A few months ago, Google re-launched their popular messaging app, Hangouts as a service that is focused on businesses and teams. Hangouts Meet is the video component of the whole thing and it was released prior to the texting app. Today they are adding dedicated hardware that will make the video conference calling feature much more streamlined.
Information on the Hangouts Meet hardware
The hardware is quite similar to another piece of hardware. This is the Chromebox/base for meetings. It comes with a speaker mic, a 4K resolution camera sensor and an ASUS Chromebox. One major improvement is that it has a touchscreen for controlling purposes. This makes using it much easier than the previous solutions.
The screen comes with an intuitional touchscreen. This makes it easy to see info like meetings and details related to it and join events. The touchscreen can also be used to handle other things such as the camera or adding other users. Furthermore, it features HDMI output. This means one can easily configure it to a laptop and use it for presenting purposes.
The speaker mic is completely designed by Google. According to the company, it will remove echoes and background noise. This on paper should deliver clear and noise free audio. A maximum of 5 devices can be daisy chained together.
The camera is 4K as mentioned above. It has a one hundred and twenty degree view and is made by a different company called Huddly. As with most Google products, it comes with machine learning. This means it can automatically detect people and crop or zoom into a person. Since it is powered by Chrome OS, it will have automatic updates which will be done in the background.
Pricing and availability of the Hangouts Meet Hardware
The entire kit is being sold at a price of $1999. Google says it will be available in only certain markets but did not specify which markets this will be.
