A Zoom On/Off Switch For Sacrament, Etc.

Cutting the Zoom Meetings audio and video feed, for the sacrament, and some baby blessings, etc., has been a pain point, in that it sometimes requires a tech specialist to leave the meeting to turn it off at the A/V cabinet (in our attic entrance), right when they should be physically in the meeting, participating in sacrament worship. If nothing else, it is a distraction to their personal sacrament worship. Sometimes software mechanisms are used (multiple Zoom accounts, Chrome Remote Desktop, OBS websockets, etc.), so that the tech specialist can turn it off from within the meeting, but software updates and wifi issues make the reliability questionable from week to week, as sometimes those methods fail. The following is a picture of our Zoom On/Off Switch that was recently installed, as an alternative, at the Bishop's [controls] pedestal, in the chapel:


It was installed in the wall plate of the XLR ports so that if its existence was disagreeable, it could be removed, and a new wall plate could make it as if it never happened. A corresponding LED indicator was installed on the side of the pulpit, near the presiding authority's seat: the green light indicates that the Zoom feed is ON, and the red light indicates that the Zoom feed is OFF, as controlled by a Zoom On/Off switch:


A Zoom On/Off switch has also been installed in the A/V rack (in our attic entrance) so that the tech specialist can turn it on and off from back there (see the push button switch on the front of the following photo:


The other items in that photo are necessary to make it work. It works by having an HDMI repeater that is powered by a relay which is on a power circuit that also illuminates the LEDs of the attic and pulpit indicators, and which is controlled by the two switches (similar to two 3-way light switches in a house, which both control the same light, except that these switches can control two different colors of lights, rather than one 'on' state and one 'off' state); when the relay does not have the power circuit completed, it does not trigger & output power which ultimately goes to the HDMI repeater, and when that happens, the HDMI audio and video feed stops at the HDMI repeater, rather than entering the computer (at which point SMPTE color bars, and no audio, are all that is sent to Zoom); alternately it can be powered, and it's audio and video feed continues on into the computer, and on to Zoom participants, etc.

Generally the tech specialist would start the Zoom Meeting, and turn on the Zoom On/Off switch (so it is green), to check the audio, and the framing of the camera preset, etc., as to how they sound and look in the Zoom Meeting, and then they would turn off the Zoom On/Off switch (so it is red), but leave the Zoom Meeting on, all from the attic entrance, and then the presiding authority of the meeting, and their counselors, could turn it on when the meeting is to begin (from the back of the Bishop's [controls] pedestal in the chapel), supposing they deemed that streaming is to be authorized, and they can turn it off and on as necessary for some baby blessings, the sacrament, etc., alleviating the tech specialist from needing to miss out on being in the meeting, going into and out of the meeting, trying to control it remotely from the middle of the room over less reliable wireless methods (that change with software updates), or from needing to approach a baby blessing to see if this one should be streamed, etc.

For an overview of the tech used, see the following:


For detailed instructions on wiring and installing, and other useful notes, and how to source the items used, see: 'ZoomOnOffSwitchInstallGuide.pdf'.

This is the latest of one of many methods that our local unit, and those in our same meetinghouse, have employed, to lessen this pain point. Many of you are very tech savvy, and could improve upon such, if it would be useful to you and yours.

Best wishes!

An interesting setup. I like the user interface, but I'm concerned that there isn't really any way to be sure that Zoom is actually working. If I understand correctly, green simply means the signal is allowed to get to the Zoom PC.

I'm not sure how to correct that.

Thanks for the feedback. The indicator lights can't be on at all unless the streaming PC is on, because the IOT relay Always On outlet powers the 12V power supply that lights up those indicator lights, and the IOT relay gets its power from the slave port of the Smart Strip power strip, which has the streaming PC power adapter plugged into the Master port. To see a green or red indicator light, at all, is an assurance that the streaming PC has been powered on, and by whom? The only one who powers it on is the tech specialist, or their substitute, and they only power it on if they are to stream, so they would have logged into Zoom when turning on the streaming PC, and toggled the Zoom On/Off switch, as needed, to be able to see the image in Zoom, and frame the camera, etc., and to toggle it off, seeing the picture go out, before the presiding authority or their counselors ever touched the switch that day on the other end. If you review the circuit wiring (maybe you have), it is impossible (generally speaking) for power to go to the HDMI repeater if that indicator light is red, so the line break is basically certain, if seeing red, and the feed going into the streaming PC when green is basically certain (and we only have one capture card, so Zoom is still on board with taking what it can get from that, when it can). But if all of that isn't enough assurance, our bishopric counselor sometimes has Zoom on his phone and watches it go off and on.

