OptIPortal

Industry

This next generation, ultra-resolution visualisation display wall allows real-time, interactive collaboration across the globe.

The OptIPortal display screen is nearly 50 times higher resolution than the highest-resolution HD TV commercially available

The OptIPortal is essentially a cluster of computer screens which can be deployed on a variety of hardware platforms. The many screens are capable of displaying one or many high definition virtual displays. OptIPortals can be used to view a wide variety of visual data:

Viewing high definition static images and/or video
Live streaming across one or more OptIPortals
Video conferencing and collaboration with other OptIPortals or compatible devices

Aims

QCIF successfully installed a new computer display at UQ-VisLab (co-located with the HPC Unit) that has the highest capacity in Australia: 36 Mega-pixels (compared to regular desktops with 1-2 Mpixel), cementing for QCIF a growing partnership with CalIT2 and EVL.

Methodology

The primary objective of this project has been to more tightly couple computing, data and display devices by computer networks. This is required because, increasingly, research now involves larger data sets and more intensive computations. A significant obstacle for end users is whole-of-systems performance, which is demonstrably poor. And users need better visualisation interfaces to these larger outputs. Additionally, deployed networks can have high theoretical performance (1 Gbps [Giga bits per sec.]), but routinely are not well tuned so that measured data transfer rates are more typically ~5 Mbps. That would be equivalent to driving on a freeway at 0.5 km/h.

The physical system to be built is a tiled LCD display, with associated PC graphics systems and network manager; a simple mechanical frame supports and aligns the array of LCD displays.