Hardware Review of:
Create and Share 
PC Camera Pack 

You might want to know what you can do with a camera that sits on top of your computer. Well, for one, you can take snapshots of your family, pets, or even yourself to send to your friends who have e-mail. There are several built in E-Mail (digital) Postcards that can have a snapshot picture, voice recording, digital video clip or combination of the aforementioned included on the postcard. These digital "postcards" look like the real thing on your screen and come complete with a "postmark" on the card. Like the real thing, you can personalize them with a message you type in your own words. Unlike the real thing, it doesn’t cost a penny to e-mail it. You have to be careful, though, these types of files can get rather large very quickly. 

The package includes the Intel Videophone Software. This product will allow you to make or receive video phone calls over the Internet. Wouldn’t it be nice to see and hear the person to whom you are talking long distance? You can call across town or across the world for what it costs to maintain your current Internet service.  No extra charges added. You can call friends, family members, business associates and if they have the same camera and software, they can see and hear you also. You can also use the Intel VideoPhone software to make or answer calls or you can switch a current call to Intel VideoPhone. They even include an extra copy of the CD for you to send to a friend or family member of your choice. 

The kit also includes free PC Camera games. These are a lot of fun. One of the games, Shoop, consists of a basketball and hoop with the camera pointed at you and when the ball touches your image on the screen, it bounces with the goal to get the ball into the hoop. Another one is BounceIt, which has a globe that you bounce on your screen. A third game is Pop the Bubbles and even though it sounds silly, its fun! Bubbles come into and out of your screen and when your image touches them, they pop. You get points for each popped bubble, but if you miss one, you lose points. These games were included from Reality Fusion, who are apparently a major partner with Intel in the webcam endeavor. 

Photos, videos, audio recordings, scanned-in images or practically any combination of the above are available using the accompanying software. The heart of this package is the Intel Create and Share software. With this software, you can adjust the sharpness of the camera for shooting digital video. The software lets you create galleries of photos that you can scan in from pictures or take with your camera yourself. It is quite easy to edit out a bad snapshot or when you take it initially, not save it at all. The amount of pictures you can have available to you in your gallery is dependent on your choices and the size of your hard drive. You can save these photos in the gallery and use another photo editing program to edit them. Included are clip art files, avi files (short movies with sound), and a number of photos in JPEG format on the CD. 

However, one drawback with this package is that it did not come with a microphone. Although I already own a microphone (from my voice software) one should be included for this camera pack to be complete. If this is my biggest criticism, and it is, then Intel has done some things very right with this product. It is fun and I have enjoyed having it and using it. If you are in the market for a PC Camera or a "webcam," consider this alternative. If I were grading this product, I would have to give it a solid A, not perfect, but very, very good. 

Minimum requirements for this program includes a Universal Serial Bus (USB) port, a desktop or notebook computer with a Pentium processor running at 166 MHz or greater speed. The system should have a Windows 95 OSR2 or Windows 98 operating system, 32 MB of RAM, an 800X600 16 bit display, 150 MB of free hard drive space and a  4X CD-ROM drive.  Additionally, there should be a Windows compatible sound card with speakers and a microphone, Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 or higher or Netscape Communicator 4.0 or higher, an Internet Service Provider and at least a 28.8 Kbps (or faster) modem. 

The camera packs can be purchased locally in Best Buy, CompUSA, Office Max or Office Depot. The prices I have seen and have been quoted varied widely. Shop carefully and be sure that you are getting the Intel Create and Share Camera Pack if you expect it to include all the amenities listed in this review. Prices ranged from $124.99 to $119.99 for the Intel Create and Share Pack. The more basic Intel PC Camera Pack was quoted as low as $39.99 (after rebate) to as high as $79.99 (with no mention of rebate). The Intel website also offers these products for sale with the Intel PC Camera pack listed for $69.00 and the Intel PC Camera Pro Pack listed for $99.00. As far as I could tell, the newer products, Intel’s PC Camera Pack and PC Camera Pro Pack also include most of the software mentioned above. Therefore, my recommendation is to shop wisely and carefully and be sure to research what you will be getting before spending your money.