Good for Now... *Updated 8/25/00*
Written: Jul 01 '00 (Updated Aug 25 '00)
|
Product Rating:
|
|
|
Pros: nice netcam for the price
Cons: image quality not as good as higher priced models, doesn't do well in low light situations.
|
|
|
| cptsulu's Full Review: Creative Labs Video Blaster WebCam 3 |
Video conferencing used to be for only big corporate tycoons. But now that computers are getting faster and more capable, with fast processors and hard drives keeping up with the demands of video capture, USB buses with a pipeline big enough for video to be transferred through quickly, and broadband connections capable of sending a live video call smoothly, the average consumer is now able to enjoy this luxury.
However, the consumer will probably not get the picture quality that a corporate tycoon attains, when attempting to video conference. The Creative Labs WebCam III proves it. A an old VHS camcorder probably gets better picture quality than the WebCam III. The pictures are not as sharp as that of a motion picture presentation. However, it is more than adequate to discern what is being displayed. But living in a world with digital video (DV), DVD movies, and DLP projectors are common, it's not exactly nice to be looking at a lousy picture on a machine very capable of editing huge 45 gigabyte DV clips.
Colors are also not as rich and vibrant as you would expect from a computer capable of playing DVD movies and editing digital images. The colors are faded and washed out. The netcam is just not capable of picking up very many colors in our spectrum; or at least not able to do it well. Interestingly enough, it can pick things up beyond our spectrum. If you use your television remote and point it at it, while pressing buttons, you can see the infared signal. This is true with other infared devices too. I don't know why you would use this, but it is pretty entertaining if you're bored.
Other than that, the netcam performs well. Installation was a breeze, thanks to the USB bus. Simply plug it in, install the drivers, and you're ready to go. The netcam can capture images at up to 640x480 at a rate of 30 frames per second. This is may not seem much, but it is a very high resolution in the world of the netcam. It also automatically adjusts to the lighting situation so it gets the best picture. You can also manually calibrate each variable so you can fine tune the picture better, if you're unsatisfied with that automatic adjustment. As a note, it does not well in low light situations, whether it's on auto or you manually calibrate it.
The netcam comes bundled with the Creative Labs WebCam Control, to create video clips and take snap shots. However, the software did not encode the video in the type of compression I want. It insists on using full frames, uncompressed. No matter what type of compression I select, it will always capture in full frames, uncompressed. It also comes with Creative Labs WebCam Monitor to catch each unwanted person using your computer. One extra treat is Microsoft Internet Explorer 5. If you didn't want to downlod this browser because it was too large, now you can get it without the download.
Overall this netcam provides an exceptional price to features trade-off. Even though the first netcam for your personal computer was introduced years ago, the picture quality is acceptable for our current situation. Netcams are just now flooding into the homes. When the netcam becomes a commonplace item, technology should improve and the picture quality should match that of DV.
Recommended:
Yes
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
cptsulu
|
|
Member: Ryan Samiley
Location: University of California, Irvine
Reviews written: 33
Trusted by: 15 members
About Me:
Third year Information and Computer Science major at UCI.
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.