Do you need a Vocera to use their comm badges?

March 12, 2009 1:22 PM

Has anyone chanced to have any experience with the Vocera wifi comm-badges?

I see that Computer Discount Warehouse is admitting to a retail price on the badge -- it's about $429 -- but I'm sure they want $a billion and six for the server software... and I need a project this year. :-)

posted by baylink to Computers & Internet (7 answers total)

I have! They are really useful in hospitals. I volunteer in a hospital. All the nurses and techs and unit clerks (kinda like receptionists) have them. All of them can call each other to ask questions, etc. I can pick up the phone, dial a number and say their name and you can speak to them. However, sometimes the voice quality can be less than optimal and it does pick up a lot of outside noise. Then every so often you'll say one name, and it'll think you said something completely different. For instance, you might say Christine Frazier and it will think you said Jose Cuevos.

I'm not sure if this is what you wanted to know, though. I'll watch this thread in case you have any other questions, though.
posted by majikstreet at 1:34 PM on March 12, 2009

We researched them for almost a year and tentatively decided against them. The cost is not just badges and server licenses: it's badges, servers, wireless infrastructure upgrades, existing telephony integration, contracts, consultants and added IT support costs to implement and support all of the above.

From the network guy's perspective - Wireless networks, even those that perform 'well' with laptops and tablets, need to be watertight and seemless to support VoIP.

Power: Generic wireless adapters can transmit at up to 55mw, allowing them to be fairly distant relative to the receiving access point. Vocera badges transmit at something more like 11mw, and with tiny antennas to boot. This means more access points, using lower power but with more overlap to prevent drops and facilitate roaming. Managing even 2.4G channels becomes tough in these conditions.

Coverage: You didn't 'need' good wireless in stairwells and elevator shafts before, but you do now. People like their calls to stay up as they walk from room to room. Again, more WAPs, this time with special antennas to cover those weird areas.

Roaming: I hope you use something like LWAPP or CAPWAP because disassociating and re-associating to WAPs with different IP ranges will definitely kill your call.

Speed: The gen1 badges were wireless B only. B clients on an access point knock all associated G clients back to B speeds. Boooo.

So there you go - those are the drawbacks from the wifi perspective. We had a Vocera reseller tell us that they get sent back more than 25% of the time to remove the install because of performance.

tl;dr: get your network and phone guys involved early so they can double the cost before you submit it to budget.
posted by datacenter refugee at 6:53 PM on March 12, 2009

Response by poster: Not having seen any recent general press coverage, I'd sort of thought the situation with them might be as dcr describes. I'd been thinking about just grabbing some badges, and, y'know, a Linux DVD, and playing around a bit, but if *they* can't even get it to work reliably...
posted by baylink at 8:25 PM on March 12, 2009

Well, speaking from working at a Best Buy several years ago that used them... they work. We could call each other and our corporate helpline (which was nearly worthless for helping us with in-store problems).
posted by IndigoRain at 9:52 PM on March 12, 2009

Another healthcare person - I'm in clerical, not clinical, so I only got to see it from the outside, but it apparently only lasted about a year or so and now they're not used quite so much (the proximity rfid badges that let residents and nurses do what they need to do without 'logging in' to the system - good god, you would've thought that somebody cured cancer, with all the resounding praise).
posted by eclectist at 1:29 AM on March 13, 2009

Response by poster: Oh, really? They've got logging in down to "the radio sees your RFID nametag and knows who you are"? And I don't already know that, even after looking at their own website? Someone's falling down on the job.

And I see I hosed the title. "Do you need a Vocera *server* to use their comm badges?"

And, what, no "steenkin bodges" jokes? Even in the grey? :-)
posted by baylink at 6:00 AM on March 13, 2009

I think what electist meant was that the staff have rfid badges in addition to the voceras. afaik, the voceras don't have a rfid chip.

I really don't know whether you need the server. I imagine if they were cheaper people might eventually reverse engineer them so you don't have to.
posted by majikstreet at 1:55 PM on March 13, 2009