[tlug] Webcams from Biku Camera

[Dave M G <martin@example.com>]

TLUG,

I've been having a lot of fun using Skype on my Ubuntu machine for 
talking to friends and family all over the place.

Thought I'd go the next step and get myself one of them snazzy web cams 
and do some video talking.

I can get a web cam from Biku Camera for pretty much nothing with my 
Biku point card. The one I'm looking at is the Logicool Qcam Connect. I 
*think* it's the same as the Logitech QuickCam IM/Connect, just a 
different name for the Japanese market.

If that's true that it is the same camera, then it's listed as having 
Linux support on this page:
http://mxhaard.free.fr/spca5xx.html

But... I've been burned by this kind of thing before. When I bought my 
Hauppauge TV card, I first looked around the net and found all sorts of 
sites that said it was supported. I got the impression that, as far as 
TV tuner cards go, it was a popular and fairly standard choice for Linux 
users. Thus I made my decision that it was the one to buy, feeling like 
a smart Linux consumer, having done the research and being cautious in 
my purchase.

After I bought it, I discovered that it was indeed usable with Linux. If 
one was willing to spend forever searching for decent instructions, ask 
questions on at least 4 mailing lists, and spend endless hours 
compiling, configuring, finding out that it doesn't work because of a 
missing something-or-other and then starting over again. It took me 
about two months before I got a TV signal on my desktop, and I have to 
redo the whole source-compile thing with every kernel upgrade.

I used to think "supported" meant "most likely works, maybe with one or 
two minor configuration tweaks". Now I know it means "might work 
automagically out of the box, or maybe you'll need to be one of the 
world's last COBOL programmers who can visually interpret machine code 
and spend three years at Xerox labs to research and develop the correct 
driver".

Back to web cams. To hopefully save myself the heartache of discovering 
that the webcam I bought is "supported" in the most esoteric sense of 
the word, I'm wondering if anyone here has experience with any of the 
brands available here in Japan.

Is anyone using a web cam? Which one? What software are you using to do 
video calls over the internet? What drivers did you use and do you have 
any tips?

--
Dave M G