Hello… I think this is the best way to try to find out a camera with great quality that works nicely in my linux box 
Best Regards
Alex
On Tue, 15 Jun 2010 20:36:01 +0000, alaios wrote:
> Hello… I think this is the best way to try to find out a camera with
> great quality that works nicely in my linux box
When you say “video camera”, do you mean “web cam” or “digital camcorder”?
If you mean the former, I have a Flip camera that works very well with
Linux - it presents as a storage device. I assume the newer HD versions
would work as well.
If you mean “webcam”, I can tell you the QuickCam Pro (Dark focus ring)
doesn’t work well. I have one and gave up (there was an experimental
driver being written through reverse-engineering with the 2.4 series
kernels) because the driver support wasn’t there and the CCD manufacturer
wouldn’t share the specs so a driver could be written.
I’ve just ordered a Logitech QC Chat (should be here in about a week)
that is supposed to be well supported; I guess I’ll find out when it gets
here. It was only $15, so if it doesn’t work, I’ll give it to my
stepson.
Jim
Jim Henderson
openSUSE Forums Administrator
If you mean video camera (and not webcam) then I use an Canon HF S10 . That is not a webcam. 
I only use Linux with the videos from that video camera.
Sorry for the inconvenience caused! I mean web camera… I would like to buy a web camera with nice quality to use in my linux box. It is not so easy to track what is supported in linux (perhaps not so many people use web cams).
Hi Alex,
I have lately installed a Logitech QuickCam E 2500 on 11.2.
I had to install one extra driver and am not completely satisfied with
the adaptation of dark or bright faces but it seems to work and I have no comparison.
I am stupid enough to be a reference for an easy installation. As far as I remember I did it an an easier way than described in How to install logitech Quickcam E2500 - openSUSE Forums - I think you have only to download and install an extra driver via Yast>Software Manager nowadays and configure the web cam with your chat program nowadays.
Make sure you could give your webcam back if it does not satisfy you under linux/openSUSE.
Good luck
pistazienfresser
Thanks for the feedback ! I think that it is easy to notice that the web camera support is linux is perhaps one of the last things that need to be improved
I have a Microsoft LifeCam NV-6000 which is a hit-or-miss with most Linux distributions. I would recommend avoiding it at this point.
I won it in a raffle, which is why I have it.
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41S1HZCSX1L.SS400.jpg](http://www.amazon.com/Microsoft-94N-00001-LifeCam-NX-6000-Webcam/dp/B000GOUE7Y/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1276695334&sr=8-4)
Thanks for the feedback. So do you mean with the hit-or-miss that might work somehow in some distros?
I had it work in one version of Ubuntu, followed by not working unless I modified the command line that ran, followed by not working and now it works. The last two “statuses” is in part, I believe, due to the Intel 855 GPU issue between the Intel graphics and the kernel (which is effecting multiple distributions).
Meanwhile, in Fedora 13 it worked, and now it doesn’t (possibly related to the same Intel issues and an update)
Also, I have been able to run it in Cheese, but Skype would not detect it, or could not stream the video.
That’s why I call it hit-or-miss, because sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.
Kopete hasn’t like this webcam at all, and usually locks up the program when I try to get it to work. I don’t remember trying it with Kopete in 11.2 or 11.3 Mn yet so it may have improved, or not.
Thanks!
Cheers
On Wed, 16 Jun 2010 06:26:01 +0000, alaios wrote:
> Sorry for the inconvenience caused! I mean web camera… I would like to
> buy a web camera with nice quality to use in my linux box. It is not so
> easy to track what is supported in linux (perhaps not so many people use
> web cams).
Not a problem. When you say “nice quality”, what are your parameters?
The one I ordered is 640x480 IIRC - which for my uses is good enough, but
maybe isn’t “nice” enough for what you need.
Jim
–
Jim Henderson
openSUSE Forums Administrator
Good timing for this thread as I’m just starting at look getting a webcam. It’s best to get one that complies with the UVC specification. Have you looked at the HCL for webcams?
I think I’m going to go for a Logitech as there is a comprehensive document which lists all their webcams that are UVC compliant and so should work in Linux. Click the link to Logitech UVC device list.
