Video

Review: Aver Information VC520 All-in-One USB Conference Camera System

aver-vc520-with-boxPractically everyone has a webcam. But what are your options when a fixed webcam simply isn’t good enough? For example, how to adequately service a small meeting room? What some would call a “Huddle Room.”

When Google launched their Chromebox-For-Meetings they selected the venerable Logitech HD Pro Webcam C920 as the camera. However, it wasn’t long before they rethought the offer, calling the initial offering the small room bundle (up to 8 people) and offering a large room bundle to accommodate larger spaces and crowds.

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Comcast MPEG-4 Upgrades & TiVo

We love our Tivo DVRs. We’ve had them basically since the original Series 1 was initially offered. Our current compliment is a Tivo Roamio Plus with two Tivo Mini‘s.

Tivo Roamio Plus 600px

While there have been one or two times that CableCard related matters caused problems, Comcast and Tivo mostly get along. When problems do occur solving them, which typically falls to Comcast, has proven difficult. So, when we received an official notice from Comcast labeled “Equipment Update” we got a little nervous.

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Can You See Me now? Microsoft Suffering New Windows 10 Webcam Strategy

It seems that others have now encountered the change in how Windows 10 handles webcams after the Anniversary update. Many applications simply never try to go beyond 720p30, so it wasn’t clear to me how many people would be impacted by this change.

After my initial post about this on 8/4 I dropped news of the trouble in the related support forums for OBS, vMix, and Wirecast. My thought was that people involved in the production of streaming media could possibly be impacted.

How ironic that in the two weeks since there’s been a flood of complaints about the Anniversary Update breaking webcam access in Skype. It hadn’t occurred to me that Skype, a Microsoft product(!), would also be impacted.

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Coming Soon: A Pair of New USB 3.0 Webcams

You might recall my ongoing lament about the lack of innovation in what we now laughably call webcams. If not, here’s a brief refresher…the current state of the art in consumer webcams (IMHO, the Logitech C920 & 930e, released in 2012 & 2013 respectively) are getting quite vintage. Where are the newer models that address current technological front lines, like USB 3.0, 4K resolution, VP9, HEVC, etc?

Well, there appears to be some movement in this area. Although, while interesting, it’s probably not what you expect.

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Conference Room Systems Preach Looking Good on Video

CRS web site on hdx4500My long and continuing exploration of the evolution of webcams has reliably turned up a small set of companies that are doing interesting things. Conference Room Systems is one such company. An AV reseller in Pennsylvania they seemed to recognize that A/V tech was evolving beyond its traditional boundaries. It was moving into live streaming, in applications from corporate to churches, schools and community groups.

However, a sales organization is just that. They exist to sell things. Having spent many years in such an organization it’s familiar territory for me. Sometimes they are genuinely knowledgeable, occasionally less so.

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