If you flip a light switch on and see the light come on, and flip it off and see it go off, could you close your eyes and flip it on (feeling that indication) and trust that it turned on? Power outages happen, lightning strikes happen, software can fail, Zoom servers can go down, so the feed can at-times fail, but barring such infrequent anomalies, it works every time. And this isn't a switch certified for emergency and life saving use: most people who tune into Zoom are not who the stream is authorized for, so we care not whether they get anything out of it, while missing the primary reason we have that meeting, to partake of the sacrament of the Lord's Supper.

Your point is taken though. But if you see it on your screen, how do you know that Zoom servers sent it to each participants' screen, without seeing their screen for yourself. At some point you watch 'Dr. Strangelove: or how I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb.'

I'm not sure if any of this or that has resolved your concern however. I'm satisfied with it. As Brigham might say, we did the best we could under the circumstances.

I would add that when you see your own webcam in Zoom, on the device sending it to Zoom, that's a local feed: it hasn't gone to Zoom's servers and back (according to one of their tech support employees I conversed with), so that's no assurance that Zoom got your Webcam feed.

I've thought more about your concern, in case there was something that could be improved upon in our setup. It seems like the red indicator isn't a concern because the line break is basically certain (electrically) when the red indicator is on. It seems like your concern is the green indicator: it only indicates the PC is getting the audio and video, but not that Zoom is getting the audio and video. I thought up all kinds of ways to try to indicate that Zoom is getting the audio and video, but in the end I think the only thing that needs correction is my explanation.

In our building, you'd need a separate device to join Zoom, from the chapel, either by dial-in audio, or with full video, etc., to get some sort of indication from Zoom servers that they are getting your webcam feed (unless they have some notification on the host streaming computer, that there is a problem), because the view of your own webcam, on that computer, is local, and hasn't gone to Zoom servers and back. But most people trust that if they can see their own webcam on the device streaming it, the Zoom app has access to it and is doing its job.

The green LED doesn't indicate electrically that Zoom is getting the webcam and audio, but it is a notification to the presiding authority that the tech specialist is doing their job (the tech specialist started the streaming PC or else the red or green indicator electrically couldn't be on, and the tech specialist did so because they intend to stream, hence they started the Zoom Meeting, and tested their Zoom On/Off switch to observe what that does to the audio and video feed in the Zoom Meeting).

Would you feel comfortable starting a Zoom Meeting, seeing that the Zoom app has your webcam and audio, then leaving that room locked, going physically into the meeting, and trusting that it is still streaming? I would. All the tech specialists, and their ward clerk substitutes, do that very thing, in our meetinghouse. So the conclusion I came to was this: When that indicator is red, that HDMI repeater is literally (electrically) off, which means that the SMPTE color bars that are now being seen on Zoom are from our capture card, which means that Zoom is entirely unaware that you have even 'cut' the feed, so Zoom couldn't even send you some notification or alert that anything different has happened. Same goes for audio: Zoom is still getting its audio from a Realtek driver, except that driver isn't sending any words or background noise anymore. So because there are things in the pipeline immediately preceeding Zoom, which are still on the whole time, nothing for Zoom has changed. Seeing the Zoom Meeting from some other device, which has joined as a participant, might alleviate any concerns as to whether the Zoom app is doing its job, but if you've done that before the physical meeting started, and Zoom knows of nothing having changed as to the functioning status of the host's audio and video, there would be no necessity for checking it after each toggle of the Zoom On/Off switch at the Bishop's pedestal in the chapel, or in the attic entrance.

Brigham says the 'Mormon' motto (he seems to call it that as if with air quotes, because he doesn't really use that term except to poke at it a bit), is: "Let every man mind his own business." Correspondingly, the presiding authority may be assisted by the tech specialist in starting the stream, according to the General Handbook. This switch at the Bishop's pedestal actually accomplishes that, rather than the tech specialist doing it all, which is not assisting. So it is the business of the presiding authority to start that stream, but it isn't really their business to see that green light and presume the tech specialist didn't do their job, and assume all those duties unto themselves. If there is an indication of a problem, such as no LEDs being illuminated, when they intended to stream, then it can become the presiding authority's business to find that tech specialist, or otherwise assume the tech specialist's duties.

leftofdamascus wrote: Sat Sep 09, 2023 5:17 pm Same goes for audio: Zoom is still getting its audio from a Realtek driver, except that driver isn't sending any words or background noise anymore.

