Nottingham Trent University (NTU)

Nottingham Trent University (NTU) is one of the largest and most respected higher education institutions in the United Kingdom, with roots dating back to 1843. With over 40,000 students and staff across five campuses, NTU combines academic excellence with a strong commitment to inclusivity, sustainability, and real-world impact. The university’s reputation for high-quality teaching and graduate employability has earned national recognition, including “University of the Year” titles and a Gold rating in the UK Teaching Excellence Framework. To support high-quality, accessible learning at scale, NTU continues to invest in a robust and future-ready lecture capture strategy.

Beginning with the new Design and Digital Arts Building, completed in 2024, and currently rolling out across campus, approximately 40 teaching spaces are now equipped with Cynap Core Pro devices, operating as dedicated capture appliances for the University’s Panopto video management platform. The Panopto Remote Recorder runs directly on Cynap Core Pro, providing a stable and purpose-built recording solution. In other teaching rooms, recordings are still made using in-room PCs. However, by introducing Cynap Core Pro into selected spaces, NTU has demonstrated a more streamlined and efficient alternative. The appliance-based approach removes the recording load from high-performance teaching PCs — and places it within a dedicated AV device.
 

Cynap Core Pro is now part of NTU’s standardised room specification. As teaching spaces are refreshed, the University is deploying Cynap Core Pro as the dedicated capture appliance across all upgraded rooms, ensuring consistency, simplified support, and a scalable long-term lecture capture strategy.

Academic staff share content through Cynap Core Pro, either wirelessly or via HDMI, with the system simultaneously handling display and capture. This ensures that everything shown on screen is recorded effortlessly, without interrupting the teaching flow. All sources in the teaching spaces are pre-switched via a simple Extron switcher before reaching Cynap Core Pro. The selected source is distributed to NTU’s AVoIP (Extron NAV) infrastructure and looped into the HDMI input of Cynap Core Pro ensuring clean and professional recordings. 

Audio is delivered via Dante. Microphones feed into an Extron DSP, with program audio routed through Dante and into Cynap Core Pro via a Dante-to-USB interface. This ensures a consistent and high-quality audio mix for recording. Importantly, NTU records presentation content and audio only -  no cameras are used. This simplifies system design, avoids privacy concerns around capturing students, and aligns with user expectations: for most academic content, students primarily need clear visuals and intelligible audio rather than a video feed of the lecturer. 

Recording control is integrated into the existing Extron touch panel interface. In addition to scheduled recordings managed through Panopto using timetable data, staff can trigger ad-hoc recordings directly from the control panel. Recording indicators on both the control interface and ceiling microphones provide clear visual confirmation when capture is active. This ensures that the system remains intuitive and transparent for teaching staff, without introducing additional operational complexity. 

A key advantage of the deployment is remote management via vSolution Link Pro. Through Link Pro, NTU’s AV team can centrally monitor devices, manage configurations, and streamline support across multiple rooms. This reduces maintenance overhead and supports a consistent operational framework as the deployment expands. 

By shifting lecture capture to a reliable appliance platform, NTU is improving system efficiency while preparing for long-term standardisation. As room refresh cycles continue, Cynap Core Pro is expected to play an increasingly central role in the University’s AV ecosystem. The result is a practical, scalable lecture capture solution that integrates seamlessly with Panopto, reduces system strain, and positions Nottingham Trent University for continued growth in digital learning delivery.