The Bottom Line: Both basic and a few above basic features. The sound quality on this camera is truly the main selling point. If you make Skype calls -it's a good choice.

Introduction

Like many people my family is quite spread out across the globe and a webcam is a good way to keep in touch with people. My goals were simple:

Reasonable price, integrated microphone, easy set up, and no annoying delay in Skype conversations or echo/feedback from my PC. I just don't like wearing those silly headsets.

Let's face it - unless you shell out the big bucks you aren't going to get studio quality video from a webcam.

After going to my local computer shop, I was pointed in the direction of the Logitech equipment. The attendant informed me that, the "RightLight2" and "RightSound" technologies were in fact excellent value for the setup I described and the microphone had zero echo.

Quite excited to play with my new toy, I opened the box, and to my surprise it wasn't the cut your skin open packaging that is so loathed by all of us technophiles! Score 1 for Logitech! It seems that Logitech is quite adamant that you do not plug the camera in until told to do so - there is even a warning attached the the end of the USB cable. I suspect this is why many people are getting Windows XP errors.

Software

The software was a cinch and I plugged it in to my PC when instructed, the camera worked right away. The software is pretty low-rent, nothing special to it. Below is a breakdown of the software and the functionality:

Logitech Quickcam 10.0:

Quickcapture - Lets you capture video and photo, but unfortunately no "Youtube" mode. You can change the quality to email size (320X240), VGA (640X480), or 1.3MP (1280X960), with the latter mode being available only for photos. You can record up to 30fps.

Video Effects - Lets you create an avatar which you can use instead of your video - I only got this to work with the quick capture software and nothing else. It is kinda cool, I had a shark as my avatar, the other options include crown, goatee, pig nose, robot face, and arrow through head. This is pretty fun, and if you have kids; they will love it.

Privacy Shade- Instead of sending video, you can have a privacy shade.

Settings- Pretty straightforward, also allows you to enable/disable the face tracking mode (not entirely sure what this does). You can also configure the microphone and everything else from this section, audio settings, video settings, flicker settings, and many more.

Video Calling Options- The software seamlessly integrates itself with any software that you may already have installed - quite cool, I didn't have to do anything in Skype.

Hardware

The camera itself is quite a no hassle piece of equipment. Made from plastic - the construction is quite solid, but nothing fancy (gloss or metal). The cord is quite short and comes with a little plastic cap that we always lose behind the desk. It has a flexible base so you can place it on a CRT, LCD, Laptop or TV - and it doesn't feel cheap. I like that, when products have a nice strong feel to them. The camera is able to tilt up and down and rotate 360 degrees (cord gets in the way obviously). It has a plastic privacy shade as well to protect the nice glass lens, however it isn't attached to the camera. There is a green LED above the lens, to let you know when the camera is in use.

Calls

I tested the camera with Skype and nothing else. The video quality is okay, but you do need sufficient lighting, and the whites get pretty whitish/yellow and the darks are too dark. It's not perfect but it gets the job done. You may have to install a new light in your office area to get the best benefit, but the RightLight2 tries to compensate and adjust; sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. The camera does have a very good ability to produce strong and bright primary colours, it's just everything else that it has difficulty with.

The sound quality is excellent. I have my speakers turned all the way up, and no echo, I can also play music while listening to calls and the camera is able to eliminate the music and only send my voice. I usually sit about 2 - 3 feet away and it's perfect quality. Some of the comments which I received were "...it sounded like you were right beside me...", or "...is this your new cellphone...?". 10/10 on the sound quality.

Final thoughts

As with any piece of computer equipment, you must ask yourself if the product will satisfy your intended use. In my case, it did, and a few fun features along the way. Price was a little high, but it also comes with a 2 year warranty and Logitech has a very good no hassle system.

All in all it's a good buy. Price paid $62.99 CAD.