Linksys Wireless Internet Camera with Audio

I have a B.S. in Electrical Engineering and a Masters in Computer Science and still had significant challenges in getting the software configured. Not for the faint of heart! Seriously recommend looking at Panasonic cameras before purchasing one of these. You have been warned!

I had lots of issues with installation and configuration. Had to download new firmware for an out of the box purchase. Many calls to Linksys. They were helpful but the wireless functionality has never worked.

In addition to my prior first impression here is the final.
The camera does not work as claimed or advertised. Repeated testing using different configurations, computers and setups shows hardware defective design and manufacture which cannot be repaired through software updates. The actual hardware needs to be replaced. Indiscriminate buyers might be happy with bad focus, bad peripheral focus, false colors (green is not rendered properly and comes out at violet), poorly designed and executed user interface, frequent lockup, falsely claimed speed of 30 frames per second - on 5Mb (up and down) Internet connection the camera on the smallest resolution is not able to deliver 10 fps, when more than one person is watching it gets even worst, the ActiveX is very bad choice for interface and could not be utilized on anything but Windows Internet Explorer, false claims that the camera sends MPEG4 to Windows systems - it does not and Cisco does not provide any drivers to make it possible.

The camera is expensive: list price over $700, but is sells for less because it is very poor performer.
The camera was first introduced in summer 2006 and Cisco/Linksys did nothing for a year to make it work. At the end of summer 2007 it introduced first firmware and software update which did not solve major problems which are caused by hardware and cannot be repaired without recalling the camera.
The camera is very poor in low light conditions. All cameras inherently are sensitive to infrared, but this one is poorly corrected and filtered and displays greens as violets in less than full sun.
This camera and lack of support is a shame on Cisco/Linksys name.

PROS:
-- Moving the camera to other locations is easy. Just unplug, move, and replug into AC outlet.
-- Multiple indicator lights and LCD address display on the camera, in case you forget what IP address your camera is assigned to it is there to see.
------ For the price and Cisco/linksys name - there is no significant pros - it is a shame on Cisco's name

CONS:

-- Can access the camera wirelessly (WiFi) and through the Internet. Can use Dynamic DNS for access from Internet. Your browser must support ActiveX (this means Windows Explorer only). ActiveX does not work with Apple, Blackberry or anything other than Windows. Apple has a chance of MPEG4 but I don't have Apple. Linksys also provides monitoring software for access outside of your browser and it works better that ActiveX and only on Windows, but it occupies large portion of your screen without any chances of making it smaller.

--- Advertised as having Zoom. The software enlarges the pixels only 2x, without event attempting to smooth them in any way. Without smoothing this does not qualify as Zoom. It is a useless ability to enlarge pixels.

-- Advertised as having email alerts and motion detection - I and many others find it impossible to set up. I have tried all these features and they do not work at all as described in literature.

-- Very poor image quality even at highest Quality settings. The quality depends on the sensor and optics which cannot be repaired via software updates. The camera has adjustable frame rate and quality settings which make no difference. And I never seen it sending 30 frames per second through very fast Internet connection.

-- Very poor color quality. I believe this is a serious hardware issue for security. Lack of color quality (or accuracy of color) is because the camera's infrared sensitivity. The camera does not see in the dark. With the pictures from this camera one would not be able to obtain a conviction in court.

-- Poor low light sensitivity with color falsing. The camera's infrared sensitivity does not make the camera more usable in lower light. If you can read under the existing light, you will get a very mediocre picture. (For viewing under dark conditions, you would need to supply your own strong infrared illuminators. the camera does not pick up infrared body heat.)

-- Motion detection with email alerts cannot be setup with instructions provided by Linsys/Cisco.

-- Audio is only one way - from the camera. I.e. no way to talk to your pet, kid or sitter.

-- Camera focus can not be changed and is out of focus under most conditions. (There is no capability to manually focus camera). The peripheral focus distortions are caused by the curved plastic 'protective' shield.

-- Remote pan and tilt - very slow and very noisy.
-- Must update to newest firmware to start working. The first update was after one year of complaints from users.

