Art Comes Alive With Converged Network

Museums typically showcase the old. Classic pieces of art and sculpture to take visitors back in time. But with a little help from NEC, the Dallas Museum of Art (pictured) is taking a modern approach. With LCDs and digital signage solutions from NEC, along with its Univerge solutions, the museum is bringing exhibits back to life.

Dubbed the DMA Arts Network, the museum and NEC have embarked on a technology vision to deliver broad public access to great works of art through a unified infrastructure comprising wireless LAN, voice and digital signage.

The goal of the Arts Network is to offer a digital arts experience, including public wireless access for educational purposes. The infrastructure behind the Arts Network helps the museum accommodate major exhibitions, like the Egyptian government's upcoming Tutankhamen and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs exhibit slated for October.

And while the specific project in Dallas wasn't undertaken by a reseller, all NEC Digital Signage solutions are available to channel partners, along with NEC's Univerge Assured Mobility WLAN solutions and Univerge voice, networking and unified communications solutions, giving VARs the power to update the ancient and breathe new life into classic exhibits, or to offer to their clients in other verticals, such as health care and education.

The Dallas Museum of Art's wireless LAN infrastructure is unobtrusive and, in many cases, can go unnoticed, such as here in one of the exhibit halls. The tucked-away wireless network lets the museum discreetly accommodate major exhibitions and deliver broadband wireless access to students, patrons and staff.

There are currently 148 wireless LAN access points (pictured) that provide wireless connectivity within the Dallas Museum of Art. NEC designed and deployed the museum's WLAN infrastructure using Cisco wireless gear. With the current deployment, the museum has 85 percent wireless coverage, but plans are under way to bump that to complete, 100 percent, coverage.

Forget those little metal signs offering more details into a piece of artand#8212;the work may be ancient, but learning about it doesn't have to be. Using NEC LCD touch-screen displays, the Dallas Museum of Art is bringing these pieces back to life. Here, a museum patron has a private and personal interaction with a work of art.

NEC's Univerge NEAX 2000 IPS (pictured) offers hybrid and pure IP voice all in one system to keep the Dallas Museum of Art connected and running smoothly behind the scenes.

We all know you're supposed to be quiet in a museum, and NEC's BlueFire VC400 Digital Signage Controller is billed as being suitable for noise-sensitive environments, like hospitals or museums.

Here, the BlueFire VC400 manages this digital display as part of the museum's Arts Network initiative.

While visitors will no doubt have long-lasting memories of their visit to the Dallas Museum of Art, a great deal of memory is required to make sure that experience is, well, memorable.

Pictured here is the NEC Express5800, designed for locations and enterprises that host large image files. The server's platform delivers access to massive memory stores.