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HOLIDAY 2008
ROAD WARRIOR'S GIFT GUIDE
Video and TV
Global companies and
social chatters worldwide rely on webcams to show
their faces online. With the multitude of
webcams out there, we had trouble recommending a
particular unit. As of now, we still like
Logitech's solid build, great image quality, and
super value:
Webcam:
Logitech QuickCam Ultra Vision
It has a built-in mic and a flexible yet solid base for holding the camera at any desired position
There's a button on the side to let you take quick
snapshots
The flexible base lets you mount the web cam on your
LCD with a great amount of stability
Of the half-dozen
webcams we've looked at, the Logitech QuickCam Ultra
Vision provided us with the clearest, brightest
images, with the highest frame rates. Static
photos looked like pictures from a decent digital
camera. Although its base is a bit bulky and
has the required weight for stability, this is the
right tool for the right job. Like a few of
them, the Logitech required no drivers for it to
work on our XP-SP3 system. But installing the
latest ones certainly provided additional features
and options including the snapshot button
functionality, face tracking, and lighting
compensation. Lastly, the blue ring on the
webcam illuminates when streaming - a nice touch to
remind you to be on your best behavior!
Now for some fun.
Airports typically show their own programming such
as CNN and such. Sports bars at airports also
show good games, but crowds can be bothersome at
times. As for hotels, they may have TVs but no
HD. If you're in a big city, chances are you
are within the range of ATSC HD broadcasts.
Why not bring your own HD tuner?
TV Tuner:
AutumnWave OnAir GT
We know that there many
other USB TV tuners out there far smaller than this
one. That's absolutely true, but since this
device is something you'd probably bring far less
often, its size is forgivable. Furthermore,
the great majority of those stick-like tuners do not
have the clear-QAM tuning capabilities of the OnAir
GT, something that you might to do at home. As
for performance, its software is superb. The
remote control has its own EXE, with pre-set
commands for other applications such as SageTV and
Win MCE.
It was tested in one of
the toughest environments for any ATSC tuner -
downtown LA. About 18 miles from Mt. Wilson
where the transmitters are located, the multitude of
buildings create an inordinate amount of multipath
interference, destroying any clear analog signal
with ghosting and reflections. But with the
OnAir GT, the HD broadcast of KCAL-9's Lakers
coverage was clear, clean, and unnoticeable frame
drops. This is preferred by far, over any
crowded airport bar, or 10-year-old hotel CRT TV.
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