-- The stand the camera sits on is flimsy.

-- No functional technical support. Linksys has not been helpful and did not even try. No useful online help. The user forum administrators and monitors will delete your complaints and ban you for life if you dare to ask critical questions. Censorship is the king on this site. Linksys administrator masquerades as a user on the forum. Go elsewhere for help.

-- Accessing the camera through the Internet requires port assignment on your router to get around blocking places by your ISP on the standard server ports.Some corporate firewalls won't let you install ActiveX from the camera and you need not install the monitoring software which might be violation of your company prohibition against software installations on company computers. Had they used Java which could be run without installing anything on company computer.

Conclusions:
After this testing - the camera will go back to the store. My company will not order any camera from Cisco/Linksys. This camera should not be considered unless the price is below $100.00.

I saw a lot of reviews saying the same thing as I experienced. The features of the camera are great!!! Especially for the price. The setup was rough.
The setup worked ok while hooked up via ethernet cable. When I tried to go wireless, that is where the lack of fun began. I couldn't get the system to recognize the camera. I had an experienced IT person help me and couldn't get it to work. Not sure if this was the final correction but I read about placing the antenna straight out vs at a 90 deg. angle. Not sure that was the problem.... but that along with many software mods suddenly had it working. The IP adddress at first was defaulting to xxx.115. When it finally worked, it read xxx.100. 2 other things... I ended up fixing the IP address at xxx.105 since following any power interruptions... it would switch from .100 to .101 and lose its wireless connection. It saw .100 as already being used and oved to the next one. This messed up the router port forwarding setting.
Also...I wish you could pick the file name when auto uploading to a server. That would enable you to select one file name and display the latest picture sent by the cam. As of now, it date and time stamps it which makes it tough to display the latest pic since it has a uniqe file name.

I purchased this camera as a baby monitor & grandparents camera. It works OK, but beware a few issues:

1. Although Linksys tells you it is Vista compatible, it isn't really. You can view the camera through any IE web browser, but if you want to view recorded video clips or use the Linksys recording/monitoring utility, don't plan on using Windows Vista. I've been arguing with Linksys since I received this camera over this issue. I took me three days and four of their "engineers" to finally get someone who had the capability to understand the issue and try to help. Even then, I was advised that Microsoft is at fault for not making Vista so that all pre-vista products will run in it. They say they're considering updating their software, but will not give a time to update. Keep in mind that Vista has been available to Linksys for testing and development for almost a year, and they act like this is an issue that I pointed out to them.

2. The audio on this camera is flaky. When I first set it up and plugged it in, the audio was remarkably sensitive. I could hear everything in the room through the camera. After a month of use, the audio is seriously degraded. I have to reboot the camera frequently to get any audio from it. Yesterday when I was testing it, I had to get my wife to stand 2 feet from the camera and talk directly to it in order to hear anything from it. The Linksys customer forum has previous customer postings on this issue, from 6 mos to a year ago, and the recommended solution was to update the firmware on the camera. I'm running a firmware that was released in the past two months.

3. Linksys' customer support forums are heavily censored - one of the best resources available to Linksys customers is their customer forum, where customers can go to share knowledge and experience on their products. What I discovered is that the forum moderators don't like customers to describe negative experiences they have with Linksys products. I was banned from their forum for my insistence that Linksys was not providing good customer support over their inability first to acknowledge and then to effectively address the Vista compatability issue described in item number 1 above. I didn't use any bad language or make any defamatory claims, but I was banned for life from their forum for "bashing".

Aside from those issues, the camera was very easy to set up. The picture is good. It doesn't matter what kind of home networking gear you have (you don't have to have Linksys). I have the camera connected wirelessly, and it works fine (except for the audio problems). The PTZ controls work well through the web browser. If you're in the room when someone is viewing you through the camera, there is an activity light that flashes on the front of the unit.

If you can look past the audio issues, the non-compatability with Windows Vista, and the poor support from Linksys, this seems like a good camera. I haven't used the competing DLink, Siemens, Panasonic, or other products, so I can't compare.