Reading the review, I expected better than three stars out of five to be the result. Considering that the cylindrical plastic case that comes with a (much more expensive) iSight camera doesn't hold the cable OR even the mounting bracket, I am surprised that the cable issue would play into the review so heavily.

Not having a Mic is a minor detail-- for as you said, portables have built-in mics, but so do iMacs and eMacs. And mics for other Macs are available cheaply, and are not a bad idea to have in any case.

I bought such a cam for my nephews to do iChat and iStopMotion movies, and from what's I've seen, it's a great alternative to the iSight cameras, at less than half the cost.

Four out of five stars in my book.

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toeknee wrote:
Reading the review, I expected better than three stars out of five to be the result. Considering that the cylindrical plastic case that comes with a (much more expensive) iSight camera doesn't hold the cable OR even the mounting bracket, I am surprised that the cable issue would play into the review so heavily.

Not having a Mic is a minor detail-- for as you said, portables have built-in mics, but so do iMacs and eMacs. And mics for other Macs are available cheaply, and are not a bad idea to have in any case.

I bought such a cam for my nephews to do iChat and iStopMotion movies, and from what's I've seen, it's a great alternative to the iSight cameras, at less than half the cost.

Four out of five stars in my book.

There are some advantages to the external iSight, however. It actually focuses. It has a built-in microphone and is easy to turn off.

Having said that, I will be getting one of these for my PowerBook, especially given the price!

Rats. This seemed liek a good alternative to the iSight until I read it was USB 2.0. Now I have to add the cost of a USB 2 PCI board to the price to get it to work with my G4. Great.

Bought it last week for use on my IMAC G5. Works well -- not as good quality of video as on my new MacBook, but a good picture for 59.95. Easy to setup after downloading Image plugin. Definitely recommend.

Hi there, does this cam work with skype??

I have an early MacMini, with Panther on it, I am trying to find a webcam suitable to use with Skype & PC users. Can I use iMage with a patch? I am not particularly computer savvy. Has anyone got any other suggestions re webcams to use with my computer?Thanks, newbie

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Anonymous wrote:
Bought it last week for use on my IMAC G5. Works well -- not as good quality of video as on my new MacBook, but a good picture for 59.95. Easy to setup after downloading Image plugin. Definitely recommend.

yes it does. but im not satisfied with the quality

I PURCHASED THIS CAMM AND TO SAY THE LEAST I WAS REALLY DISSAPPOINTED. THE PRICE IS OK, BEING THAT IS THE ONLY CAM OUT THERE OTHER THAN ISIGHT THAT WORKS WITH MAC, BUT I HAD TO RETURN IT BECAUSE I COULD NOT GET IT TO WORK WITH YAHOO OR AIM LIKE THEY ADVERTISE. I SPENT ABOUT AN HOUR ON THE PHONE AND ONLINE WITH THEIR TECH SUPPORT PERSON TRYING TO GET IT TO WORK WITH YAHOO AND THE GUY COULDN'T DO IT.

TRUE IT WORKED WITH ICHAT BUT I ONLY KNOW A COUPLE OF PEOPLE THAT ACTUALLY OWN A MAC OR USE ICHAT, MY PRIMARY CHAT PLATFORM IS YAHOO MESSENGER AND IT DOESN'T WORK, SO I D NOT RECOMEND THIS PRODUCT UNLESS YOU EXCLUSIVELY USE ICHAT TO CHAT.

You know that you can use Aim, Yahoo, and every other messenger THROUGH iChat right? you just have to know the correct info to program into the server settings in iChat.

so...
you can actually use that thing...

and if you don't want it, send it to me!

i can use it!

For those of you who ordered it from ecamm, do you know if there is a Canadian Distributor? It's such a hassel ordering from the states and paying duty.

Yeah i also want to know if i can use this for skype...
And how much does it costs? Do they sell it in Europe?

I have a macmini so it's just too bad they don't have a version with built-in microphone.

Anybody knows of any alternatives ?
I heard logitech offered decent mac compatibility on some cams. Can anyone recommend an affordable Logitech cam with a mic that worked successfully ?

Tks !

I can get it to come up on my screen but it won't show up anywhere that there is a webcam capability.
skype, msn messenger and other sites with cam

There are several other cams that work with Macs. I have a MacAlly ICE Cam. It's small, highly portable, and has a long flexible neck that allows me to position the cam in a variety of ways. It's got ok image quality, but nothing to write home about. It cost me less than $30 at the time (about 3 years ago). No mic, though. But no big deal, as I use a PowerBook. It works with Skype and iChatAV (with eCamm's iChatUSB plugin.)

I also have plugged my Sony Handicam in and used that as a webcam with iChat and Skype. That has EXCEPTIONAL image quality and I can use the camcorder's mic if I want.

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Anonymous wrote:
I have a macmini so it's just too bad they don't have a version with built-in microphone.

Anybody knows of any alternatives ?
I heard logitech offered decent mac compatibility on some cams. Can anyone recommend an affordable Logitech cam with a mic that worked successfully ?

Tks !

Unfortunately I don't know of any, and I can't understand with all of the various products available why there aren't more that have Mac compatibility. It's not rocket science, I don't think. It's a USB interface which most reasonably recent Macs have covered.

What's the story? This issue for me is one where the Mac user/second class citizen syndrome is particularly apparent. If someone, anyone can answer any or all of the following questions, I'd be grateful.

1. Does anybody make a quality webcam that works with the Mac?

2. If not, why not, and why can't, for instance Logitech, who has umpteen models of webcams, make at least one that works with the Mac, and says so on the box?

3. Why did Apple cancel iSight, not replace it with a newer model, and also fail to release Cinema Displays with built-in cameras?

A short list of 'These-Just-Work-On-A-Modern-Mac' UVC compliant USB 2.0 webcams for Apple Mac OS X 10.4.9+ and Leopard 10.5+ is here:
http://www.mac-compatible-web-cam.com/

Logitech models can be dicey, only the 9000 and UltraVision at the very high end are UVC for sure. Creative Labs has a few UVC choices with built-in microphone that are more affordable. Those listed are also good choices for Intel Macs running Windows Vista with BootCamp, VMware etc., since Vista has native UVC web camera support as well.

apple is attempting to make consumers by new computers with cameras installed. just one more reason to get new make 3 years from now. I'm upset they are trucking us to not allow more web came with webcam capabilities.

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Anonymous wrote:
apple is attempting to make consumers by new computers with cameras installed. just one more reason to get new make 3 years from now. I'm upset they are trucking us to not allow more web came with webcam capabilities.

I am skeptical of this, because an employee of the Apple store would never say this to a customer.

Despite what obviously biassed commentators claim, the image quality of the iMage, compared to both similarly and lower priced Logitech, Microsoft and Creative Labs webcams is significantly inferior. Color balance is inferior -- contrast is inferior -- images are very grainy in lower light levels that other cameras available for less money and with many more features perform MUCH better. I have an ten year old webcam from Logitech that outperforms the iMage, albeit it at a lower resolution. Don't waste your money.

For a specific example, the quality is massively inferior tot he built-it MacBook webcam -- and I don't mean maybe.

"Perfectly acceptable image quality". Sure, for a $20 cam maybe. VERY disappointing. Pity Ic an't attach screen shots as evidence.