Actually, audio is coming through USB from the capture card driver, along with video. I've switched the audio source in Zoom many times and my thoughts were reverting to the other source.

Also, if anyone else seeks to implement or improve upon this, it may be that other local units in the same meetinghouse have other presiding authorities who may not want to use it, and may want their tech specialist to use the old ways, etc., to stop and start the Zoom feed for the sacrament, etc., in which case it may be helpful to know how to circumvent the Zoom On/Off switches and LEDs: you can unplug the Ethernet cable that is above the Zoom On/Off push button switch (in the A/V rack) to disconnect the LEDs and switches, and you can unplug the HDMI cable next to it and plug that into the Extron HDMI video switcher OUT port (you'll need to remove the HDMI extension cable that's already plugged in there). Doing so sends the HDMI direct into the computer capture card. Just consider putting those 3 cables back when finished, unless all the local units in the building are circumventing the Zoom On/Off switches. Best wishes!

russellhltn wrote: Thu Sep 07, 2023 8:42 pm I'm concerned that there isn't really any way to be sure that Zoom is actually working. If I understand correctly, green simply means the signal is allowed to get to the Zoom PC. I'm not sure how to correct that.

I'm not sure the following corrects that, but we haven't really had issues with this setup when used for a single local unit (ward/branch); the issue comes in when the next ward/branch might not be streaming: the Zoom On/Off switch could still be toggled to indicate that Zoom is on (green LED)(or even if it is red, it would indicate that the presiding authority could toggle it on, and that might confuse them into thinking that they are streaming when they aren't). So a protocol was instituted that a tech specialist (or substitute) would shut down the PC when finished streaming, unless the next ward/branch was on-hand (at the streaming computer) to start their own stream.

Furthermore, the PC power plan, advanced setting for multimedia, which prevents idling when playing back media [or streaming], was enabled, and a task was created and enabled in Task Scheduler that would automatically shutdown the PC if idle for 10 minutes. Once someone ends their Zoom Meeting [for all] the computer could become idle, and usually would automatically shutdown after 10 minutes (if they forgot to do so), in time for the next meeting in the meetinghouse, of a different ward/branch, to not have the Zoom LED indicator lights on when their meeting starts, unless they started up the streaming PC themselves. That backup isn't perfect because an idle state happens when keyboard and mouse usage ceases, and when resource utilization is low (perhaps 80% unused), and software updates or other things could keep resource utilization high enough to delay that automatic shutdown (though some further scheduling of updates, etc., could remedy some of that, and the automatic shutdown worked during my tests). In general though, if the streaming party shuts down the PC when finished (unless someone is there to start their own subsequent stream), it solves the problem so far as it has been possibly impactful in our meetinghouse.

Attached is an image of my auto shutdown task settings (some options are non-essental, but OS, on startup, '/S', 10 min., no wait, all seemed helpful). Also attached is our How 'ToUseZoom' instructions, which include details on using the Zoom On/Off switches, LED indicators, camera remote control usage (camera angles, creating presets, and placement), and the whys and wherefores. Also attached is a Bishop's [controls] pedestal instructions label for the counselor or whomever is at the controls in the chapel (since the General Handbook seems to want the A/V feed cut for the entire sacrament ordinance, and the breaking of bread is part of such, hence they are instructed to use the Zoom On/Off switch when the sacrament hymn starts).

If installing a separate decora wall plate, and wall plate insert, at the Bishop's [controls] pedestal in the chapel, rather than working a toggle switch into the decora wall plate of an XLR insert, as my circumstances required, and supposing you get Stake and FM Group approval to do so, you might consider using a pushbutton switch with such, instead of a toggle switch: it will be an easier install (more clearance, no custom cutting beyond the electrical box, not back-mounted), it will be quieter than switching with a toggle switch, a pedestal instructions label could be integrated into the wall plate insert for the person who operates the switch (i.e., bishopric counselor, stake presidency counselor, etc.), and that label could be integrated with the Zoom On/Off Switch label, and it will be easier to adhere that latter label because it isn't a ring shape going around a toggle switch. A decora wall plate and wall plate insert (or just a full wall plate) would likely be required since most pushbutton switches don't have threads that span long enough to fasten their nut onto the other end of the 3/4" thick wood often used for a Bishop's pedestal, but they could fasten to a wall plate insert, for example. If you change the toggle switch to a pushbutton switch, you might consider benchmarking specs or options similar to the following, which were currently available (though I haven't used them and can't vouch for them, but as options are limited, I thought to provide you with some idea of something that could work):

