Great for basic video conferencing, but leaves much to be desired
February 20, 2017
Great for basic video conferencing, but leaves much to be desired
Score 4 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Software Version
Highfive (legacy product)
Overall Satisfaction with Dialpad Meetings (formerly UberConference)
We use Highfive company-wide for conferencing in remote offices and employees. Rather than trying to hack Skype to work with cameras mounted on our conference room screens, we can have one device to plug in, mount above the TV, and have awesome video conferencing functionality.
- Minimal initial config needed.
- Audio and video quality is good (as long as your internet connection is good).
- Desktop App is easy to use (with some caveats).
- Highfive uses a lot of bandwidth. This has been a problem for our Atlanta office, where they have a cable internet connection. Our Auburn office has no problems, but we have a 250x250M fiber connection.
- There's no option for lower resolution on slower connections.
- Moving calls from laptop to TV and vice versa can sometimes be confusing.
- No Linux app. I use Linux regularly and find it very frustrating that HighFive doesn't have an app so I'm forced to reboot into Mac OS to do HighFive calls.
- Monthly cost is high.
- Sometimes the hardware/software is glitchy and needs to be restarted.
- HighFive has made cross-location meetings much more efficient, allowing our teams to meet quickly (saving time) and enjoy relatively high quality video conferences.
- I've spent a fair amount of time troubleshooting HighFive issues like poor connection quality and failing devices.
- We would like to use HighFive for more scenarios, but it's limited capabilities make that difficult and we have had to resort to alternate solutions like Skype. That is unfortunate given the amount of money we are spending each month.
We originally selected HighFive due to its simplicity. It promised plug-and-play video conferencing without hassles. It has delivered on that promise, but has not completely replaced other solutions like Google Hangouts, Skype, and UberConference. We use all of the above technology in combination because HighFive is lacking in features. At this point, we would not phase out HighFive in favor of another product because of our need for simple video conferencing that feels like a face-to-face meeting; however, if another solution offered better capabilities with similar video/audio quality, we might consider switching in the future.