POS, Payment Processing, AIDC, And IP Video News

By The Business Solutions Network

Honeywell Releases New Compact Industrial Label Printers

Honeywell has released new models of its MP Series compact industrial label printers. The MP Series printers are among the smallest industrial label printers on the market, featuring all-metal casings for improved durability. The MP Series printers can be used in almost any orientation and can be mounted on walls, manufacturing lines, or fork trucks. In short, Honeywell has designed these printers for industrial work environments where space is an issue.             

The MP Series printers are available in two models: MP Compact and MP Nova. The MP Nova is available in 4” and 6” sizes. It offers both direct thermal and thermal transfer printing capability, providing options to businesses that operate in environments with dust and debris. Print speeds reach 10 ips (inches per second) on the 4” model and 8 ips on the 6” model.

The MP Compact printer is, according to Honeywell, the industry’s smallest all-metal rugged label printer and weighs less than eight pounds. It can be mounted on tables and walls or be connected to a mobile cart or fork truck to improve worker productivity, reduce errors, and enable faster workflows in manufacturing, cross-docking, and distribution centers. The MP Compact can print up to 5 ips.

Epson Introduces New Document Scanners

Epson America recently unveiled two new business solutions — the DS-530 and DS-1630 commercial document scanners. The DS-530 and the DS-1630 include a complete set of software tools, allowing users to make a seamless transition to a paperless office. Both models feature a 50-page auto document feeder (ADF) for scanning and come fully equipped with TWAIN and ISIS drivers for integration with existing document management systems. The DS-530 offers scan speeds up to 35 ppm (pages per minute) with enhanced paper feeding technology. This technology includes a double feed detection skip button for stickered pages, a slow-speed mode button for wrinkled or fragile paper, and dynamic skew correction to prevent misaligned scans. The DS-1630 is a versatile, auto-duplex, flatbed document scanner designed for virtually any task, offering speeds up to 25 ppm.

Both models offer one-touch scanning for users to directly save their files to folders, email, and — with Epson Document Capture software installed on a connected Windows PC or Mac — to online storage accounts including Dropbox, SharePoint, FileBound, Evernote, and Google Drive. In addition, both scanners are equipped with a software package including Epson Document Capture, ABBYY FineReader2, and Presto! BizCard Reader.

BlueStar Partners With blueRover For IoT

BlueStar recently announced a new partnership with blueRover, which will give VARs and systems integrators access to more IoT (Internet of Things) solutions and enable their foray into this growing market opportunity. blueRover works to connect clients’ “things” through monitoring work environments, assets, and equipment sensor technology. Through blueRover, companies can gather information on their workplaces through a secure data stream to a private cloud storage system. Solutions such as temperature monitoring in food service and advanced asset tracking in transportation are just two of these new ventures made to be easily deployed by channel partners.

“The partnership with blueRover is very exciting for us at BlueStar Canada, as it provides live opportunities for our VARs to dive into a segment that was, up to now, more an acronym than a reality,” says Jacques Lapierre, president of BlueStar Canada.

Through blueRover’s data compilation services, end users will be able to gather comprehensive overviews of how their companies are functioning and further pinpoint critical issues, identify trends, and make predictive, proactive decisions.

Milestone Updates XProtect VMS

Milestone Systems unveiled a new version of its XProtect video management software (VMS) product suite, marking the third release of the VMS in 2016. XProtect 2016 R3 Advanced VMS has numerous enhancements, primarily developed based on feedback from the partner community.

To minimize disk load for recording servers, Milestone has developed a new strategy for storing video in RAM before committing recordings to disk. By fully utilizing the large RAM capacity in modern servers, recorded video is kept in RAM until the VMS determines the video needs to be written to slower mechanical disks. Initial testing shows the savings in disk activity can be up to 80 percent and even more in scenarios with little or no motion. Reduction in disk activity enables the recording server to handle more cameras, be more resilient, and run cooler. Because disk load is reduced, less-expensive disk drives can be used. Additionally, there is less wear of the disk drives, reducing maintenance costs.

The update also brings a new Milestone feature, SVQR (scalable video quality recording). With SVQR, a low bandwidth connection can be used to send low-resolution video to a command center for real-time situational awareness. When the cameras are connected to a high bandwidth network, high-quality recordings from the cameras’ local storage can be retrieved by XProtect 2016 R3 Advanced VMS by event, schedule, or manually. This means that SVQR improves evidence investigation as well as real-time situational awareness, providing added value to the Milestone community.

Finally, savings in disk space are achieved by the support of highly efficient H.265 video compression. More video can be stored on a given disk volume. Alternately, the recording quality can be improved with the same storage use. Use of 4K ultra-high-definition is also a viable option with this video compression technology. Smaller video files mean less network load, creating savings in bandwidth.

Touch Dynamic Releases New Kiosk Product

Touch Dynamic recently announced its new Podium Kiosk, a customizable solution compatible with any of the Touch Dynamic all-in-one terminals mounted on the universal printer base. This includes the 14.1-inch, 15-inch, 17-inch and 18.5-inch all-in-one systems, allowing VARs to customize the look, speed, and storage space of the kiosk.

“We wanted to provide an affordable, simple Kiosk POS solution to end users,” says Craig Paritz, president of Touch Dynamic. “With the Podium Kiosk, we’ve done that. We’ve created a customizable, cost-effective, sleek, and ergonomic kiosk solution.”

The Podium Kiosk is available with custom wraps featuring customer art and logos, providing real estate for marketing, advertising, and branding. With optional shelves on either side of the unit, there’s display space for sales literature, menus, scales, or other materials. These shelves are removable, allowing the Podium Kiosk to squeeze into tight corners and spaces if necessary.