E-Switch PV4F2G0SS:
pushbutton switch, 22mm (fits in wall plate insert), DPDT (can be wired as the toggle switch was wired), no LEDs (trust the datasheet more than the specs and image at the link below; and no extra voltage drop), no internal resistor for LEDs, 50000 actuations lifecycle (at max electricity it can handle; it should go longer at less), IP65 (so water doesn't immediately call into question what the lifecycle should be, at minimum; ip54-67 or higher is generally sufficient), silver color (you could put a colored 'Zoom On/Off Switch' sticker on the actuator to limit the silver appearance to just the flange), 2.8mm terminal pins (requires 2.8mm female spade connector jumper cables for wiring);
https://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/E- ... RR1g%3D%3D

2.8mm Female Spade Connector Jumper Cables:
These could go directly to the CAT/Ethernet surface mount [screw terminal] box, without necessitating Wago 221 connectors to downsize the gauge to something those boxes can work with (18-22 AWG is ideal; these are 20 AWG stranded copper, tin plated).
https://a.co/d/cJzcESC

Cheers!

Just a thought. I've wanted to build exactly this but for the main pulpit mic, as it's often a hot mic.

In newer AV setups people in quieter rooms can overhear bishop's supposedly private chatter. This occurs when the AV system is on but the chapel's speakers are off. So a mom in a quiet mothers room, a mom in an empty primary room, a Relief Society president setting up in that classroom, can often just turned up their room's audio and hear it.

The issue is that the bishop's on/off turns on the chapel's sound system, but isn't the master for the AV on/off. When the AV system is already on, then the bishop's mic is hot and live when the bishop's switch is off (the AV may be on due to the gym AV speakers being used). The bishop doesn't know his mic is hot because tapping on the mic doesn't make a sound in the chapel.

The first workaround is to make sure the AV system is off, then the bishop turns on his on/off switch, turning on the chapel speakers which also triggers turning on the building AV system. But the issue now is broadcasting gets messed up because the AV system takes about a minute to boot up the camera and other equipment, and that causes problems for the first minute of a broadcast. The second workaround is to turn on the AV system via the gym, then tell bishops not to have confidential conversations on the stand. But historically they often forget.

The third workaround is a hardwired switch onto the pulpit mic. That lets them control and fixes the hot mic problem for everything.

brad_p wrote: Mon Oct 23, 2023 11:04 am In newer AV setups people in quieter rooms can overhear bishop's supposedly private chatter. This occurs when the AV system is on but the chapel's speakers are off. So a mom in a quiet mothers room, a mom in an empty primary room, a Relief Society president setting up in that classroom, can often just turned up their room's audio and hear it.

I'd report that to FM so the next time the audio contractor is in the area, they can address that. The center of the system is computerized, so it's likely just a programming oversight.

brad_p wrote: Mon Oct 23, 2023 11:04 am In newer AV setups people in quieter rooms can overhear bishop's supposedly private chatter. This occurs when the AV system is on but the chapel's speakers are off. So a mom in a quiet mothers room, a mom in an empty primary room, a Relief Society president setting up in that classroom, can often just turned up their room's audio and hear it.

The issue is that the bishop's on/off turns on the chapel's sound system, but isn't the master for the AV on/off. When the AV system is already on, then the bishop's mic is hot and live when the bishop's switch is off (the AV may be on due to the gym AV speakers being used). The bishop doesn't know his mic is hot because tapping on the mic doesn't make a sound in the chapel.

russellhltn wrote: Mon Oct 23, 2023 11:27 am I'd report that to FM so the next time the audio contractor is in the area, they can address that. The center of the system is computerized, so it's likely just a programming oversight.

Our 20 year tech upgrade for the Stake Center, which is currently ongoing, and has been for nearly a year, has the same issue, and we reported it to the FM Group, and the tech contractor came out, closed about 17 or so open tickets needing repairs, after fixing maybe one of them, and laughed about it as they passed me in the hall. Other local units kept reporting such unfixed things until the FM Group Manager asked us to not submit tickets which pertain to the tech contractors, since all tickets automatically go to EMCOR and the FM Group gets charged for all tickets sent to EMCOR, even if they aren't something EMCOR would fix. So far as I'm aware, all the remaining tickets are closed, and still unfixed. Perhaps your mileage may vary: russellhltn seems to have had success with such.

