W ednesday, BusinessWeek and Fortune took a look at Appleis iSight camera and iChat AV teleconferencing software, and on Thursday, Popular Mechanics did the same. The non-stop Gallery Of Apple Exposure shows no sign of stopping, however, and today itis Forbesi Arik Hesseldahl that is offering a review of Appleis iSight and iChat AV.
Mr. Hesseldahlsis look at the two products is not as glowing as most of the other reports we have passed on have been. In the review, he complains about the effect that some of the environmental conditions had on image quality, as well as some connection and quality issues he experienced with his trans-continental test conversations. From the review:
If youive ever experienced videoconferencing via computer before then youill be only marginally impressed. From our end the image of our friend broke up and became blocky and sound quality was inconsistent. When the connection was first made, the quality of the sound connection was excellent and perfectly clear. Then as the conversation would wear on it would become increasingly muffled and difficult to discern words. This was true on both ends. It may have had something to do with the fact that our friend was using the Airport hub and not a wired connection--though as yet weire not sure.
[...]
A few other frustrations: At least one end of the connection kept dropping without warning. This again may have been because of a weakness or interference with the Airport signal in San Francisco. Then after the third or fourth drop we were inexplicably unable to reestablish the link and resorted to chatting by text for the rest of our conversation.
Now, of course, this was only our first try--and under less than ideal conditions. As more people acquire the iSight and download the iChat AV software, weill be eager to give it a more thorough tryout under better lighting conditions and without the wild card of the Airport connection that may or may not have been part of the problems we had. As we said, being an iSight owner in the first few weeks of the public life of the product is a tad lonely for now.
You can read the full article at Fortuneis Web site.