3COM HomeConnect PC Digital Camera
Written: Dec 11 '99 (Updated Dec 11 '99)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: picture quality especially in low light
Cons: cost, driver problems with Netmeeting
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| rturkel1's Full Review: 3Com HomeConnect PC Digital Camera |
I purchased a 3COM HomeConnect PC camera about 3 months ago, mainly to use with Netmeeting to have video and audio contact with my daughter up North, and friends in my area.
Installation went simply, I thought! It is an USB product and comes with a CD setup from 3COM that almost seems like it was made for their previous camera. My computer is a Dell PII with windows 98.
Once installed, you find several programs installed of various utility. One of them is a demo version of Webcamera, but this is not clear in the info from 3COM or the program itself.
Once installed, I fired up Netmeeting and tried to adjust the 3COM camera's settings (brightness, contrast, etc) while running the program. It not only would not bring up the utility to do this, it also locked up my computer and failed to recognize the camera until I rebooted!!!
Snooping around the Internet led to a Netmeeting newsgroup where someone told me about a company called ViCam. It seems they make the camera which is now marketed by 3COM. They had different drivers on their website which I downloaded and installed after deleting the 3COMs drivers from my system. This solved the problem and now I can adjust all the settings while in Netmeeting. Funny thing about my problem was that 3COM could not pinpoint the problem when I called their tech support number (which was not obvious in their documentation), and they seemed to be rather uninterested in helping me. Basically, they told me this was a problem to take up with Microsoft and Netmeeting. Bad experience that I hope none of you have encountered. It was a problem with the drivers 3COM supplied me, and no newer ones were available on their less than adequate website!!!!
This aside, the camera is fine with all the attributes mentioned in the other reviews here. It works extremely well in low light, but needs adjustment in higher light situations (thus my frustration with not being able to adjust it in Netmeeting). I had a Kodak 323 webcamera for a few days prior to getting the 3COM and returned it because of the poor picture quality I was getting in my media room which has a lot of ambient outdoor light in it. The 3COM blows it away in picture quality and smoothness.
Guess I'll recheck 3COM's website and see if the are supporting the camera better now that some time has gone by.
Incidently,the lens on the camera can be removed. ViCam makes an extra lens package which fit the "3COM" version and adds wide angle and macro capability to the camera. I have not tried this package yet.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
rturkel1
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Member: Bob Turkel
Reviews written: 2
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