Microsoft VX-6000 Webcam – a 1.3MegaPixel, Wide Angle desktop webcam which seems to be very cheap from its RRP and looks like a bargain. The numbers and stats on the side of the box look amazing, its made by a named brand (Microsoft) and claims to work well in low-light – what can possible go wrong?
Low Light and webcams
It seems that while both the human race and proper camcorders can see perfectly well in a normal lit room which is lit with a lightbuld (60Watt) – webcams on the other hand struggle so badly with this low light situation that they either do one of two things it seems:
- Lower the Frames per second to 5 as it has to increase power to get more light in.
- Keep the Frames per second high but make the image very grainy.
Microsoft Webcams seems to favour the 2nd one on that list, in a well lit office, outside or shot during the day with a lot of daylight coming into the room and the image is in fact great but the second it starts even to get remotely dark, the quality goes out of the window and there is nothing you can do short of buying spot lights to make your room brighter then the sun.
With low light and low FPS – you can sort this out by turning off the auto expose (which is then dark image) and changing the numbers until it is both semi-fluid and semi-light. With a grainy image, there is nothing you can do except get better lighting.
Price
I feel this is the most important factor in buying any device and how this purchase came along was I seen the Webcam in one store on “Sale” from the RRP of £79 ($129) to a new low of £49 ($80). I then spotted in while doing food shopping in Tesco on offer for £29 ($47) but still never crossed my mind to buy it. Finally while looking in a store which deals more in Magazines (WH Smiths) I seen it for £19 ($31) and I felt this was a bargain considering the original price of the thing.
Look & Feel
As you can see from the picture it can be used as Free-Standing or the base folds out to allow you to clip it to a TFT, I tried it on most of my collection of various shapes and sized and it sat there quite happily. It can be moved up and down as well as rotate around o get the correct picture. The base feels like rubber in fact and it is quite light but not too light so that it will fall over.
Features
As claimed, it has a 1.3MP Lens and I noticed the front can be turned which is in fact the focus ring, now I would have thought it would do this itself – this is both a blessing and a curse at the same time. A Blessing because it means you can focus the webcam on the distance you want and it will not change but a curse as it means you have to fiddle to get the right focus of the picture and of course moving the lens means you are putting your hand over it thus making it that much harder to focus.
Picture Quality
I have tested this first when I got back from the store, it was raining so slightly dark outside and the quality of the picture was grainy. Later that night with the Blinds closed and the light on – it was even worse I would say unless I pointed it so the light souce was under me. I tested this through the day and the picture as expected was much better though I had to say still some grainy looks to the picture, it only got 100% when I pointed it outside in the daylight.
Is it worth the money?
The question here is – am I happy with the end product even though I paid £19 for the thing? The answer is actually no, I have seen many cheaper webcams produce a much better picture (even if it means low FPS). This is now the 2nd Microsoft Webcam I own and the 2nd one that does very grainy pictures – my advice is to steer clear of anything made by Microsoft then if this is the best they can do. I will probably be doing some more testing and if no better by Monday then it is going back, I would rather have that money in my back pocket then a grainy webcam I would probably not use.
