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This is a printable version of the article found at http://onepc.net/reviews/0015/ To print, press CTRL + P on your keyboard now. |
By Tikkler (tikkler@onepc.net) - October 14, 2000
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Meanwhile, as the prices were dropping, the features and quality of the images that these cameras were capable of producing were improved on significantly. Nowadays, a "decent" model will usually be able to produce images with megapixel-quality, bundled with a nice-sized color LCD screen so one can preview images, some plenty amount of built-in memory and the capability of adding more storage space in the form of, for example, Compact FlashCards, to store hundreds of high-quality images, and uses a USB interface to transfer data, among other model-specific features.
Unfortunately, a few hundred bucks is still quite a lot just to get a camera, especially when compared to regular 35mm cameras, and plus, not everyone needs these ultra-high resolutions and features that cost an arm and a leg to purchase.
On the other hand, we have the webcam, a fairly new device that has only been around for a few years as well, but has enabled home users, when bundled with a high-speed connection, to experience video conferencing, much like how they do it in sci-fi movies (although not quite up to snuff in terms of video quality).
These devices don't have any on-board memory to store images and video clips, so they must be plugged into a computer through, for example, a USB port, so that they send data directly to the computer, meaning that they must stay by the computer and can't be carried around. Furthermore, these devices, mainly limited by the slow 12Mbps transfer rate of the USB interface, are only able to deliver very low resolutions and frame rates such as 320x240 at only a maximum of 15 frames per second.
Because of the low functionality of these webcams, prices for these devices have remained quite low and one can easily purchase a decent one for under $100.
Now, digital cameras are a tad too expensive with too many features that most people won't use, while webcams are only capable of very low-quality image and video quality, so what if someone took the best of both worlds and combined them into a single device? Well, the D-Link DSC-350 is exactly that.
D-Link advertises this product as a 3-in-1 product. It has basic digital camera capabilities, webcam capabilities and, a little extra on the side, a very little taste of digital video camera capabilities. With a price tag of only $129 USD, the DSC-350 is supposed to take the role of all 3 of these devices.
| DSC-350 | |
| System Requirements |
Windows 98, Windows Millennium Edition, Windows 2000 Pentium 200 or Equivalent and Above 16 MB RAM 30 MB Hard Drive Space CD-ROM Drive Video Adapter that supports 24-bit (16.7 million colors) or greater color USB Port |
| Standards | USB Specification version 1.1 |
| Connector | One upstream (USB Type A) |
| Sensor | CMOS Light Sensor with 350K Pixel (1024x768 using pixel enhancing technology, 640x480, 320x240 pixels) Resolution |
| Performance |
WebCam: 30 fps @ VGA (640x480), 32 fps @ QVGA (320x240) Video Recording: 4 fps @ QVGA (320x240), 20 fps @ (160x120) |
| Lens | 340 degree manual adjustable (f-7.1mm; equal to a 46.7mm lens on a 35mm camera) |
| Shutter Speed | 1/4"~1/2000" |
| Focus Length | 4 cm ~ infinity |
| Aperture | 2.2/5.6 Automatic |
| Power Consumption | Max 1w |
| Weight (without battery) | 110g |
| Dimension | 96mm(W) x 58mm(h) x 31mm(D) |
A quick look at the specs shows that this isn't exactly the most feature-filled digital camera available. With a maximum resolution of 1024x768 at 24-bit, this camera has the capability of taking pictures at very high resolutions and with 8MB of memory inside, which is a lot when compared to a lot of the other, more expensive digital cameras such as the oh, so popular Kodak DC215, which only includes 4MB of storage, this camera has plenty of storage for pictures… but that's about all that this camera has to shine with in the digital camera portion of it. It doesn't have a color LCD screen so you can preview your pictures, it doesn't have any way of adding more memory such as a Compact Flash slot and, here's the part that really puts this product behind its competition, it doesn't have a flash! I wouldn't suspect that adding a feature as simple as a flash to this camera would've boosted the cost of this camera much, so I really don't understand the reasoning behind D-Link's decision in leaving this important feature out. I understand that this camera is supposed to be a "low-end" digital camera, but any camera these days should have a built-in flash or at least some way of adding a flash to it-the DSC-350 has neither.
