The NDS
industry literally has hundreds of "proprietary" software and
hardware systems to chose from. Some of these systems are good but cost
too much. Others just cost too much. Others have great functionality for
running a very large digital sign network but have no capacity to provide
interactive tie ins.
Three Major Types of NDS Platforms
Dedicated "Box" or Appliance
In general, the industry has three major types of technology. The first
is a system that combines a dedicated player (known as a "box")
which comes with a bundled software solution. These solutions are normally
at the lower end of the price range due in part to the fact that they
do not require a Windows or Apple operating system license. In addition,
there is no need to buy a NDS software license apart from the player.
In recent years these systems have become more robust (in that they can
run HD files and some even come bundled with content services) but they
still do not provide the full functionality of systems that run on more
open systems.
Digital Sign Platforms
Another type of software platform is one designed to do one thing and
that is to run a digital sign system. These can range from a product to
run one sign in one place that costs around $500 to highly scalable systems
that are designed to run thousands of signs and to operate a system which
uses an advertising business model. More often than not these systems
run on the Windows OS. Given the complexity of operating a large digital
sign system, especially one based on ad sales, the best of these systems
are well designed to make them easy to operate and scale. As a potential
customer, however, you do not want to buy a system like this if your needs
are different.
Next Generation Platforms
In general, these systems have their roots in the interactive kiosk world.
They tend to be flexible and allow for tie-ins to any IO device such as
RFID, card swipes and anything else you can think of. Yes, they can even
do "Minority Report" types of things. The main potential draw
back is that in general they require some level of custom programming
to tailor them to your specific needs. Nonetheless, their best attribute
in general is their ability to be highly flexible and adapt to your systems
specific needs.
