Creative Live! Cam Optia

This webcam is excellent. It worked perfectly and quality is brilliant. However, it took ages setting up with all the bundled programs. Then I made the mistake of doing the online update which took another 20 minutes! I finally got it going after well over an hour.
It also works great with Skype. Smart Face Tracking is good. It follows your face over quite a wide angle. It looks very good & seems of a high quality. Only one problem, it doesn't clip very securely on top of my LCD monitor though!

not bad

i bought this webcam when for £9.97 off here and it arrived very quickly on the super saver option, the box was a bit big for wot i had ordered, but it wasn't broken

it took me minutes to work out how to connect it up and get it going

the only gripe i have is that i had to buy a headphone splitter, which now appears i didnt need to....but it was only £3.99

also the pictures are about 240x320, so they're not big

however...i am willing to bet that if u bought this like i did, u won't be displeased!

Does what is says on the tin

I thought that this was too good to be true..... and actually this is a great product. Worked first time - although you have to look really carefully in the packaging to find the driver miniCD.

The lights are more of a gimmick that of any use, but hey - for 2 quid !!!

Be aware of the focussing ring - to start with I thought that it did not work, that was just becasue the focussing ring meant the picture was soo out of focus that all you could see was white. Once I had worked that out (and taken the cap off!!!) it worked like a charm.

I take it away with me when I travel and can say hello to the family over Skype.

An ace product.

Lifecam NX-6000 - a fantastic piece of kit!

I've just taken delivery of this webcam, and am seriously impressed. I have tried various webcams in the past, and while most of them captured a reasonable image, they were all seriously below the standard one would really want. The NX-6000 isn't. It captures video at 2MP resolution, which is very high quality, and the image is clear, crisp and well coloured. The still image capture is 7.2MP (assisted by software), and might as well be taken by a proper digital camera. It is genuinely high quality.
The webcam is very easy to install; even with Windows Vista, everything installs itself and you're ready to use it with Windows Live Messenger straight away. It automatically adjusts settings to suit the light, and I couldn't fail to notice the superior quality of the image this resulted in. I turned off the main light in my room to check this feature, and the image adjusted instantly to a properly exposed version. Previous webcams, even those with auto-adjusting exposure, have failed to do this adequately.
I am seriously impressed by this piece of equipment, and would definitely recommend it to anyone who is looking to spend reasonable money (c.£45) on a webcam. You might just find one that comes close, but I seriously doubt you will find anything better for your money!

First time webcam/video calls with no problems. Very good

This is the first time I have bought a webcam, which I wanted to use to try making video calls using my laptop. I didn't want to buy the cheapest camera but didn't want to invest too much either since I'm learning how to do this stuff; so this midrange camera seemed like a good choice.

The camera is very handy and I think the image quality is good. It is tiny (about 3cm by 6cm) and comes with a small pouch so it is protected when you pack it away with your other laptop stuff. The camera has a manual focusing ring which you have to turn so the image is nice and sharp - this worked well. (The clip is good for a laptop screen but I think it would be a bit too narrow for a flat desktop monitor, for which I would recommend the Logitech QuickCam Communicate STX which we use on our home desktop PC.)


I took the precaution of ignoring the supplied CD and instead downloading the latest driver from the Logitech website. Driver download and installation was straightforward. I setup the camera using the Logitech software first (to check the camera and microphone, which worked fine), and then I downloaded Skype, set up a new account and started it up. I then made my first call and started the video. It all worked like a dream without any special intervention required. Image quality at both ends was good.

If, like me, you want to try a pretty good quality webcam without spending the earth, and you have a laptop, then I would recommend this one.

Excellent Cam

My previous web cam was a Logitech Quick Cam, and it's served me fine, but I wanted something better. I am not disappointed!

Pros:

Excellent picture quality.
Excellent audio quality reported by listeners.
Excellent low-light quality. It is even acceptable with only LCD monitor light, and no other light in the room (ok I have three monitors, but even so).
The face tracking and digital zoom are very smooth.

Cons: None really, although I can understand why some folks feel that the mounting is a little iffy on some monitors. However there is a screw mount on it, so you can buy your own clamp if you wish to.

With my previous set ups, I've always had to use a headset, to eliminate howl-round and echo at the other end. The noise cancelling mic on the camera seems to cure this, and I can use this cam with the built in mic, and my Cambridge Audio speakers, and it works fine. No howl-round here, and I asked all my listeners, and not one could hear any echo.

I don't really care less about the accompanying software, although there were options to install it, and I did. It all works as it should, but I really bought this for Skype/IM, and the odd quick snap for a web page. (I have a digital cam and DV cam for proper photos and video anyway).

I don't use MS Vista, so I can't comment on that. In fact my next project is to see how well this works on a linux box with Skype, as I'm moving my network over to this OS.

Conclusion:

This is a webcam. It's not high-end image audio or video hardware. Having said that it does an excellent job at what it's supposed to do. The best I've seen in this price range.

I recommend it without reservation.

Good value for money

It's a high quality webcam, which provides good features such as light and colour enhancement which really make the difference in poor light.
When I bought this item it was £13 which made it excellent value at the time.

Simple to Install and Stunning picture

I bought this webcam as an upgrade from my old Logitech pro 3000, mainly because I needed a webcam which would sit on top of my LCD screen, also because I believed I needed a better quality picture and sound. Needless to say I have not been disappointed.
I didn't need to uninstall my old software, I just loaded new software which took about 7mins, configured sound and picture via the wizard and that was that. I run XP home and had no problems.
It looks good and works perfectly, so not a bad piece of kit for the price! Though if you shop around it can be found a little cheaper.

"ideal for MAC OS X" is misleading

The camera installed easily (you visit the supplier's web site for the driver) and it worked well with Skype - nice clear image and its stand clips easily onto an iMac. Generous length of USB cable too.
But it does not work"out of the box" with iChat or Photo Booth. For iChat (or Photo Booth) the install instructions tell you to go to another web site and BUY an extra piece of software. It's only $5.95 extra but I think it should be included with the product to fulfil its claim"ideal for MAC OS X".
The supplier's web site also said"The microphone on this unit is not compatible with MAC"; not an issue if your Mac has a built-in microphone.

Will not work with a Vista O.S

On the box this camera is marked as"Vista Certified". However, even after downloading the latest Vista Webcam software from the Microsoft website, the installation failed because the required drivers could not be found. I have reported this to Microsoft and got back a totally useless reply"try and re-install the software"
The camera will operate with Windows XP, but with Vista it turned to be a total disaster.
I can therefor not recommend purchase of this item for use with a Vista O.S.

Can't figure it out...

I have Windows XP and I installed the VideoCap programme but when I open the file, even after plugging in the camera, it's just a blank screen. If I click"Capture" it asks me to open a file, but I have no idea what file it wants or why it needs a file opened. I can't seem to get it to do anything! Help!