As to the issue at hand, if you have a QSC amp, you can look on the last screen on its built-in LCD and see if it says P12, and has it filled in for some input in question. We are locked out of our own A/V cabinet, and the front panel of the amp is locked out, so we can't change settings, but P12 represents if phantom power is being sent. Supposing they programmed that correctly, the question is whether they set it to receive mic-level or line-level in Q-sys Designer, which I'm not aware of a way for us to check, directly (though it's electrically connected to nothing other than an analog to digital converter, so you can't hurt it by sending it line level to check if that's better, so far as I'm aware [but I'm not assuming liability; that's just what the user manual seems to indicate]). If they programmed it to receive line-level off your mic-level pulpit mic, the signal will be so small that when they implement a compressor on the signal, it will compress the loudest parts, and add makeup gain to increase the loudness of what remains: if the dynamic range between loudest and quietest was very little, as it would be in a mic-level signal read into a line-level input, your person speaking at the pulpit is speaking barely over the noise floor (room tone, background chatter, private conversations, etc.), and when the compression and makeup gain is added, raising the loudness of all of it, what was loud and what was quiet are not that different, and both are now amplified, making background noise nearly a main attraction. We have this same issue. My guess is that if you unplug the pulpit mic XLR (along with its high pass filter XLR attachment) and plug that high pass filter end (with the mic still attached to it) into an audio mixer board input, and increase the gain, then send it out over another XLR cable to that EmTech XLR port under the pulpit, in the podium cabinet, from whence you removed the high pass filter, you might fix the problem. Increasing the gain would send the signal out much larger before it gets to the compressor, and the difference between loud stuff and quiet stuff should be further apart, before they are brought closer together by the compressor and makeup gain, rather than being close together to start and then brought closer together by the compressor and makeup gain [which would be much more also]. I saw one video ( https://youtu.be/qlfwiwyy9iM ) where it was recommended to have the voice of the person speaking (at the pulpit) to be midway between the top level (on the VU meter) and the noise floor level (whatever the level is when they aren't speaking at the pulpit), so it gives headroom for louder speaking, and for compression, but has some distance from the noise floor. If you can at least get the background noise to be much quieter than the primary noise (the person speaking, or the music), then the classrooms, and Zoom audio feed, etc., should be able to have their volume cranked up and the background noise be louder, but still comparatively faint. It might not make it impossible to hear private conversations in the chapel, but less of an issue.

If you want to go bigger than that, consider an RDL paging sound detector (TX-PSD1; it's speaker-level) in the upper [insulation] attic by a chapel speaker [nearest the conduit to the chapel A/V cabinet], triggering the pulpit mic 'on' when it detects sound, and 'off' otherwise, via their (RDL) switched mic preamp (STM-2X, kept at mic level; it prevents popping when switching by keeping phantom power 'on') at the podium cabinet, and use their 100Hz oscillator (ST-OSC2B, at an inaudibly low volume, but not off) at the podium cabinet to generate the sound that will be playing when the pulpit mic is off (which the sound detector will hear when the chapel speakers are turned on, and which the classrooms and Zoom audio source will hear when the chapel sound system is off, but it would only be electronically heard at that volume; it technically would always be on though), and convert that to mic-level via an attenuator and phantom blocker (AMS-XLRMA), and mix it with the pulpit mic (the ST-OSC2B output) via a small mic-level mixer or combiner (ST-MX2 or ST-UMX3 or STD-600) and have the output go through another AMS-XLRMA (not using attenuation, just using phantom blocking) to protect everything from the phantom power coming in from the amp. If you find that your amp is expecting to receive line-level and you can't change it, have the STM-2x actually turn up amplification, and omit the AMS-XLRMA that is just after the oscillator. Or find some similar setup with gear from some other brand(s), but that's the one of which I'm aware, which focuses on some of that stuff and is usually not crazy expensive (<$600 for all of it and the stuff to get it all together), which was a brand in our A/V rack. Lowes has 22/4 CMR wire (get maybe 150ft.) that could run from the paging sound detector to the control port of the STM-2X, and otherwise can be used for jumper wires throughout those devices.

If you want to play the 'mic-level compressor (a rarity) before the untouchable compressor' game, you can look at the RDL EZ-MCP1, but if you need line-level into that untouchable amp and its compressor, there are other options from lots of brands, the idea being that if you regulate how it is compressed, you can hand it off already tweaked as it should be, and the untouchable compressor in the DSP which you can't get programmed as you need, might not do much to it because it already fits their constraints, but if you send it in mic-level and they wanted line-level, it would be a tiny wavelength that gets lots of makeup gain and your mic-level compressor would be largely moot. At least that's my guess. I can't say what you should do, but start small, and best wishes with whatever!