On the video side, the DSC-350 is capable of up to 30 frames per second at 640x480 in real-time and can act as a webcam. This resolution and frame speed capability is the highest that I've ever seen on a webcam so it'll be interesting to see if it's capable of producing as much as it claims on paper. A very neat feature, which counts as the third feature in the "3-in-1" part of the product slogan, is the video recording. The DSC-350 can record up to 4.5 mins of video in its 8MB of memory at either a resolution of 320x240 @ 4 frames per second or at 160x120 @ 20 frames per second. This video can then be transferred to the computer and saved as AVI files. Although 4.5 mins may not seem like a lot, this could be handy when all you want to do is record short video clips on the go.
The camera connects to a PC or Macintosh through the USB interface, which is nice since USB devices are usually very easy to install and can be plugged in and out without a reboot of the computer.
First Impressions
The DSC-350 came in a plastic casing with no box, something that I've rarely seen computer components packaged in. Inside the package was the camera itself, a cradle to hold the camera in place when using it as a webcam, a user's guide, a quick-start guide, a copy of MGI's PhotoSuite III SE and VideoWave III SE, 2 x AAA batteries and some minor accessories such as a pouch to keep the camera in and a hand strap.
The first thing that I must comment on is that D-Link did a nice job in satisfying the software package. PhotoSuite III SE, a light version of MGI's PhotoSuite III line of graphics/photography software is an excellent tool for beginners to the world of digital photography that allows users to easily work with their photos. VideoWave III SE, a trimmed-down version of the $100 USD VideoWave III video editing and capturing software, is great for doing some minor editing on the videos that you create and can be used as a tool for capturing video directly from the DSC-350.
Also included in the package were both a User's Guide and a thinner Quick-Start Guide. Unfortunately, both of them were done poorly. Yes, they did explain everything that was needed to install the product and the language was easy to understand, but information was scattered all over the place and was hard to locate. For example, information on how to transfer photos from the camera to the computer is found in the User's Guide, but information on how to capture video is found in the Quick-Start Guide. Also lacking is a FAQ section that I like to see manufacturers include just in case something goes wrong during the installation process.
The camera itself was very small. It can easily fit into my shirt or pant pocket and can be taken anywhere I go. On the bottom is a hole to screw in the included cradle or to screw the camera onto any standard tripod. A rotating dial on the front of the camera allows you to manually put the camera into focus and a small LCD screen (not color, just a plain LCD screen) allows you to view how many pictures are remaining, the level of light that the camera is aiming at and which settings the camera is in.
Speaking of settings, there are a whole ton of settings that you can set this camera to:
One gripe that I found with the camera, physically, is that there's no way to cover the lens. It does not come with a built-in lens cap or even a removable one, so there's no way of protecting the lens when the camera's not in use, unless you stuff it in the very tacky-looking pouch (which, in fact, looks like a hallowed-out shoulder pad). Personally, I wouldn't carry around this camera in the pouch that's included just because of how bad it looks.
To power up the camera, I simply pressed the power button for a few seconds and the camera was ready for taking pictures in the default resolution of 640x480. This is a nice resolution, but I prefer to use the highest resolution of 1024x768 that this camera is capable of, especially since it's got 8MB of memory for plenty of image storage. So, a quick few presses of the mode button changes the mode and resolution to what I want-so far, nice and easy. To take pictures, I simply pointed the camera at an area where there's enough light (you'll know if there's enough light in the picture when the green LED beside the viewfinder lights up) and simply press down on the shutter release button to take the picture. Because of its lack of a flash, if there's not enough light in the picture, the camera will just refuse to take the picture.
Unfortunately, here's where things start to get a bit annoying. A feature of the camera is that it automatically shuts down after 1 min of inactivity. At first, this sounded like a nice feature that will save battery power, but it ended up becoming more of an annoyance than anything. After a minute of inactivity, I'd have to press and hold down the power button to turn it back on so I can take pictures again and what's more, everything resets back to its original settings! I had mentioned before that I like to take pictures at 1024x768, but the camera always defaults back to 640x480, so I have to go back and set the mode and resolution every single time I turn the camera back on. It would've been nice if D-Link had included a way to either change the time period that the camera automatically turns off or even have an option of turning off this feature altogether.
