Canon T1i + 18-55 EF-S IS lens $599

Adorama is selling a refurbished T1i with the 18-55 EF-S lens for only $599.

These are factory refurb and come with a one year warranty from Canon just like a new retail unit. All items are included that come with a retail unit as well.

Microsoft LifeCam HD-6000 review

Earlier this spring Microsoft released their LifeCam HD-6000 hd web camera for notebook computers. After using the product for a couple of months, I’d like to share my experience with other potential purchasers.

Priced from newegg at around $50, I was fairly excited for an hd webcam at a value price. I received the camera and quickly set it up for use on my core 2 duo Dell vostro 1500 running windows 7 32 bit. Installation was a breeze, I downloaded the latest software from Microsoft and then fired up Skype.

At first I was very pleased with the image quality and colors the camera was producing, however I soon became frustrated with the cameras “autofocus” feature. The camera has a substantial depth of field, however even when in focus and little movement has been made, the camera decides to attempt to refocus too often. In refocusing the camera will hunt from one end of its focus spectrum to the other, which leads to a very blurry picture prior to focus being acquired. While video skyping with other people, they began to complain of the constant refocus the camera was performing. Often times I could not explain why the camera would decide to refocus, especially given the high level of interior lighting I was using throughout my office. So my conclusion on this issue is that a substantial drawback to this camera is the autofocus, as it really actually harms more then helps, and constantly interrupts your video conferencing. There is no apparent way to disable the autofocus either.

After about 45 minutes of use, skype began losing its connection and my image became choppy. Thats when I realized my laptop was overheating, and thus wasn’t able to perform. While part of that may be the cooling features of my computer being inadequate, I will also attribute this issue to the lack of onboard processing within the Microsoft HD-6000 webcam. The camera relies entirely on the comptuer CPU to process the video for transmission, which after any length of usage leads to much higher CPU temperatures. I then began using the HD-6000 on a desktop computer and experienced better results, given the superior heat disipation of a desktop computer. However, I think calling the HD-6000 a notebook webcam is inappropriate given that this is a problem many people would likely encounter during normal expected usage of the camera.

At the end of my two months with this camera, I’ve decided to return it to the vendor and replace it with an hd camera that has onboard processing. I also hope that Microsoft releases an update for this camera to tame the autofocus, and improve overall performance especially on notebook computers.