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Copyright © 1999 by Woody Liswood. All rights reserved.
By Woody Liswood
Remember that old saying: A picture is worth a thousand words?
With the Xirlink USB Video Camera and CiT software, that old saying is now true for your business and personal communication. Yes, that's right. Just like Dick Tracy's video watch, video is there for you to use. Written communication is there when you need it, but you no longer have to suffer written email.
The Xirlink USB camera and CiT software enables video email with just a couple of mouse clicks. Now, you can send email that shows and tells. No more typing. No more written memos. Just simple video communication between you and your intended.
If you are both on-line at the same time, you don't even need to do that. Just connect together and talk to each other.
The CiT software CD contains the both the video software and the software that enables the camera.
There are a number of different software programs from CiT. One of the program is the video email. Start it up, click on capture, talk and shoot away, click on stop when you are done, preview your message, save it, and then send it to any email address you wish. The CiT software will automatically set up your message so that it will extract and play on your recipient's computer. Just plan on having a high-speed connection. The video files created by CiT are not small and if you talk for a few minutes, you will create a video file that can be megabytes in size.
The CiT software also contains a conference call software that enables video conferencing directly over the Internet or phone connection. The software also contains an album so that you can save and store your video messages.
I also tested the camera with Microsoft NetMeeting. NetMeeting automatically recognized the camera and used it appropriately.
For me, the video cameras available for the past few years were of the glass is half empty rather than half full variety. With having to install a video capture card and separate modem, video communication was a pain. Now, the Xirlink USB camera changed my mind. Since this is a USB device, you plug it in and let WIN98 find some drivers on its original install CD and then install the drivers that come with the camera. That's it. Everything, for me, worked out of the box.
The camera has no microphone built-in so you must have a sound card with microphone input to record sound with the video. I use a SIIG PCI sound card, and it worked the first time I tried to use it with the camera.
The CiT software that accompanies the Xirlink camera is so easy to use that you never need to look at any documentation. From a single interface you can capture and save anything the camera sees. It also worked from the start.
I could only find two negatives. One is the size of the video file. The second is the lack of a microphone. While the SIIG sound card worked without problem, some surround sound systems require that you use the microphone input of your soundcard to enable the back speakers. You might have to switch cables to use the microphone.
This software and hardware combination works. Once you get used to sending voice messages to your friends and coworkers, you will not go back to email for those small simple messages. Just think what the Justice Department could do if it had video email instead of written email in its suit against Microsoft.