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Consumer Webcams With High-Quality Sensors?
xmas2003 writes "Since 2005, I've had a live webcam watching my grass grow — another is currently watching a bird nest on my front door — five babies! While I appreciate the 802.11g wireless and Pan/Tilt/Zoom (10x optical) of the five-year-old D-Link DCS-6620g, it has issues, especially image quality. I've investigated getting a new webcam, but except for high-end/security-related gear from companies such as Axis, there doesn't seem to be much improvement in the consumer space, as most offerings are just cheaper and USB-connected for tethered video conferencing, etc." So where, the reader wants to know, are the high-quality, reasonably affordable webcams? (Read on below.)
"I have an 18 Megapixel Canon 7D DSLR that shoots gorgeous 1920x1080x30p hi-def video. While I don't expect that in a consumer webcam, their recently released T2i uses the same chip and sells for $800. And heck, point-n-shoots are a couple of hundred bucks, and now many cell phones have cameras built in, so there're plenty of low-power, speedy CPUs in small packages these days to handle the signal processing. So why hasn't someone taken a sensor with good image quality, downsized to around 1024x768, and put it in a PTZ webcam package with 802.11n wireless for around $500?" Even if it's not that exact combination, what are the best options going these days for high-resolution webcams?
The Microsoft brand name attached to that instantly remove it from my personal list of considerations. They have enough money already; they don't need more from me.