| Mar 26, 2007 @ 11:42 PM |
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travelnfrog
Posts: 572
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Okay, after trying three different cams, I finally found one that seems to work (and doesn't hang my PC). I did have to go backwards to Yahoo! Messenger 6 though.
Anyway, the video is slow...my speech is way ahead of the video. Wondering what I can do to help. I have moved it to a 2.0 USB port and that made no difference. I've used the smallest resolution and that made no difference. I've closed all other running programs except firewall & virus software and that made no difference.
The laptop is a Toshiba Satellite A75-S231, 2 yrs old, Penium 4, 3.33GHz with 1GB of memory (although control panel says 986MB), typically runs between 300-400MB available. I'm on WinXP SP2.
The webcam is a Logitech QuickCam Communicate STX and my system well exceeds the listed minimum requirements.
So...any thoughts? I'd love to make some videos for my grandkids but can't (well, maybe they'd think they were funny....but I don't!)
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| Mar 27, 2007 @ 1:41 PM |
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andyman35
Posts: 11
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You haven't mentioned your internet speed,since this will have a lot of bearing upon performance.Your hardware is perfectly adequate for the job and you have plenty of available RAM (the missing RAM is used for the system graphics btw).
If you're using a dial up connection then you can expect poor performance.If you're on broadband through a network then other pcs on the network might be hogging the bandwidth.
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| Mar 27, 2007 @ 2:43 PM |
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travelnfrog
Posts: 572
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This is just viewing myself on the cam without doing anything else with it. I plan to eventually send the video in an email.
That said, I'm on DSL but don't think that is my issue since I'm not trying to broadcast anything.
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| Mar 27, 2007 @ 3:06 PM |
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andyman35
Posts: 11
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I'm with you now,ok do you have any problem with playing video files in general?Are you using the video drivers off the support cd or just the generic Windows ones?
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| Mar 27, 2007 @ 3:12 PM |
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travelnfrog
Posts: 572
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I've never had any problems with video (well, other than it taking over my entire screen when I'm running a monitor attached to my laptop). Never any speed issues at all.
As to drivers...where would I look? That's one gray area for me...I'm more an application software person than a hardware person. 
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| Mar 27, 2007 @ 7:58 PM |
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andyman35
Posts: 11
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The link for the product support is here:
http://www.csd.toshiba.com/cgi-bin/tais/su/su_sc_modSel.jsp
I believe that model utilises the Mobile Radeon gpu,if you're running it on the generic Windows driver it's quite like to reduce performance.
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| Mar 27, 2007 @ 8:52 PM |
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travelnfrog
Posts: 572
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Hmmm, I have ATI MOBILITY RADEON 9000 IGP and the most recent driver on there is from 2004, a good year before I bought mine. I also did a google search and the ATI site no longer even lists the driver I need. Not looking good....but I am in the process of downloading it just in case it's what I need.
Scares the heck of me that I might totally screw things up and end up with a non-working screen. GULPP!
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| Mar 27, 2007 @ 9:18 PM |
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travelnfrog
Posts: 572
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Okay, I downloaded and installed the drivers from the Toshiba site. Nothing changed...I suspect it's the same as I already had.
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| Mar 27, 2007 @ 9:21 PM |
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sealacamp
Posts: 3,151
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If you plan to send the video you need to monitor how long of a video you make. They can get really large really fast and you won't be able to send it because it is too big. I have found that about 45 seconds is the max time for recording and that is about 6MB or more depending on equipment. I have been trying to find some compression software to be able to shrink the file size but nothing so far. I have not been able to make a very long video yet and send it through the internet.
S
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| Mar 27, 2007 @ 9:38 PM |
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travelnfrog
Posts: 572
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Thanks....I'll keep that in mind if I can ever manage to get one recorded with the video in synch with the audio (rather than 1 sec behind - kinda like watching the old time satellite transmissions - LOL!)
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| Mar 27, 2007 @ 9:58 PM |
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andyman35
Posts: 11
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I think this link may help solve your problem!
http://www.seriousmagic.com/msgboard/viewtopic.php?pid=221816
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| Mar 31, 2007 @ 7:19 PM |
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waterfire
Posts: 2,921
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Your system should handle any webcam unless
1 speed of your hard rive is too slow
2 your capture (video) settings are to high
3 your system performance (ie CPU) is throttled back and not kicking in .
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| Mar 31, 2007 @ 7:56 PM |
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travelnfrog
Posts: 572
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Well, I found how to set #2 - it was at full so I moved it back to midway. Slowed the video slightly (makes it more jerky) but no change in the synch with audio (audio still way ahead of video).
I've run it with almost 50% free RAM and no change. I've downloaded all the drivers I could find and no change. I just suspect that it's something with the PC and I will have to settle for it the way it is until I eventually upgrade.
Sigh....thanks for your help, everyone!
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| Mar 31, 2007 @ 8:21 PM |
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waterfire
Posts: 2,921
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Sorry for not being clear, I meant make sure it is full throttle, video crunching is resource hungry.
You might want to try some third party software, I recently had to do as much because video and audio was out of sync with this one movie I downloaded.
You might see if there is a Toshiba or web cam ( your brand) forum hanging out on the web.
Oh, when you figure it out please post your solution 
[Edited on 3/31/2007 8:29 PM]
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| Mar 31, 2007 @ 8:58 PM |
Webcam Video Speed
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travelnfrog
Posts: 572
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I actually solved another problem by reducing the setting (that's IF we are talking the same one). I've avoided opening movie clips since when my laptop is attached to my monitor, the movies always took over my entire monitor and I'd have to open my laptop to get to the actual movie window to close it when done. Now it runs inside application. LOL!
I've checked out Toshiba and Logitech's forums to no avail...there seems to be no reason it shouldn't run better on my computer. I've tried 4 different software packages besides QuickCam. One of them allowed me to set the frames at 30 (max allowed). made no difference.
I tried and returned two previous cams - one Philips and one Logitech. Both froze up on me. That's part of the reason I suspect it's something hidden in my settings, drivers, firmware, hardware, O/S....whatever! LOL!!
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| Mar 31, 2007 @ 10:01 PM |
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waterfire
Posts: 2,921
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I tried and returned two previous cams - one Philips and one Logitech. Both froze up on me. That's part of the reason I suspect it's something hidden in my settings, drivers, firmware, hardware, O/S....whatever! LOL!!
Yeppers, you night want to check for updates on drivers. also check and make sure video and audio are set to hardware acceleration, check witch codec (video/audio) is being used during capture.
Just poking around will bring good results sooner or later 
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