Zoom, Skype Technical Q&A here:

[Cool Cat]

So here is the updated conversation with Zoom technical team.

Sherry Dalida (Zoom)  Aug 3, 2021, 9:26 PDT  Hi SImon, Good day! I've consulted this with our Engineers and in our design, share sound or share sound + optimize video clip, there is no difference between those two cases so it won’t happen that share sound is ok while share sound + optimize video clip is not ok. However, if using Windows client to do share sound, the performance is indeed not as good as Mac. This isn’t what Zoom can optimize but the Windows system does.  So to improve the effect of share sound on Windows, we can suggest the following:   Upgrade the Windows 10 to Windows 11 Or, when someone is sharing sound, make all other participants muted so that the environmental noise won’t be sent to the share side which leads to a bad effect on System’s sound capture. Thanks, Sherry

 

Simon Wood Jul 30, 2021, 4:09 PDT  Hi Sherry,   It looked like the zip files of the logs did not send in my last email so here they are again.   Sorry about that   Regards   Simon   Sent from Mail for Windows 10     Attachment(s) C5B925A39C1C494D87500E02C7D48220.png C55CF29B92F54F42B363107166C423C9.png DCCFB88CF26B4C9ABA303DB0A7D0EF7F.png Zoom Logs co-host first part of meeting.zip Zoom logs host.zip

 

Sherry Dalida (Zoom)  Jul 30, 2021, 1:37 PDT  Hi SImon, Good day! I hope this email finds you well. Thank you so much for the logs. We really appreciate your cooperation. Please allow us 3-5 business days to investigate this matter. Thanks, Sherry

 

Simon Wood Jul 29, 2021, 13:31 PDT  Hello Sherry,   Please find attached the logs for our meeting this evening.   The co-host has provided a time log of sound issues for the beginning music along with his logs and I have provided my logs as host for the entire meeting.   Many thanks   Simon Wood       Sent from Mail for Windows 10     Attachment(s) AFFB4549AE674614B5811C7DB19322BD.png 2AECA52B928B47478F12D30464C4AF73.png 768E357AE1BB49CD9E8BE53F74BEB032.png Zoom sound issues time log

 

Sherry Dalida (Zoom)  Jul 27, 2021, 4:06 PDT  Hi Simon, Good day! Is it possible to try both? So our Engineers can easily determine the root cause. Thanks, Sherry

 

Simon Wood Jul 26, 2021, 16:11 PDT  Hello Sherry,   Just so I can get this straight.   I have appended the new line in the zoom.us.ini file and am ready to record the log file.    The next opportunity to reproduce the issue is Thursday evening. I will be the host on that evening. I will have to keep the meeting going for 3 hours at least though. Will this be appropriate for the recording of the log file?    The host does not hear the issues it is the participants and co-hosts that are listening to the music that hears the issues. Would it be more appropriate for myself the host to log the issue and send you the compressed log file or would it be better for one of the co-hosts that will be able to hear the issue to log the issue and send a shortened version of their logged file (Maybe 20 minutes worth)? Your advice on what you would prefer would be helpful.   Thank you so much for your help with this matter.   Kind regards   Simon   Sent from Mail for Windows 10     Attachment(s) 9FAE44CC8ABE4148B17DC532D5471F25.png 3BEC1479F6684A06978148CBB670F3EC.png 439E25EACD7248CF9E6B404F884EC5A2.png

 

Sherry Dalida (Zoom)  Jul 26, 2021, 8:39 PDT  Hi Simon, Good day! Thank you for contacting Zoom Technical Support! My name is Sherry and apologies for the inconvenience that caused you, so let me go ahead and help. For me to begin with, please record on cloud/local and reproduce the issue by following the steps below.   Exit/Quit Zoom client. Append new line enable.memlog.file=true under section [ZoomChat] in configuration file %appdata%\Zoom\data\zoom.us.ini . Relaunch Zoom client. Reproduce the issue. Exit/Quit Zoom client. Remove the configuration added in step 2. Compress folder %appdata%\Zoom\logs and send to us. Provide also the meeting ID together with the date and time. Thanks, Sherry

 

[Cool Cat]

So basically they are telling us it's a Microsoft issue and not a zoom issue and that hopefully Windows 11 will fix it. They are also saying that macs are better quality sound wise with zoom.This could explain why some are not hearing the issue at their meetings. Some brothers may be using a Mac so are not hearing the pops and crackles

Edited August 3, 2021 by Cool Cat

[On the huh]

We never had the pops and crackles until recently.  So what changed.  Still using the same laptops and devices, same settings.  The only thing that has changed is Zoom.  Either the app or the servers have changed.