I don’t know how much you want to spend but here are a couple that specifically mention supporting Linux.
Logitech B500
Logitech Quickcam 3000
Saying the best or most reliable way would be to buy a web-cam that someone recommends as working well with Linux.
May I mention the linux sub-fora in the forum http://forums.quickcamteam.net for cameras of that brand?
If you realy want a hight solution (money, hardware, net ?) his looks also cool to me:
B905 2MP Portable Webcam (with UVC driver, article number 960-000565).
Are there any other brands with a (good) linux support?
Good luck
pistazienfresser
On Thu, 17 Jun 2010 09:26:01 +0000, suse tpx60s wrote:
> Good timing for this thread as I’m just starting at look getting a
> webcam. It’s best to get one that complies with the UVC specification.
> Have you looked at the ‘HCL for webcams’
> (http://en.opensuse.org/HCL/Web_Cameras)?
>
> I think I’m going to go for a Logitech as there is a ‘comprehensive
> document’ (http://www.quickcamteam.net/devices) which lists all their
> webcams that are UVC compliant and so should work in Linux. Click the
> link to Logitech UVC device list.
>
> I don’t know how much you want to spend but here are a couple that
> specifically mention supporting Linux. ‘Logitech B500’
> (http://tinyurl.com/2cu55yt) ‘Logitech Quickcam 3000’
> (http://tinyurl.com/2ab9yjw)
>
> Saying the best or most reliable way would be to buy a web-cam that
> someone recommends as working well with Linux.
The QC Chat arrived here yesterday; the CCD is not 640x480 - that’s
achieved through software. The CCD itself is only 352x288.
It works OK, but there are some tricks to getting certain apps to work
(like skype) using LD_PRELOAD, but in general, it seems to work OK based
on my ~20 minutes of testing yesterday.
Jim
–
Jim Henderson
openSUSE Forums Administrator
Microsoft Lifecam Cinema seems to be working fine! Nice camera with great quality. Check online
lol!Great! I am happy for you! The solution for video is really HD 720P?!lol!
:‘(My birthday is so far away:’(!
Just some (about 2,5) questions:
- Do you refer to :
- ASIN:
B00359F1G6 - Item model number:
H5D-00009
or
- ASIN:
B002I3IRY8 - Item model number:
H5D-00003
(Do not know if its only a regional difference.)
a) How easy was the setup?
b) Did you need any additional software for openSUSE (driver etc.)?
Greetings pistazienfresser
Well I am not sure… you can check here that there is one guy that made it work under linux
Microsoft LifeCam Cinema unter Ubuntu | Linux und Ich
Also the device is in the uvc database so 90% will work
Best Regards
Alex
Is there much difference in image quality say between a £20 and a £50 camera? It just doesn’t feel right spending £50 on a web cam for some reason.
I can report about the following webcam:
046d:0991 Logitech, Inc. QuickCam Pro for Notebooks
Works with openSUSE >= 11.1 and v4l2 (fswebcam, guvcview, uvcdynctl). The only thing which does not work is the manual focus adjustment (not yet supported under v4l2; some other widely used OS supports it with the software provided by Logitech).
The image sharpness decreases towards the edges, not quite what I would expect from a Carl Zeiss lens, but other cams are still worse.
My experience: you get what you pay for.
Microsoft Lifecam came yesterday. It is really nicely supported
Greate Camera. Excellent quality!
I just plugged in and it was recognized (11.2) ! I launched cheese I could see all the resolutions working great!
It also works in kopete, and skype.
There is a small problem in Skype I couldnt see my web camera when I was clicking the Test Button but this is a skype-linux-version problem. The other side was seeing my in a nice 640480 quality@30FPS (and not 15 fps which is the default). Just to mention here that 640480 video quality consumed around 1Mbit 
thus sometimes might be the case that you can not get better quality due to bandwidth upload limits.
This a a great camera! The auto focus is great which sends always nice and sharp pictures whatever the resolution is. To sum it up what is important in a web camera is if can focus correctly on you (that’s reduce bluriness), how good its lenses are and how sensitive might be in low light settings.
Best Regards
Alex