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Linksys WVC200 Wireless PTZ Internet Camera with Audio
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| Linksys WVC200 Wireless PTZ Internet Camera with Audio |
| Part Number: WVC200 |
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| Reviews: 11 |
| Average Review: 5.2 / 10 |
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Reviewed by
Design: 8.0 / 10
slightly noisy when panning, but not terrible. You will know when somebody pans it though.
Image Quality: 7.0 / 10
the default image quality is pretty standard for an inexpensive CMOS tech camera. It does, however, have quite a few different settings to tweak. I purchased it knowing the picture wasn't going to be perfect.
Easy of Use: 8.0 / 10
I have to mention that I am a Director of IT, and a technical one at that. Nothing scares me any more, but for somebody that hasn't done much with networking/camera/wifi, etc it could get to be a bit to deal with. There is a setup wizard that seems to work okay. I went through that at first for the sake of the review. Truly though, if a person has any experience with networking, ethernet or wireless, there are no suprises here, except for the poor layout of the webpages. All the stuff is there, you just have to hunt some to find it.
Connectivity: 9.0 / 10
ethernet was a no-brainer, and wireless was just as easy. Put in my key, and other config, said go, away it went. The only way it could have been easier is if they allowed you to switch between wireless and wired on the fly. As it is, I pulled the plug. It likes wired over wireless if both are available.
Other Features: 8.0 / 10
This thing is PACKED with options/features. I chide it 2 points because 1) it is active X based, and they seem to check for M$ browsers. and 2, even though the options are there, the granularity of some of the settings should be expanded.
I wanted to rate it lower due to the activeX crap, but I could not. It just has too many good features packed into it. This COULD have been a 10 if they get rid of the dependancy on ActiveX or at least the dependency on M$. Firefox has an active X plugin afterall, why limit it to Microsoft? The real irony is the Linux kernel driving this thing.
Strengths
tilt/pan
digital zoom
microphone built in, and optional port for additional/better mic
wifi G
ethernet
features coming out of its ears
wall mountable
bang for buck
Weaknesses
ActiveX blech.
slightly noisy on tilt/pan
stand rather sucks, and is cheap. Camera just sits in it, no lock
interface is not as intuitive as it could be.
Summary
overall, this camera is going to do what I wanted it to. Hopefully a firmware will be available allowing it to work with firefox. I give it a 8 out of 10 overall, and will be keeping it. The limitations it has I knew of ahead of time, and nothing got in the way of it working after it was in hand. Nice to see a PTZ camera in this price range!
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