Whether you want to chat with friends or send video greetings, a webcam is what you need to quickly turn your computer into a video telephone.
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There’s a huge variety to choose from, so when it comes time to buy the one that’s right for you, it’s best not to get distracted by numbers games. It’s easy to get lost in advertising copy about eight megapixels, or transmission rates of 90 images a second.
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It’s mainly massaging numbers, says Nam Kha Pham, a webcam expert with the German computer magazine PC Praxis.
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Thus, any search should focus on picture and sound quality.
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Robert Globisch of German online merchant computeruniverse.net agrees, noting that webcams now tout their megapixels the way makers of digital cameras once did without actually stating that this has any relation to image quality.
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Extremely high megapixel counts only really matter with still photography. It’s seldom that these high resolutions are realized when chatting via the net.
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Most chat programs reach their limits with a resolution of 640 by 480 pixels, or 0.3 megapixels, says Nam Kha Pham. And only a very few households have a fast enough connection to allow full-image high-definition telephony.
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In a best-case scenario, truly high rates are possible with a display the size of an average mobile phone screen.
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But those rates aren’t even necessary. Twenty to 30 images per second are enough to make for streaming video telephony, says Nam Kha Phan. Even older computers and netbooks should be able to handle that. Thus, customers needn’t bother with cameras advertising 1.3 to 2 megapixels.
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Picture and sound quality are what count. So does ease of use. It’s no longer necessary to spend a lot of money for a decent webcam. Household names like Logitech, Microsoft and Philips offer starter models.
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You can get a light-intensive camera with good sound for 20 to…