[jwhess]

I was reflecting to the changing times.  18 months ago we were all amazed that a world-wide organization could even get our meetings, field service, assemblies and conventions online to us.  We were overwhelmed by the sight of our locked down spiritual family being able to show up as a box on my tablet screen every day of the week.  We helped, advised and prayed for the publishers who were not tech savvy and we (in our congregation) brought everyone to Zoom.  What a joy.

 

I live in an area with lots of rural internet connection  and only 3 towns (less than 4000 people) with modestly decent connections.  Many of the publishers are barely able to get speeds much above the old-style "dial-up" and when they make a comment it is a jerky "robot" kind of viewing.

 

So to watch the last few pages of this thread devoted to fine tuning the audio response of a couple of songs twice a week shows we have elevated our view (and criticism) of a marvelous provision of Jehovah.  I can imagine the brothers in Malawi and Mozambique gladly changing places with us and treasuring the "poor" results in their homes instead of having to listen to all of programs on a public radio broadcast.

 

Just reminiscing about expectations....💗

Edited August 4, 2021 by jwhess

[Intercore]

11 minutes ago, jwhess said:

I was reflecting to the changing times.  18 months ago we were all amazed that a world-wide organization could even get our meetings, field service, assemblies and conventions online to us.  We were overwhelmed by the sight of our locked down spiritual family being able to show up as a box on my tablet screen every day of the week.  We helped, advised and prayed for the publishers who were not tech savvy and we (in our congregation) brought everyone to Zoom.  What a joy.

 

I live in an area with lots of rural internet connection  and only 3 towns (less than 4000 people) with modestly decent connections.  Many of the publishers are barely able to get speeds much above the old-style "dial-up" and when they make a comment it is a jerky "robot" kind of viewing.

 

So to watch the last few pages of this thread devoted to fine tuning the audio response of a couple of songs twice a week shows we have elevated our view (and criticism) of a marvelous provision of Jehovah.  I can imagine the brothers in Malawi and Mozambique gladly changing places with us and treasuring the "poor" results in their homes instead of having to listen to all of programs on a public radio broadcast.

 

Just reminiscing about expectations....💗

I understand your point, brother John, bet personally I don't agree with everything...

 

Our brothers here try to do their best to make our meetings experience better. And they have tools or knowledge to do that. Is that wrong? I don't see it as criticism, more about wanting to make everything smoother and finer. Why not to try if you can do that? It helps to improve. Of course we value opportunity to have meetings on Zoom. I believe everyone love this. But technology is technology and sometimes there's need to fine tune something. This discussion and raising questions helps to do that.

 

Sorry, brother, if I misunderstood what you've said. Correct me if I was wrong. 😊

[Cool Cat]

We are looking to try to get the best experience for our brothers and sisters and produce the best for Jehovah. The possibility to fix this sound issue for our songs for perhaps thousands of Zoom accounts and congregations would of been worth it. 

 

At the conventions our brothers would be doing everything they could to fix this kind of sound issue as they would want the quality to be great for our brothers. 

 

If the problem had always been there then I would of left it but it has only been an issue since May. As this is a Technical/Zoom chat I couldn't think of a more appropriate place to discuss this.

[jwhess]

2 hours ago, Intercore said:

I understand your point, brother John, bet personally I don't agree with everything...

 

Our brothers here try to do their best to make our meetings experience better. And they have tools or knowledge to do that. Is that wrong? I don't see it as criticism, more about wanting to make everything smoother and finer. Why not to try if you can do that? It helps to improve. Of course we value opportunity to have meetings on Zoom. I believe everyone love this. But technology is technology and sometimes there's need to fine tune something. This discussion and raising questions helps to do that.

 

Sorry, brother, if I misunderstood what you've said. Correct me if I was wrong. 😊

It was just a reflection, not a criticism.  We can try to be the best we can be.

