Who provides computer to broadcast Stake Conference

[KeithCunningham]

Hello, Just had a stake conference. We have 2 cameras, which end up feeding into a zoom webinar. The computer this happens on is quite slow, and in need of upgrade. I've been told that the computer needed to broadcast the meetings are not provided by the church. I find it hard to believe that the church will provide a zoom account to each unit - stake, ward, branch, have mechanisms to manage these meetings through the meeting and broadcast websites, but not provide a computer to do the actual broadcasting.

What is a reasonable expectation here? Am I getting bad information, or is the stake on our own to upgrade?

[russellhltn]

You are not getting bad information.

Adding to that, in Handbook 34.6.2.2 - Appropriate Use of Budget:

Expenses for building construction, maintenance, telephones, utilities, computers, and priesthood leader travel are paid from general Church funds according to current guidelines.

That tends to discourage units from buying computers. General IT and personal guidelines is to replace computers every 5-7 years. That's only 10-14 stake conferences.

Many members loan the use of their own equipment, but that raises questions about if it's proper to expect members to do that.

You could look at seeing if you can use a clerk computer.

It's possible the church will do something in the future, but I've heard of nothing. It's possible they're in "wait and see" mode to see what the members come up with.

[lajackson]

I use my own personal laptop to run stake conference. When the stake asked what they should do if I am not available to run the conference, I told them they should call a new Stake Technology Specialist who has his own laptop. Someone in each of the four other buildings that broadcast stake conference brings their personal laptop each six months.

During COVID-19 when our General Authority presided from Africa, I hauled the desktop computer out of the stake clerk's office to use as one of the three computers I needed to run the conference. I could do that instead of using my own laptop, I suppose, for less intense setups.

[KeithCunningham]

You are not getting bad information.

Adding to that, in Handbook 34.6.2.2 - Appropriate Use of Budget:

Expenses for building construction, maintenance, telephones, utilities, computers, and priesthood leader travel are paid from general Church funds according to current guidelines.

That tends to discourage units from buying computers. General IT and personal guidelines is to replace computers every 5-7 years. That's only 10-14 stake conferences.

Many members loan the use of their own equipment, but that raises questions about if it's proper to expect members to do that.

You could look at seeing if you can use a clerk computer.

It's possible the church will do something in the future, but I've heard of nothing. It's possible they're in "wait and see" mode to see what the members come up with.

Thank you for this information. Much appreciated.

[KeithCunningham]

I use my own personal laptop to run stake conference. When the stake asked what they should do if I am not available to run the conference, I told them they should call a new Stake Technology Specialist who has his own laptop. Someone in each of the four other buildings that broadcast stake conference brings their personal laptop each six months.

During COVID-19 when our General Authority presided from Africa, I hauled the desktop computer out of the stake clerk's office to use as one of the three computers I needed to run the conference. I could do that instead of using my own laptop, I suppose, for less intense setups.

Hmm. Thank you for sharing your experience.

[wgotzmann]

Just came across this post - while I understand and appreciate what has been stated, in our stake they have provided through some stake funds for reasonable PC's

In addition related tech items have also added to our current set up. This has occurred over time and many years.

I have also provided the use of my own equipment - laptops IPADS etc as well. again I may be lucky enough to have this available.

This obviously depends on Stake Needs - we have three remote units and long distances. So many meeting are carried out over Zoom especially since 2020

If you can present a good case for items they should be available when needed.

[Mikerowaved]

Our stake purchased a Beelink NUC-style mini-PC for webcasting and a wireless Logitech keyboard/touchpad. We just added a couple of HDMI to USB 3 adapters and mounted it to a sliding tray on the equipment rack. It's worked flawlessly for the past 3 years streaming 3 weekly sacrament meetings and stake conferences using OBS.

It can stream 4k/30, 2k/60, or 1080p/120 without breaking a sweat. The limitation is in the lesser expensive USB converters we're using. The heavy lifting of A/V encoding is done by the hardware encoder on the Intel i5-12450H. Way nice!