Polycom Touch Controller slow and unresponsive

[Anonymous]

Since the introduction of the PTC i -and my customers- have had issues with the performance of the touch controller device.
Not all installations have the same result and therefore i decided to do an analysis of the device in the hope to find out what is the cause of this bad performing touch controller.

The problem was that the loading of the Favorites took way to long. You could get a cup of coffee before the were visible. Which is unacceptable.

To start of there are several thing that i found strange from the moment i had the first Polycom touch controller in my hands.
- Why it needs a NTP server? (can it not get this information from the codec?)
- Why does it need DNS server IP addresses? (what does it need to resolve?)
- Why does it need a default gateway? (the devices should be on the same subnet!)

Okee i understand if you need to resolve the FQDN for NTP then you need DNS but really, why not pull this information from the codec? Also i understand that, maybe, there are some configurations in which the devices are not in the same subnet and therefore you need a default gateway, but again why? This is just a remote control. Its not necessary for the device to go and talk with a DNS or NTP server, just talk to the codec for all information that you need to function.

While troubleshooting the slow and unresponsive touch controller i found out that the PTC device is not only connecting to a NTP server but also try's to resolve the IP address of the codec in DNS. As i do not understand the reason for this communication i decided to just leave the DNS server IP addresses in the PTC blank, however it's not allowed to leave it blank therefore i put the default value of 0.0.0.0 in both fields.

So i put the NTP server on "manual" and put the IP address of the NTP server.
The DNS server IP address field i have kept the default of 0.0.0.0 on both fields.

After configuring this i had a quicker responding touch controller and, more important, the customer accepted the response-time of the touch controller.

Polycom could you please answer the questions i have in the first part of this post as i am trying to understand why the PTC has to be configured the way you describe in your guides.

Thanks in advance,

sapol

[SteffenBaierUK]

Hello Sapol,

welcome to the Polycom Community.

It is always useful to include the currently used software version as issues experienced may already be addressed in a newer release.

This also allows yourself and others to check against current software release notes.

Not knowing what Version you have tested this against it is tricky to explain the reason behind this.

The PTC is running an Android Operating System and has the ability to update it's own software via the Web and therefore needs to be able to utilize DNS. In conjunction with a DMA / CMA / RPRM it may also require to resolve their FQDN's.

Certain actions are depening on time so it require a NTP server.

If you want to discuss this in more detail please work with a Polycom reseller to bring this to the attention of a Polycom sales engineer.

Please ensure to provide some feedback if this reply has helped you so other users can profit from your experience.

Best Regards

Steffen Baier

Polycom Global Services

[Anonymous]

Hi Steffen,

You are right i should have included the SW versions used.

The problem has been there since SW version 4.1.1 al the way through 4.1.5.

versions that had the same issues:

4.1.1

4.1.1.1

4.1.3

4.1.3.2

4.1.4

4.1.5 (this is the version that we run now)

I will discus this issue with my Polycom representative.

thank you.

sapol

[Anonymous]

Sapol,

What was the outcome of your talks with the Polycom Rep?

I am experiencing the same issues, my customer is ready to send them back.

The time it takes to control anything on the system is unbearable, and usually causes the system to freeze and requires rebooting.

Using the most up to date SW version on both Group 500 and PTC.

Any advise is appreciated.

Regards

Ash.