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TinyGreenPC, InStore Media, Silver Curve showcasing joint digital signage solution at ISE15

Companies set to demo new joined up media player product in standalone and OPS versions in Amsterdam in February.

December 8, 2014

Integrated Systems Europe visitors can create and post signage content direct to screens on stand 8-F315 at this year's ISE in Amsterdam (Feb. 10-12, 2015), where TinyGreenPC, In-Store Media and Silver Curve are demonstrating a complete content-to-screen digital signage solution designed for economy and ease of management, according to an announcement from the companies.

The solution is centered on the TinyGreenPC Solitaire Pi-Player, which is built around the Raspberry Pi and draws just 7 watts. According to the announcement, it delivers much of the functionality of a PC-based Media Player but uses approximately a third of the power. The Pi player is a professional-grade, dedicated media player offering both simple scheduling and ready templates and enterprise scalable scheduling with the Instoremedia Digital Signage solution. With output to HDMI, Wi-Fi and Ethernet, as well as OPS (open pluggable specification) slot-in and standalone versions, the Pi is aimed at breaking down the barriers to adopting digital signage, the announcement said.

The Pi Player has already been successfully adopted by several retailers, including London department store Gieves & Hawkes, the companies said. AVMI, a global integrator of retail digital media solutions, created a custom window display for Gieves & Hawkes, powered by a professional digital signage platform from InStore Media and using an Aperture-powered Pi Player. Aperture was developed by digital signage software developer Silver Curve.

"InStore Media, Silver Curve and TinyGreenPC offer a truly joined up digital signage screen, allowing content to be created and played back quickly and simply," said Paul Mullen, sales director, TinyGreenPC, in the announcement. "Silver Curve Aperture, bundled with the Pi Player, is a graphics engine that makes the outstanding graphics capabilities of the Raspberry Pi fully accessible. The Solitaire Pi Player from TinyGreenPC is the ultimate compact, low power-consumption media player that costs just £7 a year to run in terms of power."

The TinyGreenPC Solitaire Pi Player andersDX and TinyGreenPC is offered fully cased as a standalone media player or an OPS media player. Both can receive content via Ethernet or (optional) Wi-Fi and render it to an attached screen of up to 1920 x 1080p (full HD) resolution. The standalone player is equipped with HDMI, RS-232, Ethernet, GPIO and USB 2.0 Interfaces. The OPS player is based on Intel's specification and comes with the appropriate 80-pin connector. A UPS mode maintains the power supply from a battery for seven minutes in the event of temporary disconnection.

Instoremedia NOW is a solution for those who want to install and run simple, small-scale signage installations from a user interface that takes minutes to learn, according to the announcement. Utilizing the ultra-low impact Pi Player, with Instoremedia NOW, users can be running a digital signage display within hours. For larger scale deployments, Instoremedia Enterprise offers end-users the ability to schedule content across large display networks from a single user interface. It is also compatible with the Pi Player and features both playlist and metadata rules based scheduling, as well as complete system diagnostics.

SilverCurve Aperture is a graphics engine for digital signage that enables software vendors to run their software on a mobile phone chip instead of a PC. Designed from the ground up specifically for digital signage, Aperture sits between the vendor software and the device hardware, drawing rich content and rendering it at full, broadcast-ready HDMI. It drives the graphics processor on the chip and uses it in a highly efficient way to obtain graphics, motion images and animation.