Microsoft phones due in October

Stephen Withers
Friday, 10 August 2007 06:28

Your IT - Home IT

A range of phones based on reference designs created by Microsoft is set to arrive in Australia in mid October.

The highlight is the 'RoundTable' desktop conferencing phone developed over a four and a half year period by Microsoft Research.

RoundTable uses five cameras to capture a panoramic view of the people sitting around the table, along with a set of directional microphones to determine which one is speaking. The speaker's face is then displayed centrally in the image, even if they are being captured at the boundary between two of the cameras. The software can also track a speaker physically moving around the table.

RoundTable requires Office Communications Server, but it can also be used as a conventional conference phone with a normal phone line.

According to Oscar Trimboli, director of Microsoft's unified communications group in Australia and New Zealand, RoundTable phones are likely to cost around $3000. The company hopes to see "one in every meeting room in the world" within five to seven years, he said.

The other phones in the family are the 'Catalina' USB handset and the 'Anacapa' Bluetooth headset that both work with Office Communicator running on a PC, and the 'Tanjay' standalone deskphone that runs Office Communicator with a touchscreen interface showing presence information and more.

Companies producing phones based on these designs include Jabra, LG-Nortel, NEC, Polycom and Thompson, Trimboli said.