Installation
Installation of the DSC-350 into the computer was rather simple, but not as straightforward as I had originally thought. After plugging in the camera to the computer using the included USB cable, Windows automatically detected it and it asked for the driver CD that was included. After installing the driver files, I found that I was able to capture video but I still couldn't use the camera to transfer images. It was not until I put in the driver CD again and ran the installation program to install some TWAIN drivers from the autorun program on the CD that I was able to use the camera to transfer images.
The TWAIN program that was included for the DSC-350 was very easy to use. In a matter of a few seconds, I was able to preview all the images and videos that I had on the camera and transfer of the images took a very short time because of the fast USB connection.
The Digital Camera-Side
After experimenting with some different lighting and different resolutions, I found that this camera is able to put out some pretty decent images, especially when there's a plenty amount of lighting, although sometimes, the pictures tend to turn out to be a little on the blurry side. This could be mainly attributed to the manual focus that is required with this camera and the fact that I'm not a photography expert.
The camera was able to store around 140, 1024x768 images in its 8MB of memory. That's a lot of pictures considering that most 35mm films can only take 24 or 36 pictures for every roll.
Video Capture Woes
D-Link specifications stated that the DSC-350 was capable of capturing video at 640x480 @ 30 frames per second. At first, I was excited to be able to capture at such high resolutions and at such high frame rates, but, unfortunately, the camera was far from able to produce such nice video captures. After running through the included VideoWave and experimenting using a few settings, I found that it could only capture at very low resolutions (such as 320x240) at very low frame rates (I was only able to achieve 5-10 frames per second at such low resolutions). If I set the resolution or frame rate to anything higher, the program will report loads of frames being lost and the video will become very jerky.
I suspect that this is caused by the slow data transfer rate of the USB interface. 12Mbps may be a lot for data transfers such as photographic images, but it quickly becomes a bottleneck for the huge bandwidth that's required by moving images, such as captured video. I'm not doubting that the actual camera is capable of capturing at 640x480 @ 30 frames per second, but when transferring the video to the computer through USB, the speed is lost.
The DSC-350 is a nice attempt, on D-Link's part, to bring the best of both the worlds of the digital camera and the webcam. The digital camera, with its high-quality images and storage capacity and the webcam with its capability to capture video, although only at low resolutions with low frame rates, to enable some basic video production on any USB-equipped computer.
D-Link did a nice job in placing basic features of both of these worlds, with even a little on the side in the form of a digital video camera. This product can act as a basic digital camera, capable of capturing photographs at a resolution as high as 1024x768 @ 24-bit color and, with 8MB of memory, which is twice the amount that you'll find in a digital camera in its class (such as the popular Kodak DC215), you can store an lot of pictures in this tiny camera (about 140 pictures in this camera's highest resolution setting). Apart from the digital camera portion, the DSC-350 can also act as a webcam, when plugged into a computer using its USB port. Another added bonus is that this camera is capable of recording up to 4.5 mins of low-resolution digital video on the go. The included software bundle of MGI's PhotoSuite III SE and VideoWave III SE allows any user, regardless of how experienced they are with digital photography and video, to get started immediately in enjoying the capabilities of this product.
Unfortunately, though, D-Link did come up short overall in this product. The first and foremost shortcut that I think sets this product back the most is the fact that it has no flash. To take pictures, you must have either full or half-light, and if there's not enough light, you simply cannot take pictures with this camera. Although this camera can take pictures of up to 1024x768 resolution, the pictures can sometimes turn out to be blurry and unclear because of the lack of an automatic focus and the fact that D-Link resorted to a manual focus. Furthermore, although the specifications claim that the DSC-350 is capable of capturing video at 640x480 @ 30 frames per second, in real life, the camera fall short and was only able to capture a recognizable video clip at only about half that resolution and frame rate.
Overall, a great product for only $129 that tries to give you a taste of digital photography and video but truly leaves much to be desired. If I was looking for a digital camera, I would personally opt for a "mid-ranged" digital camera that's 2-3 times the cost, but for someone who's on a budget, this product will surely satisfy.
Pros
Cons
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