 

Multiple monitors and perfect stereo audio many not be the goal or even a possibility for some others.  God loves us all even if we don't have production studio quality electronics.  Rest easy and don't let anxiety be of our own making...💗

[AH173]

I'm sure Jehovah will bless our good efforts in taking care of the precious sheep whatever the situation. 

[More4me2do]

8 hours ago, Cool Cat said:

If the problem had always been there then I would of course have left it but it has only been an issue since May. As this is a Technical/Zoom chat I couldn't think of a more appropriate place to discuss this.

Totally agree this problem has crept in and was not with us in 2020. The Win 10 vs. Win 11 and Macs suggestion is pathetic and a deflection. I assume that Zoom has the same level of support structure that someone like Microsoft has, which means you are talking most likely yo level 1, you will not get anywhere until you talk to level 3 the guys who know the code and can dissect the problem, however it is extremely difficult to get to them. In the meantime you most likely have to even inform Zoom tech support of things and ideas that have not crossed their minds. This has always been my experience when dealing with other tech supports and eventually I gave up and found the solutions on reddit.com.

 

Case in point Paramount+ will not play back their streaming videos in a Chrome browser  on a Win 7 PC. Their Tech support had no solution and suggested ideas that made no sense, but the solution on reddit.com was easy, trick Paramount+ by sending the browser identification on a Win 7 PC as Chrome on Win 10, problem solved. That is in their code which the tech support would not know.

 

The strongest evidence for me that it is Zoom related I posted on the previous page but here is my reasoning again.

 

I used Zoom's internal player and it works in my opinion best for media playback, instant 1280 x 720 resolution at 30fps. So this eliminates any errors introduced by 3rd party playback solutions.

 

The 1st song for the meeting of July 25 to August 1 was 141 and I played the entire song 30 minutes before the meeting started with 7 connections and there was no crackling, popping or any other interference. Played the same song 30 minutes later using the same device, playback method and setup, everything identical, but this time we had 103 connections and there was crackling and interference galore. The same was true but not so pronounced for the two remaining songs 37 and 108.

 

At the time of playback the host has muted everyone and my Win 10 laptop is not connected to the Zoom audio connection just the ticked box of sharing sound and optimizing video.

 

I really appreciating you staying on top of this and I almost feel that the tech savvy personnel at the branch needs to get involved in this because it is the organization that pays for the license. Yes it is a small thing but we pay for it and Zoom charges more when over 100 connections are there which is the case for us.

Edited August 4, 2021 by More4me2do

[More4me2do]

Just encountered a new problem this morning with our organizational account. Everything is normal when logging in from a phone or tablet, however using a Windows PC I get the following message when normally I get the box for entering the password.

 

 

Tried this from three different PCs all on version 5.7.4(804) and it would only let me in if I authenticated with my Personal Zoom account ID.

 

In the security settings for the Account profile the setting:

"Only authenticated users can join meetings"

has been disabled.

 

Anyone else have experienced this change? The Zoom support page states this:

If a participant tries to join the meeting or webinar and is not logged into Zoom, or logging in with the wrong specified email domain, they will receive one of the following messages.

 

Again this is not the case for my personal Zoom ID but must have changed on organizational accounts since some of the settings are labeled as locked by admin.

Edited August 5, 2021 by More4me2do

[AH173]

I haven't seen this before. I think it's a setting that was probably checked by mistake or a default upon upgrade for organizational account. 

Edited August 5, 2021 by AH173
update

[TylerD]

42 minutes ago, More4me2do said:

Just encountered a new problem this morning with our organizational account. Everything is normal when logging in from a phone or tablet, however using a Windows PC I get the following message when normally I get the box for entering the password.

 

 

Tried this from three different PCs all on version 5.7.4(804) and it would only let me in if I authenticated with my Personal Zoom account ID.

 

In the security settings for the Account profile the setting:

"Only authenticated users can join meetings"

has been disabled.

 

Anyone else have experienced this change? The Zoom support page states this:

If a participant tries to join the meeting or webinar and is not logged into Zoom, or logging in with the wrong specified email domain, they will receive one of the following messages.

 

Again this is not the case for my personal Zoom ID but must have changed on organizational accounts since some of the settings are labeled as locked by admin.

This is strange. I couldn't replicate the same problem on my end.

 

I logged in to my congregation organization account from my iPad and started the meeting. I signed out of Zoom on my PC and joined the meeting. I did not receive that message. I was able to enter the meeting with no account logged in.

