Karaoke Forums

Thinking of going completely paperless. Perhaps (one) printed songbook just to have on file. I am using kjams and iphone users can easily access my library and submit songs via their seats. Non iphone users can do the same with any smart phone, ipad, nook, any device via wifi. I am thinking of purchasing a couple of netbooks in place of song books. Never needs updating, no slips to turn in. Much more efficient show as they pick songs and auto load into my program. Any1 already doing this? and if so, what are your experiences, dislikes, trouble shooting?

Kiosk.... wrote it ... been using it for 6 years.... not a problem... at all...

Yup, agreed.

The kids these days have had video games since they were born. (I was born in 73, year of pong incidentally enough) The only folks that I find have issues with our paperless setup are old, and aren't the typical drinking crowd that the owners enjoy taking money from.

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Living my life as Robert Cortese, 162 E. Jackson St, San Jose CA.

It's like the difference between high and low budget toilet paper, it really doesn't matter in the end. -exweedfarmer

Which is smarter? Just sticking to making/selling karaoke, while people all over the world create software FOR FREE that helps you sell it, or trying to compete with them and keeping it a closed loop while you blow your money into an industry (software) that you(the karaoke manu) knows nothing about?
-me

I haven't used phones for books but I'm an old geezer and so are the folks I play to. We still think of phones as something that sits on a table and rings. But, I have used kiosk since god was a lad which is much the same idea and doesn't rely on an outside infrastructure, and they work great. The books gather dust.

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Okay, who took my pants?

I like the kiosks. No more signing up for songs I don't have. No more trying to read illegible scrawl (sober and/or drunk). No more bs about when someone signed up or who got skipped.

However, when the kiosks go down - it is pandemonium. People freak out, act like they've been abused or robbed and occasionally start being critical. When the kiosks aren't working, I take over and provide professional service so that the singers aren't negatively affected, but I still have to endure the situation where the show has an "error". Sucks.

The other night, my hosting program crashed. I restarted the program and tried to restart the server for the kiosks, but as techno-luck would have it, the kiosks locked up because of the server-side crash.
Not really a huge problem, because I spoke with the singers who were trying to sign up and took their requests verbally. I don't have any paper sign-up sheets anymore (but I still get drunks handing me scribble on napkins).
I restarted the kiosks and went on with the show.

My books are placed on tables around the bar before the show starts. Until I can rely on a digital version that is available without FAIL, I will still print books because they are the analog solution to a digital problem.

I used to use a couple of regular old XP laptops and a digital songbook software that I could update quickly so that singers could look up songs and find the newest additions/requests. When I tried using them for kiosks, they didn't hold up to the abuse and started losing keys and then the power inputs went bad where the the cable inserted. After that I found about a half dozen Panasonic ToughBooks with rubberized (beer-proof) keyboards & touch-screens. These are my kiosks and the singers LOVE them. I wish I could say they are 100%, but the truth is they are about 97% reliable.

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Never the same show twice!

I actually thought about going strictly kiosk, but took a poll wiht our crowds for 6 months & found that most want to use a book (the avg age group with this poll wa 25 so 'old' was not a factor), I did have SOME that wanted the electronic version. So books will be a regular part of our criteria, however I may add 1 kiosk station for those who want it. I will never go paperless as I require everyone to at least minumum write down their song they want. This way I have some kind of paper trail when they come up & tell me they didn't pick this song - well YEAH you did, here's the slip with your handwriting.

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LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

That's a bummer... Why not suggest to Compuhost to do what I did with mine? I added an option (for the host) to print requests out of a "ticket printer" (cheap Dymo label printer) instead of using the network. This way, even if your PC is fine and your kiosks are fine, but your network card(s) go down, you still have a non-stop option....

If you're not at 100% reliable then you must be configured to use an ad hoc network (computer-to-computer) and not infrastructure (requires a router) between your host machine and kiosks. Is this correct?

What exactly are you guys using for Kiosk? small laptops?, one actual digital kiosk touch screen unit? etc.

I'm using autokdj, old ELO touchscreens from ebay (can be had for $80) and old Dell GX280's (about $100 used)

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Living my life as Robert Cortese, 162 E. Jackson St, San Jose CA.

It's like the difference between high and low budget toilet paper, it really doesn't matter in the end. -exweedfarmer

Which is smarter? Just sticking to making/selling karaoke, while people all over the world create software FOR FREE that helps you sell it, or trying to compete with them and keeping it a closed loop while you blow your money into an industry (software) that you(the karaoke manu) knows nothing about?
-me

No, I am not using ad-hoc networking. I am using a software hot-spot in windows 7. The network connection is reliable (barring interference) almost all of the time.

The network was still working fine. The problem was that when CH shuts down, the server for the kiosks also shuts down, the kiosks don't handle that very well and have to be re-booted. Even if I was printing tickets, that wouldn't be possible until I restart CH, restart the Remote Request Server and then restart the kiosks.

I am using old (5-7 years) Panasonic ToughBooks for kiosks. They do have touch screens and rubberized keyboards. I found them on e-Bay for around $70 each on average. I use D-Link usb adapters so that the older XP systems can "talk" to the current wireless N secured network.
I've also used, and had customers use Iphones, Blackberries, and HTC Droids. They still have to use a kiosk to enter their "performer profile" but after that they use their devices instead of my kiosks.

When the time comes that 10" tablets drop below $100 in price (kindle is already $139), I'll go book-less and have singers "check-out" my songbooks. Maybe I'll just keep a hard copy of the master list.

