Cisco TelePresence Fundamentals

Cisco TelePresence™ Systems (CTS) create live, face-to-face meeting experiences, providing a breakthrough virtual conferencing and collaboration experience that transcends anything previously achievable by videoconferencing. Although the business case for deploying CTS is compelling, implementing it requires advanced knowledge of the latest networking technologies, an attention to detail, and thorough planning. In this book, four leading CTS technical experts cover everything you need to know to successfully design and deploy CTS in your environment.

The authors cover every element of a working CTS solution: video, audio, signaling protocols and call processing, LAN and WAN design, multipoint, security, inter-company connectivity, and much more. They deliver start-to-finish coverage of CTS design for superior availability, QoS support, and security in converged networks. They also present the first chapter-length design guide of it’s kind detailing the room requirements and recommendations for lighting, acoustics, and ambience within various types of TelePresence rooms.

Cisco Telepresence Fundamentals is an indispensable resource for all technical professionals tasked with deploying CTS, including netadmins, sysadmins, audio/video specialists, VoIP specialists, and operations staff. This is the only book that:

• Introduces every component of a complete CTS solution and shows how they work together
• Walks through connecting CTS in real-world environments
• Demonstrates how to secure virtual meetings using Cisco firewalls and security protocols
• Includes a full chapter on effective TelePresence room design
• Walks through every aspect of SIP call signaling design, including both single-cluster and intercluster examples for use in a TelePresence environment
• Provides prequalification, room, and network path assessment considerations to help you anticipate and avoid problems

Tim Szigeti, CCIE® No. 9794, technical leader within the Cisco® Enterprise Systems Engineering team, is responsible for defining Cisco TelePresence network deployment best practices. He also coauthored the Cisco Press book End-to-End QoS Network Design. Kevin McMenamy, senior manager of technical marketing in the Cisco TelePresence Systems Business Unit, has spent the past nine years at Cisco supporting IP videoconferencing, video telephony, and unified communications. Roland Saville, technical leader for the Cisco Enterprise Systems Engineering team, tests and develops best-practice design guides for Cisco TelePresence enterprise deployments. Alan Glowacki is a Cisco technical marketing engineer responsible for supporting Cisco TelePresence customers and sales teams.

• Use Cisco TelePresence Systems (CTS) to enhance global teamwork and collaboration, both within your own enterprise and with your customers, partners, and vendors
• Understand how the various components of the Cisco TelePresence Solution connect and work together
• Integrate CTS into existing LAN, enterprise, and service provider networks
• Successfully design and deploy a global TelePresence network
• Understand the importance of room dimensions, acoustics, lighting, and ambience and how to properly design the physical room environment
• Provide the high levels of network availability CTS requires
• Leverage the Cisco quality of service (QoS) tools most relevant to CTS network provisioning and deployment
• Systematically secure CTS using TLS, dTLS, sRTP, SSH, and Cisco firewalls

This book is part of the Cisco Press® Fundamentals Series. Books in this series introduce networking professionals to new networking technologies, covering network topologies, sample deployment concepts, protocols, and management techniques.

Category: IP Communications

Covers: Cisco TelePresence Systems

Tim Szigeti, CCIE No. 9794, is a technical leader at Cisco within the Enterprise Systems Engineering (ESE) team, where he has spent the last decade specializing in quality of service technologies. His current role is to design network architectures for the next wave of media applications, including TelePresence, IP video surveillance, digital media systems, and desktop video. He has coauthored many technical papers, including the Cisco Enterprise QoS Design Guide and the Cisco TelePresence Network Systems Design Guide, and the Cisco Press book End-to-End QoS Network Design. Tim holds a bachelor of Commerce degree in management information systems from the University of British Columbia.

Kevin McMenamy is senior manager of technical marketing in the Cisco TelePresence Systems Business Unit (TSBU). Kevin has been doing technical marketing at Cisco since February 2000, focused primarily on voice- and video-related technologies, including Cisco IP/TV, Cisco H.323 video conferencing, Cisco IP Telephony, and Unified Communications, and now Cisco TelePresence. Prior to Cisco, Kevin worked at FVC.COM, which manufactured H.321 video conferencing solutions, and at Winnov L.L.P, which manufactured the video capture cards used in the Cisco IP/TV streaming servers and in PCs for Microsoft’s NetMeeting and WhitePine Software’s CUCME applications. Kevin has filed several U.S. patents with Cisco on voice and video signaling and security concepts and has coauthored and contributed to numerous technical papers including the Cisco IP Videoconferencing Design Guide, the Cisco IP Video Telephony Design Guide, the Cisco IP Telephony Design Guide, the Cisco Quality of Service Design Guide, the Cisco SAFE Blueprint, Cisco CallManager Fundamentals, and most recently the Cisco TelePresence Network Systems Design Guide.

Roland Saville is a technical leader within the Cisco Enterprise Systems Engineering (ESE) team. For the past 13 years at Cisco, he has focused on a broad range of technology areas, including VoIP, security, wireless, RFID, and TelePresence as a systems engineer, consulting systems engineer, and technical marketing engineer. He has coauthored many technical papers including the Cisco SAFE Blueprint documents, Cisco TelePresence Network Systems Design Guide, and several U.S. patents relating to RFID technology. Roland holds a bachelor of science degree in electrical engineering from the University of Idaho and a master of business administration from Santa Clara University.

Alan Glowacki is a technical marketing engineer in the TelePresence Systems Business Unit (TSBU). Alan has been working on video communications since 1995 when he joined First Virtual Communications as employee number 20. After five years with First Virtual Communications, Alan joined Cisco, focusing on H.323 video conferencing. During his time with Cisco, he authored many technical papers including the first H.323 Videoconferencing Solution Reference Design Guide. After three and a half years with Cisco, he left to try another startup only to return to Cisco in 2006. Upon his return to Cisco, Alan returned his focus to video by joining the TSBU.