2 minutes ago, AH173 said:

I haven't seen this before. I think it's a setting that was probably checked by mistake or a default upon upgrade for organizational account. 

That's probably it. Try it again to see if that message pops up.

[TylerD]

I was just remembering that something similar happened in the past on the organization account, which most will probably recall. The waiting room option got unlocked and disabled. Later in the day, it got enabled and locked again.

[More4me2do]

After further testing this is not an organizational account in addition my own Personal Meeting Room works fine. On this congregation ministry account I scheduled a new meeting and it worked fine, however when I went back using the Personal Meeting Room I am back with the problem of wanting additional authentication.

 

Thanks for the help I am trying to sort through this problem this afternoon.

 

To summarize it is a personal account with 100 connections, fresh newly created meetings work, however just using the existing credentials of the Personal Meeting Room come up with this box. Since I have tried this with other individuals one common denominator appeared, all the ones that has difficulties also had their own personal accounts.

 

Go figure that.

[Qapla]

I have not experienced that issue

[AH173]

On 8/1/2021 at 3:59 PM, AH173 said:

With this latest update it seems that when I share a video as a host for congregation meeting, my main zoom screen disappears and only the 2nd monitor screen shows while the shared JW Library video/image is shown on my 3rd monitor. I have looked at the settings and can not see where I can get the previous setting back.

 

Oh well, I guess another update will be needed.

When going over my settings on my personal account, I noticed this image. 

 

Maybe this is source of my problem? 

 

I emailed this to my cobe to see if it's enabled or disabled. 

[More4me2do]

On 5/23/2021 at 11:03 AM, AH173 said:

I got this one on a lightning sale at $35.00. It seem that the price went up.

Also, I drape it over my chair to edit it out of the image for zoom.

Thanks for the tip on the Green Screen mine just got delivered, set it up and it will work just fine for the Pioneer meeting using JW Studio. Love it when someone else is the Guinea Pig for a techie toy

[AH173]

1 hour ago, More4me2do said:

Love it when someone else is the Guinea Pig for a techie toy

I guess I resemble that!😃

[Hope]

On 7/17/2021 at 4:10 AM, AH173 said:

Yes Bro William. They are all not computer monitors but TV monitors - less expensive than computer monitors. 

 

2 - Samsung 32" 1080p on bottom 

1 - 32" LG 1080p top left-wall mount 

1 - 32" insignia 1080p top right - wall mount 

1 - 40" insignia portrait flipped monitor on right side - (see image) modified desk mount for vertical application. 

 

I have installed a Nvidia video card that powers the 3 monitors and the usb 3.0 to hdmi adapter for the 2 insignia monitors 

 

All seems to work as planned for me. 

Wow- you are NASA mission control!  😲🤩👍🏼👍🏼

[AH173]

Thanks Uani, 

 

I resemble that too. 😃

[Qapla]

My CPU doesn't have graphics built in so I need a graphics card ... the one I have only feeds 3 monitors and they are all in use already - I would need a second video card or an update to one that has more connections to add monitors

 

One of these days I will expand

 

 

[AH173]

5 hours ago, Hope said:

Wow- you are NASA mission control!  😲🤩👍🏼👍🏼

I would say USA Space Force also, but it would compromise my neutral stand. Lol 

[➕👇 ꓤꓱꓷꓠꓵ🎵Tone]

My CPU doesn't have graphics built in..
... has more connections to add monitors...

You can use USB ports to connect monitors (up to 10 I think)

Old (Downunder) Tone

[Qapla]

8 hours ago, ➕👇 ꓤꓱꓷꓠꓵ🎵Tone said:

You can use USB ports to connect monitors (up to 10 I think)

 

Uhhh ... yes, I can connect a monitor to the PC with the USB but, without an integrated GPU in the CPU, nothing will happen.

 

Trust me on this ... I have already tried it - just on the off chance it would work

 

[AH173]

1 minute ago, Qapla said:

 

Uhhh ... yes, I can connect a monitor to the PC with the USB but, without an integrated GPU in the CPU, nothing will happen.

 

Trust me on this ... I have already tried it - just on the off chance it would work

 

So it's a processor thing or motherboard issue why my setup works? 

 

I just took a $50 gamble that it would work. I'm glad it does.