DYNAMIC CHANGES COMING TO CARD READERS
of day and the meet- ings scheduled,” he describes. “Readers are adapting to the daily environment as opposed to just sit- ting there, stagnant.” Two-way com- munication also pro- vides opportunities for troubleshooting in an intelligent way, Geiszler adds. “Our readers have a two- way communication with the controller. If they go offline or are broken the controller knows about it and
Biometrics may not be a sig- nificant reader market right now for the dealer channel, but the attraction of credential-free access combined with maturing technology may make it a force in the future.
can send an alarm so someone can investigate.” Getting away from Wiegand also has the advan- tage of allowing for more installation opportuni- ties, says Gary Staley, national sales director and founding partner, RS2 Technologies, Munster, Ind. “Wiegand protocol only allowed a maximum of 500 feet from the panel to the reader. Newer proto- cols allow up to 4,000 feet.”
That and the ability to used standard CAT 5 cabling are really making things more flexible for the installer in terms of where they locate the read- ers and controllers.
FUTURE FEATURES
At the present time, a lot of these new develop- ments are in the works. Some, such as edge readers, networking and bi-directional communication are here now. Others are a year or two — or more — away. But manufacturers envision exciting devel- opments in the future for access control readers. “The reader is now going to be a networked
device,” Radicella emphasizes. “Time was where that was in question, but clearly it is happening. Whether it plugs in directly to the host or still to the panel, then the host is up for grabs. We are panel-free.”
That is a direction more and more readers are
likely to take, Adams says. “I see the communica- tion to readers maybe getting away from being hardwired to a controller altogether. Having a straight IP reader, just an Ethernet-connected read- er, used as a virtual IP link to a very intelligent controller would be pure IP. With new requirements coming up from the federal government, we really
80 October 2010
have to go to an IP reader to enable the high-speed and high-bandwidth connectivity to things like certificate authorities and controllers and the host systems themselves.” Also near-term is the logical progression of multi-tech readers to “universal” readers, Adams believes. “We are probably in the 12- to 18-month range from having these available. As readers become more powerful and universal, this will allow dealers and integrators to have only one SKU that they have to carry — one reader that sits on your shelf. Now they have to make a good guess at what group of readers end users might want, but the new trend towards universal readers will streamline that.” Further down the line, but a trend that is work- ing its way from general culture to security, is credential-free, says Steve Dentinger, director of marketing, Keyscan Inc., Whitby, Ontario, Canada. “Higher-end vehicles today allow you to push a
button to start your car. We are seeing technology present around us that doesn’t require you to hold anything in your hand per se. Biometrics is not widely accepted in the market right now, but as costs go down I see it making an impact. We have seen facial recognition employed on laptops. As soon as the price point makes it more accessible it could really impact access control as we know it. A company we work with has a pilot applica- tion where you walk up to a camera and it does a double iris scan without you putting your eyes up to a machine. If we can get to a point where you don’t have to carry a credential at all that is pretty impressive.” Whatever is coming, dealers and integrators need to prepare for it now, and one way is to choose a forward-thinking reader. Toscano likens it to the smart phone. Five years ago, no one could have predicted everything these phones can do today. And smart cards are similar, she says. “A lot of dealers and integrators today don’t need to do a lot with the smart card. They need a reader to read it and that’s all. But they know they will need to do more with it in the future. Most integrators are looking at smart card readers in terms of they don’t know what customers are going to do with it tomorrow, but they know they will want to do more. By looking for readers that read multiple technolo- gies, dealers can not only minimize inventory but start positioning smart card and multi-tech readers to their customers because it helps them prepare for the future.” ■
PHOTO COURTESY OF MATRIX SYSTEMS
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