Logitech Quickcam E 3500

Author's product rating:   

Picture quality	Good
Video capture rate	Very fast
Colour sensitivity	Excellent
Ease of Installation	Good - quick to install
Value For Money	Excellent

Advantages:	Clear image even in low light, vivid colours, wide viewing angle, great webcam software
Disadvantages:	Spherical shape (cumbersome for laptop users), backlighting compensation can be improved

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

Being thousands of miles away from home, internet is by far the cheapest means of communication for me and my family. With free communication software such as Skype and Live! Messenger, I've found that nowadays, one can be as far as halfway across the globe, yet be more communicable than ever. I started off with just using a headset, and it didn't take long before I decided to look for a webcam. The reason? I find that there's just so many things words can tell, and some things you just have to let them see for themselves.

Before my review, I'll like to say that this is my second webcam, the first being a really cheap one that broke a couple of months after I bought it. There comes the first lesson, boys and girls: Open your wallet wider and spend a little more money. You get what you paid for, that's for sure. For the extra money, you get far superior quality and dependable support. Plus, you most probably gonna stick with it for a while anyway.

As I'm just a 'casual' webcam user, I wasn't looking for a fancy webcam that could follow you around the room or to be used as a motion sensor or change your face into some random animals. I just needed one that do what it should do (video calls), and good at it at that!

Which brings us to the product at hand, Logitech Quickcam E 3500. Honestly, when it comes to webcams, it's either Logitech or Microsoft that are the popular ones. Unfortunately I don't have a Microsoft webcam to compare it to, so this will be based on my experience with this Logitech webcam alone.

1. Picture Quality and Capture Rate
I guess most of all one would like to know how good the quality of the picture seen on the webcam is. Glad to say that with the E3500, I've found the picture quality to be better than good (which is to say that for usual webcamming, it is more than enough). During the day and in optimum (bright light) conditions, the image is very clear and crisp. Colours came out to be very vivid, and the white balance proved to be rather efficient in determining the correct real-life colours. Video capture rate is 30 frames per second, and my family have been amazed by the smoothness of our video-calling (both sides using broadband). It's as close to real-life as it can get!

2. Sensitivity in Low-light and Backlighting
Drop it into sub-optimal conditions (at night and in low light), the picture quality can be seen to deteriorate slightly (not that noticable in video calls, unless the other party view your face in fullscreen). The main problem is that the image starts to become grainy, which is an inevitable side effect of software compensation for low lighting. A plus point is that the picture remains clear (if one ignores the slight graininess) and the colours still vivid.

If there is backlighting (source of light located behind the webcammer, resulting in bright background but dark faces), Logitech's RightLight technology will attempt to correct it. Though I won't say it is very successful in doing so, it does still make it more 'viewable'.

3. Resolution
As it says on the box, resolution can reach as high as 1.3 megapixels, but that's only when you use the webcam to take pictures. Supported resolutions for video capture (that is to say, when you record videos) are 320x240, 640x480, 800x600 and 960x720. All this are not really necessary though, as most webcamming softwares (Skype and Live! Messenger) only allow up to 320x240. So unless you're planning to use the webcam to take pictures or record videos, all these are irrelevant.

4. Webcam Software
The software I meant here is the software that allows you to tweak the settings. Unsurprisingly, Logitech's webcam software allows a wide range of tweaking to be made, including brightness, contrast, and colour intensity. White balance (by default automatically adjusted spontaneously) and backlight compensations can be adjusted as well. There's also a low light boost and colour boost options, to try to make the video image look better. All in all, I've found Logitech's webcam software to be very useful and effective, but usually I'll just use the default settings as no adjustment's necessary most of the time. There is also a feature that allows the software to capture videos when the webcam senses motion, making it a cheap motion sensor cum CCTV. Ideal for surveillance of your room while you're away I suppose.

5. Webcam Design
E3500 is spherical in shape, and I use the webcam with my laptop. Thus in terms of travelability, I find it to be rather troublesome (would much prefer a flatter design!). It doesn't fit properly into normal laptop bags' pockets. There's a button on top of the webcam which can be pressed, and it'll take a picture thru the webcam. Not very useful at all, but I guess it'll make the narcissists happy. There is also a ring on the front, which act as a manual focus. The webcam's base has 2 functions, it can either act as a stand on flat surface, or adjusted into a clip-like base to fix onto laptop or LCD screens. Bear in mind the clip-like base is not firm, but rather just allow it to 'sit' on top of the laptop or LCD screen. Moving the laptop/LCD screen around is not recommended while the webcam is sitting on top (there's no grip!). The webcam is attached to its base like a ball-and-socket joint, and allow total freedom to view around (360 degrees horizontal, 135 degrees vertical). Its view angle is very good as well, being able to see myself from the top of my head to my chest just being an arm's length away (great for laptop users). Not to forget it has a built-in microphone too, which is able to pick up my voice rather clearly from an arm's length away.

6. User-friendliness
Moving on to its usability, the E3500 is just like any other Logitech webcams I suspect. Setting up requires a brief installation of the webcam software provided, and after that it'll be just plug-and-play.

7. Value for money
I bought this at a promotional price of £14.99 from PCWorld, so for me I think it's worth every penny spent.

Conclusion:
Frankly, I bought this webcam with very high expectations (no less from Logitech!), and I am glad to say that I am now a very happy customer. The only thing I'll complain about is its shape, gives me trouble to bring around in my laptop bag (but it allows almost total freedom of viewing around). But overall, it's everything I need from a webcam: great picture quality even under lower lighting, able to sit itself (albeit not firmly) on top of a laptop screen, and very easy to use!

PS - for video calling software, use Skype - it works perfectly