As a rule, I only recommend devices or services that I have actually used. Today I see that Amazon is offering nice deals on two Logitech products that I’ve been using for a long time.Logitech C920 WebcamAs you may know,…
Until recently I did not know that this was possible, but people are hacking the venerable Logitech C920 and C930e webcams. The hardware hacks allow them to be used with a diverse range of high-quality, low-cost, CS lenses.
What started as a series of hacks by Saulius Lukse in Vilnius, Lithuania has turned into a small enterprise. At his Kurokesu site he now sells various things related to his adventures in optics. That includes machined metal cases to refit the internals of the C920/C930e. 
Remember the 1988 movie “Twins” with Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny DaVito? This is a bit like that.
The past few weeks have seen the introduction of a two new webcams. From a distance these two items seem in some ways very similar. Looking closer, there are also some significant differences.
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.
As more and more people make use of video, whether via Blab, Blue Jeans, Hangout, Skype or Zoom, webcams have been continually increasing in importance. Yet the competitive landscape for webcams has been relatively unchanged in recent years. However, there has recently been some movement that sleepiest corner of technology as Logitech this week announced the Logitech C925e Webcam.
The family of Logitech webcams can be confusing. Logitech’s own web site and marketing language make it difficult to differentiate the various models. Given my rambling exploration of webcams I have a handful of them hereabouts, which leaves me potentially well-positioned to help explain where the C925e fits.
Yes, I want a new webcam! The idiocy of that statement doesn’t become apparent unless you’re familiar with my home office, which is littered with various webcams. They have become something of an obsession. Yet, none of them does quite what I’d like.
My reference for a simple USB attached webcam is the venerable Logitech HD Pro C920. One sits, a near permanent fixture, atop my left-side monitor. It’s a solid product. It’s affordable. Makes great video under various lighting conditions. It can deliver MJPEG or H.264 encoded streams, which makes it capable of 1080p when used with suitable software.