Skype and Logitech have teamed up to offer high quality videoconferencing. Skype 3.6 will be required and will increase the resolution from 320 x 240 to 640 x 480 (VGA). High Quality Video will also require Logitech QuickCam software, version 11.5. It will support up to 30 frames per second (fps) to people using a broadband connection. 384 kbps connection or higher is required and a PC with a dual-core processor to do the heavy processing of the video stream.High Quality Video on Skype is available with the following premium Logitech webcams: the Logitech QuickCam Pro 9000, the Logitech QuickCam Pro for Notebooks and the Logitech QuickCam® Orbit AF (Logitech® QuickCam® Sphere AF in Europe).
According to the release, all three High Quality Video-certified webcams offer a Carl Zeiss lens and a very cool autofocus. Logitech’s autofocus system refocuses images in less than three seconds and helps ensure that images remain crisp even in extreme close-ups (up to 4 inches/10 cm from the camera lens).
For the office and the home, the Logitech QuickCam Pro 9000 comes with a flexible universal base, which allows it to rest comfortably on nearly any monitor. For the on-the-go professional, the Logitech QuickCam Pro for Notebooks is sold with a protective travel case and an adjustable, spring-tension clip that accommodates even large laptops with panels up to 20 mm thick. The QuickCam Orbit AF webcam can cover 190 horizontal degrees and 100 vertical degrees of a room and offers a unique pan-and-tilt tracking technology.
So can Skype crack the high-end videoconferencing market? Should Microsoft Roundtable be worried or Polycom with their dedicated videoconferencing hardware? I'm not holding my breath. I still think hardware videoconferencing solutions are the way to go for businesses. Maybe SMBs that can't afford high-end video hardware might use Skype.
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Why the unnecessary restriction?
In the Skype 3.6 beta releases, it was possible to manually activate the higher resolution video with cameras other than the three Logitech cameras mentioned in this article. It was proven in the Skype User Forums that a variety of other webcams were capable of 640x480 resolution video, both from Logitech and from other manufacturers. With the 3.6 production release, this manual activation capability has been removed, so only users with one of the three specific Logitech cameras will be able to benefit from higher resolution video. It is surprising that Skype has decided to relegate the majority of their existing users who own webcams to "second class status", apparently only because of a marketing agreement with Logitech. If the Skype/Logitech "High Quality Video" is truly superior, as they say, then why not let it stand on its own merits, and allow users with other webcams to benefit from the improved resolution? One would think that this would encourage more webcam owners to start using Skype for video calls, and probably encourage more users to buy the "better" Logitech cameras, when they see how good High Quality Video can be.
You bring up a good point about the fact that Skype is restricting other high resolution cameras.
Have you tried this Mac workaround which in theory should also work on the PC?
Just go to Application Data instead of the Mac folder listed below, since I see on my PC that I have a config.xml file. You may have to change the [device] name as well to your camera model.
How to enable High-quality video calls: (note: you have to replace brackets with < and > since MT filters out HTML tags
Quit Skype, navigate to "~/Library/Application Support/Skype/yourskypename/", i.e go to your home folder, and then the Library folder in it, and then Application Support in Library etc. Find the file called config.xml. Open the file and find the [Video] block that is itself inside the [Lib] block. The [Video] block probably looks as follows.
[Video]
[Device]Built-in iSight[/Device]
[/Video]
Now, edit this [Video] block, adding capture height and width settings. The block should now look like this.
[Video]
[CaptureWidth]640[/CaptureWidth]
[CaptureHeight]480[/CaptureHeight]
[Device]Built-in iSight[/Device]
[/Video]
Now if Skype is blocking this patch in favor of Logitech, then that is indeed a good story. Might have to blog about that.
This crazy modern world (la digital vida loca) gives us lots of ways to get together, without boarding an airplane from
fancy video conferencing, to free conference calling and Skype, it's all good.