Squiggly Lines

[Abby London]

I'm a new technology assistant at a school on Mac with quite a few SMART boards.  

One of our teachers has been having problems with his board for the last three years.  The most pervasive is that when trying to write he gets squiggly lines because he is unable to draw or write in certain places. More recently the board cannot keep it's orientation even if it has just been reset.  We've replaced almost everything including the board and he is still having problems with it.  We are working with SMART board, but at this point it's unresolved.  

I'm wondering if anyone else had has any problems like this with their board, and if anyone can offer any suggestions or solutions.

 

Thanks

[Abby London]

Do you have an update on testing the direct line of power in?

[Theresa Pierce]

So far - our teacher has had 2 days with no crazy writing!!! I also went back in some of my emails and found this note as well - in case it helps anyone out there :)

The pointer moves erratically or gaps appear when you draw with a pen, indicating that the USB voltage
from the computer, powered USB hub or USB extender may be too low to power the interactive whiteboard..
Substitute another computer, powered USB hub or extender.

[Bob Humphrey]

We had this problem with a few boards here. The solution was to make sure the board was completely isolated from the mount (Conan mounts). We used pieces cut from a bicycle inner tube for the four places the mount contacts the board and pennies between the rubber and sharp set screws so they wouldn't pierce the rubber. We also removed the aluminum tray from the Conan mount as it was contacting screws on the back of the board along the bottom.

[Theresa Pierce]

Just wanted to give an update. Still getting wacky writing periodically. Our vendor rep was here yesterday and helped with troubleshooting and I have some addn questions to ask our vendor help desk. We do know this - computer being used has USB 2.0. It is NOT a pentium 4(or equiv) so can ONLY run Notebook 10.6 (and this version did have some "buggy" issues) We are using a Cables to Go USB extension with board - shouldn't be the issue but something to ask. I can tell you this - we have had a few of these issues in other buildings and a new computer and current 10.8 software seemed to fix it. So that may be the way we have to go with this issue! If I learn anything different - will post here!

[Abby London]

So.... I have to give a major shout out to Frank he facilitated getting an 800 series for our teacher and heis no longer losing orientation or getting the squiggle, seems to have been problems associated with the 600 series.

We are looking look on that one but need to get other boards replaced.

[Abby London]

I've got the squiggle on at least 5 boards now... only thing that fixed it was replacing the board for an 800 series

Another one of our boards is now unusable, but it started with the squiggle and then went downhill from there, random loss of orientation, the orientation would be different on different sides of the boards...anyone else have this?

[Matt Granger]

I had one mounted on an old magnetic chalkboard. After a while it built up static electricity on the back. I unmounted it, rubbed on the back to discharge the static, and remounted it. No more squiggly lines!

[Randy Tran]

Generally we recommend that when you do mount the board on a magnetic or metallic surface that you use Nylon Washers to separate the metal from the backside of the board.  

We even provide them for free on request, or just get some from your nearest hardware shop.

[Abby London]

We tried that already.  

[Obe Hostetter]

I just fixed a SMART Board that has issues because the electrical devices/fuse box were too close to the SMART Board on the other side of the wall.  Moving those electrical devices or cords fixed the issue.  In another case, I put two layers of cardboard between the SMART Board and the wall and that fixed the issues.