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Never the same show twice!

That is not true, at least for me. IF Ch shuts down, which it does not really often on my end, maybe once every three months, the Kiosk starts working again the moment I start the Remote Server in Ch again. No lock up, nothing.

Here is what I use, maybe it helps you to avoid that problem:
1. I use a wireless router. Everything else is iffy and not reliable. Actually a wired connection would be preferred, but wireless never let me down so far.
2. Make sure you have static (manual) IP addresses on both, server and Kiosk machines. Don't use DHCP. The only reason I see your Kiosk to lock up and in the need for a reboot is, if the server IP changes (if you are using DHCP)

That should do the trick. See if it helps in your case.

Since I use the Kiosk, I only had a problem once with the connection not working. After changing to static IP addresses and manual IP configuration in the Kiosk setup I never had a problem again.

DHCP is fine. Best way with DHCP is to find a server that supports mac address to IP mapping on the DHCP server. This way you can permanently lock an IP address to a machine without having to manually reconfigure the machine.

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Living my life as Robert Cortese, 162 E. Jackson St, San Jose CA.

It's like the difference between high and low budget toilet paper, it really doesn't matter in the end. -exweedfarmer

Which is smarter? Just sticking to making/selling karaoke, while people all over the world create software FOR FREE that helps you sell it, or trying to compete with them and keeping it a closed loop while you blow your money into an industry (software) that you(the karaoke manu) knows nothing about?
-me

Yeah, you can do that too. As long as the Kiosk and Server IP addresses don't change, the Kiosk should not lock up.

I actually went ahead and told the DHCP server to start using IP addresses at 192.168.1.5 automatically and set the Server to static 192.168.1.2 and the two Kiosks to .3 and .4.
That way the smart phone / tablet users can still use the DHCP and connect.

I'm also using an ELO touchscreen. As far as song books, I'll still carry about 4 or 5 with me to my venues for those die hard customers that still want to flip through pages. They just won't get updated as much.

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Electro-Voice Evolve 50... Taking Sound To The Next Level.

I really like the kiosk idea.. and have wanted to implement it for awhile.

I'm waiting to get a good deal on one of those old 'MegaTouch' machines to use, so I can just plop it down in one nice neat unit, plug it into the wall, and be done with it.

If I were hosting in a permanent location, i'd have gone kiosk a long time ago.. but i'm a mobile jock with limited space in my gigmobile, and am all about going from opening my trunk, to playing my first song and being completely ready to rock in 30 minutes.

I've thought about building one.. I have several Pentium 4 and higher laptops that work great, but have broken screens.. and I have at least two VGA LCD touch screens I picked up from a restaurant auction a few years ago.. together they'd be ideal for putting together a kiosk.. I just haven't had the time.

I'm a geek.. but i'm also a practical businessman.. I think technology serves to make my job easier and save me time.

When I do finally implement a touch based kiosk, i'm going to want something that sets up in less than 2 minutes, that interfaces or works with my existing Virtual DJ database, and has a UI that is easy for patrons to use.

Even then, i'll still likely want to use a thermal printer to print the patrons song request out and have them bring the slip up to me.. for several reasons.

First.. I think the face to face time with patrons is important in establishing a brand. A big reason why a person chooses one DJ/KJ over another is simply because they LIKE the KJ/DJ.

Second.. anonymously submitting song requests can result in drunks putting in phony requests.. people putting in requests for their friends (who really don't want to sing at all), and jerkoff singers putting in multiple requests under different names.

Here's another thing to look forward to guys.
http://www.pandawill.com/ly777-mid-797m ... 38558.html

$89 chinese android tablets. Can't wait to start replacing my elo/pc combo's with those.

_________________
Living my life as Robert Cortese, 162 E. Jackson St, San Jose CA.

It's like the difference between high and low budget toilet paper, it really doesn't matter in the end. -exweedfarmer

Which is smarter? Just sticking to making/selling karaoke, while people all over the world create software FOR FREE that helps you sell it, or trying to compete with them and keeping it a closed loop while you blow your money into an industry (software) that you(the karaoke manu) knows nothing about?
-me

I am kicking around the idea of using (or at least trying out one) Augen 10.2 Netbook. Simple, cheap if they get broke (found new for $100.00 or less) and have wi-fi connection. Perfect for my set up. Each user submits his or her name via their phone, device or Netbook, creates their own password and song choosing they go.

I already purchased one of those (for about $70) 7" tablets. Be careful, you need the updated version of Android OS to access the Android Market.
The pdf file viewer that I could use, was too clunky and a 7" screen makes browsing a songbook tedious because you can only see about 10 songs at a time.

I think the 10" form factor is appropriate for song listings, as in the iPad where I first viewed the pdf file on a tablet. It is better because you can see a whole page at a time. Right now, the 10" tablets are still coming down in price.

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Never the same show twice!

I have an Acer 10" netbook... be forewarned, 10" netbooks do not have the screen resolution required by CH to perform as kiosks (you lose the bottom 5th of the screen). I also tried them as just plain songbooks, but unless you get the screen to change orientation from landscape to portrait, you have the same problem with not being able to see a full page of listings at one time.

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Never the same show twice!

I use computers found in garbage cans. I really am going to have to update because folks are starting to make snide remarks about their age. I'll just have to start watching the trash for upgrades. My kiosks are mouse driven and no one has complained. Most of the time I have the keyboards locked out. Click your name, click the song and you're done.

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Okay, who took my pants?