft Surface Hub 55": 1920x1080 @120Hz, 4th Generation i5, Intel HD 4600, 2x HD cameras. Windows 10 + MS Office

Microsoft Surface Hub 85" 3840x2160 @120Hz, 4th generation i7, NVIDIA Quadro K2200, 2x HD cameras. Windows 10 + MS Office

Cisco Spark Board 55": 4k (4096x2160?) display, unknown hardware and software, 4k camera. Cisco Spark and SIP protocols supported, requires Cisco Collaboration Cloud service.

Cisco Spark Board 70": same as 55"

SMART Board 8055i 55"/8065i 65"/8084i 84": 3840x2160, 4k available. Doesn't seem to have cameras for videoconferencing, comes with SMART Meeting Pro 4.0 software to "collaborate in the 4th dimension", whatever that means.

Google Jamboard 55: 55" 4k (4096x2160?) @60Hz. Unknown hardware, software probably Android? Costs $5000. Requires Google's G-Suite subscription, uses Hangouts and $600/year annual management and support fee. EOL is May 2021

[1] https://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-surface-hub [2] http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/collaboration-endpoint... [3] https://home.smarttech.com/interactive-displays-for-business

I'm sort of confused about the annual management / support fee. Sounds like this would be a cool accessory that would require G Apps and therefore bring startups into the ecosystem. Why charge support for something so expensive that also requires G Suite for every user in the first place? Why isn't the functionality just linked directly into some G Suite OneNote equivalent?

I feel like that fee would really kill the appeal, if I were hunting for something like this. Also, I'm assuming there would be a support fee for each device?

There is precedent for an annual fee: they charge one in addition to the purchase price for their Chromebox for Meetings device as well.

Any form of collaboration like this requires something server-side that needs to be maintained so an annual fee is not unreasonable. The Microsoft Surface Hub uses Skype for Business so would be backing into an Office365 SAAS account and the Cisco one requires a Cisco Collaboration Cloud one which the only price I can find is CAD3547.99[1]

[1] https://www.cdw.ca/shop/products/Cisco-Spark-Board-subscript...

But I think the point is you need a Google suite account. So how much more server-side are we talking about here? Enough worth killing sales for?

This quote:

| This kind of product will often be expected to be used for 5+ years and the dependency of a non-core service from Google could affect that.

Is related to this quote:

| I'm sort of confused about the annual management / support fee

To spell it out more, here's an apt passage from Stratechery <https://stratechery.com/2017/wannacry-and-the-power-of-busin...:

| This is exactly what is necessary for good security: vendors need to keep their applications (or in the case of Microsoft, operating systems) updated, and end users need to always be using the latest version. Moreover, pricing software as a service means it is no longer a capital cost with all of the one-time payment assumptions that go with it: rather, it is an ongoing expense that implicitly includes maintenance, whether that be by the vendor or the end user (or, likely, a combination of the two).

Keep in mind that this is the same outfit that completely botched the rollout of Wave. They KNEW it was a product dependent on the network effect, and instead they drank their own Kool Aid. Simply further proof Google is an algorithm company that dreams electric Apples.

Helen of Troy has no fear of Google. None.

Wave was announced in 2009, and though it was not successful, it's feature breakthroughs led to realtime collaboration in Google Docs.

Innovation is not a linear convention.

In your warped exegesis of the world, Apple didn't launch the Newton and Microsoft never pushed the Zune.

You're confusing the product with the rollout / marketing. Wave obviously needed network. So what was the point of limited invites.

Imagine this. I want to have a group chat - a la Slack - and 9 team members are able and one is not. Guess that happened? No Wave use.

The point is simple. The history of stupidity, shite customer service and abandoment is there...Google is not - yet? - a world class product company. Innovation is not the issue. Execution is.

i think the product support will be ok as it's run via the Cloud Business side of the company, $50 a month will assure this. also Cisco normally has some kinda maintenance plan on there products. unsure about the Surface Hub

i can also see them being pack in as sweeteners like sign up for company/school wide G-Suite here is a few bonus jamboards

software is chromeOS?.

https://www.theverge.com/2017/5/23/15680250/google-jamboard-...

My experience with Google support (not for hardware, to be fair) is enough to never even consider buying a $5k piece of hardware from them.

>Requires Google's G-Suite subscription

That would be showstopper for any company not already signed up. $5 to $10/month for anyone that might use one of these boards, or remotely connect, even if only once a year?

And they have to sign in with a separate ID if the company isn't generally using G suite?

What is your favorite?

We use a mix out of all products, but arent G Suite Customers for a variety of reasons. Is the Surface Hub relatively "open" to be used with with Third Party Software?

It says in the article that the Jamboard is driven by an NVIDIA Jetson TX1.

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