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Just like the 5000 series cameras before these (the “9000″ series), Logitech has built a camera that puts out superb video (this one’s video is better than the 5000 series, and those were better than the 4000 series).

However, the software, lack of control, and enormous pile of bloatware that gets installed with the camera, coupled with its enormous system resource demands, make this another clunker.

Environment:

P4 2.4 GHz processor

Windows XP Pro SP 2

DirectX 9c

USB 2.0

First, the good:

Color and picture quality are outstanding (although focus is not good – more on this below). The new support for large quasi-hi-def picture sizes produces amazing images.

Now, the bad:

Machine resources:

You better have a FAST machine. And I mean FAST, like a Core 2 Duo, or forget it. A simple 320×240 capture/preview (not even writing the video to disk) sucks down 10% more CPU on a P4 2.4 GHz machine with Windows XP Pro, than the old 4000 series cameras did.

Holy cow — a 2-way 30 fps 352×288 video conference with the older 4000 series camera would use 55% CPU on my test machine. With this camera, it’s about 80% and that’s with auto focus, auto-white-balance, auto everything turned OFF and NOT using the audio from the camera.

This is just like the 5000. And just like the 5000 series, once THIS camera’s driver has been installed, even the older 4000 Logitech camera now uses CPU like a pig (this thing overwrites DLLs that the older cameras also use).

I’ve been down this road before. The only way to make the older camera work efficiently again will be to completely uninstall this thing, and reinstall the old driver.

Support for other applications:

I only test these cameras using Amcap and Vidcap32 (the ubiquitous, standard, simple, generic Windows capture apps) and our own custom-written videoconferencing code that I wrote myself. So I have nothing to say about Skype, IM, etc.

Just like the 5000 series before this one, this camera DOES support the proper DirectX interfaces. So if Skype or some other app is freaking out on you, it is not this camera’s fault. It is Skype, or whatever app you are running. My code works just fine with it.

But… just like the 5000 series, if you install the “driver only” (to spare yourself the bloatware), half the camera’s functions will be broken.

When I installed it driver-only, it would only do about 10 fps, in any kind of light, with any picture size, no matter how I set it.

After I installed their obnoxious applications, it snapped into shape and would obey settings to do 30 fps.

Bloatware:

It installs services and several auto-startup pieces of junk that you have to hunt down in the “Run” folder in the registry and delete. Otherwise, every time you log in, you will have these things running, and the tray icon app, and two other apps, will always be running. No matter what you do, these will always restart unless you ditch them from the registry and the services control panels.

Their apps also “phone home” to Logitech periodically, registering your purchase and checking for updates. (Yes, it does, I sniffed the network traffic.) If you don’t mind Microsoft and Logitech spying on you and connecting you to machines without you even knowing it, fine. Personally, I find that behavior deplorable.

If you are a programmer (like me), you can get rid of this junk. But if not, you are stuck with this stuff hogging down your machine all the time.

Focus:

The auto focus function works, but overall, this camera’s focus is poor. Whether on auto or manual, it cannot focus well on objects that get more than about 2 feet away from the camera. They probably honed the focussing algorithm expecting you to be sitting close to the camera. That’s a reasonable assumption, but it’s too close-focussing. Even sitting at a normal distance from a PC monitor, it just cannot focus sharply on my face. It also has AWFUL focussing at the edges of the picture no matter what.

Conclusion:

Great video, but poor focus.

If you are just an ordinary user who plugs junk into their PC and doesn’t even know what CPU usage is, and you are using a hot fast Core 2 Duo processor, this camera will do a good job for you, as long as you don’t sit too far back from the camera.

If you already let Microsoft spy on you with all their automatic junk turned on all the time, then you probably won’t mind Logitech doing that to you to.

(Hope you like Windows Media Player opening ports in your home router without telling you —- didn’t know they did that, eh?)
Rating: 3 / 5

This webcam is vastly better than the MacAlly webcam I bought before I got this one. It works with Mac OS X 10.4.9 and greater without installing any software. My only wish is that it actually came with OS X software to adjust the brightness and contrast, because it really doesn’t work well in low light without some adjustment. Fortunately, I already had a piece of software that will adjust those settings. I have recommended this camera to several friends, and I haven’t heard any complaints yet.
Rating: 4 / 5

I like this camera because it is quite small, portable – it fits in the palm of your hand. As the name implies, it is intended for clipping onto laptop screens – there is no good way to get it onto a tripod like some of the desktop models. The portable factor also means a short USB cable – good for travel, not so great if you wanted to clip this thing on your flatscreen at home with a desktop. In that case, you’ll need a male-female USB extension cord. A small mesh sack rounds out the package, allowing you to store the cam safely during travel.

I am very happy to report that this camera works fine with Skype on an Intel Mac running OS X 10.5.2 – I did install the free sourceforge Mac Cam driver but that may have been unnecessary. Skype found the camera (See Preferences / Video) and the only other thing then to do is to tell Skype to use the microphone on the Camera (See Preferences / Audio) instead of a line-in microphone. Thus, even a mac mini can be turned into a conference center.

Like most web-cams, the picture quality is so-so, particularly if you are in a high-contrast environment (i.e. it’s daytime with a window behind you). The logitech software allegedly can do something about that but since this camera is not officially supported, I didn’t even bother. Instead, I opted to invest in iGlasses, a very functional and easy-to-use piece of shareware that adjusts contrast, brightness, etc. for most web-cams very, very well.

So, overall I am happy with this product. What would make it a 5-star is if Logitech abandoned its in-house software and bundled iGlasses with its Mac-centric stuff instead.
Rating: 4 / 5