Cisco Headset 500 Series vs Polycom RealPresence Immersive Studio

Likelihood to Recommend

This wireless headset (562) allows me freedom from what was a more sedentary lifestyle with the wired headset. I have the freedom to get up, walk around and speak clearly and effectively without being strapped to my desk. Even with a standing desk, it is still nice to walk around my office as I am speaking sometimes. And the headset has a good range. It could always be longer but this one is really good. I can walk from my office to the break room without losing sound quality or clarity. Coffee refills are no problem with this headset. And people can clearly hear what I am saying which is nice. I hear others on conference calls who are barely understandable.

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Verified User

Manager in Information Technology

Financial Services Company, 10,001+ employees

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I find Polycom RealPresence to be useful when having one on one conversations in purpose built rooms for video conferencing. That is where the quality of the product shines. However, I dislike using Polycom Real Presence for any sort of content sharing because of the issues around resolution.If I need to share content of any kind, I prefer to use other teleconferencing solutions.

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Verified User

Engineer in Research & Development

Pharmaceuticals Company, 5001-10,000 employees

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Pros

Comfort
Audio quality
Long-distance range of signal

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Adam Eberhardt

AV Systems Engineer

MAHECEducation Management, 501-1000 employees

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Allows video conferencing with eagle eye view on the speaker
Crystal clear audio and video with zero lagging and freezing
Very fast connections to the conferences

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Michael Timms

IT Specialist

iQorTelecommunications, 10,001+ employees

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Cons

Not very comfortable
Too expensive

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Joshua Baever

Sr. Systems Administrator

T-MobileTelecommunications, 10,001+ employees

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Back end setup isn't very intuitive.
Every now and then we get a delay when conferencing and using multiple features.

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Verified User

Account Manager in Customer Service

Information Technology and Services Company, 1-10 employees

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Support Rating

Cisco Headset 500 Series 6.0

Based on 2 answers

I have not had to engage with support, but based on past interactions, I imagine they would do well.

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Adam Eberhardt

AV Systems Engineer

MAHECEducation Management, 501-1000 employees

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No score

No answers yet

No answers on this topic

Alternatives Considered

The team evaluated several other headsets using a scorecard approach. All did well but we felt like the Cisco had the best overall sound quality and battery life. The others were close competitors, but the mobile app also helped push the Cisco product over the top. Also, the company has a good relationship with Cisco so that helps with our pricing.

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Verified User

Manager in Information Technology

Financial Services Company, 10,001+ employees

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Polycom RealPresence is really only the preferred teleconferencing solution when using a purpose built room for a scheduled face to face meeting. For ad hoc video meetings, Hangouts, Skype, and Slack all provide fewer friction points for average use cases. In fact, as Google accounts are nearly ubiquitous at this point, Hangouts has almost become the de facto standard for ad hoc video conferencing amongst our users.

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Verified User

Engineer in Research & Development

Pharmaceuticals Company, 5001-10,000 employees

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Return on Investment

Overall it was too expensive to support. So the ROI just was not there.
It did do its job, it maintained the calls with great voice and speakers.

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Joshua Baever

Sr. Systems Administrator

T-MobileTelecommunications, 10,001+ employees

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Personally we have not gotten our money's worth, but this is not Polycom's fault, it is because users found it difficult to use.
As for me personally, I used it for video conferencing, but my job was to make sure that it was operational for video conferencing.
As stated earlier, even though I found it very easy to use, my users did not, and as such tended to video conference with other apps.

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Michael Timms

IT Specialist

iQorTelecommunications, 10,001+ employees

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Pricing Details

General

Free Trial

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Free/Freemium Version

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Premium Consulting/Integration Services

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Entry-level set up fee?

No

General

Free Trial

—

Free/Freemium Version

—

Premium Consulting/Integration Services

—

Entry-level set up fee?

No