Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)I've had this camera for a few weeks. I'm very happy with just about everything about it. I do not agree with another reviewer that it is cheaply-made, nor do I fear breaking the camera itself. A few caveats; read on.
Big advantages over other network cameras in this class:
1) Excellent image quality compared to other cameras in this class. Even though this camera uses a CMOS sensor--vs. a CCD sensor, which generally offers better video quality--the particular CMOS sensor used in this camera works very well. It has excellent low-light characteristics (supposedly down to 1 lux, which is candlelight-level, but I think that's a stretch). It has auto-brightness control. Turn down the lights and the video dims briefly then brightens right back up. Best video and fastest update is of course under decent lighting conditions, but indoor residential incandescent lighting or indoor lighting with only the light coming through the windows is just fine.
This CMOS sensor is also progressive-scan, which improves the picture quality over that coming from normal (interlaced) sensors. You can read about this on the Axis website (the URL is obvious).
2) Uses true MPEG4 compression. Most inexpensive network cameras in this class offer one type of video compression, known as Motion JPEG (or MJPEG). This offers a very good picture, but is a bandwidth hog. If you intend to stream video over the internet and you have limited bandwidth, you need something better. As an example, I have 2-3Mbps downstream on our cable modem, but only about 350kbps upstream. Upstream is what matters when you send video over the internet. This camera can stream 30 frames per second (fps) at 640x480 resolution. That's a lot of data and if it is not compressed well enough, it takes up too much bandwidth. That makes the video on the other end look jerky, with picture updates as slow as one frame per second.
This is where MPEG4 compression comes in, but you need to be careful. Again, most cameras don't offer the level of MPEG4 support that the Axis 207W offers. Some cameras say "MPEG4" but nothing more. This can be very deceptive. Here's what you need to know:
-- MPEG4, Short Header mode (SH): This is essentially no MPEG4 compression at all. It's like "faked" MPEG4.
-- MPEG4, Simple Profile (SP): This is true MPEG4 compression, but it has limited capability. Linksys has a network camera with this type of compression.
-- MPEG4, Advanced Simple Profile (ASP): This is the best MPEG4 compression offered in network cameras of this type today. The Axis 207W offers this type of compression.
Not only does the Axis 207W stream 640x480 at 30fps with MPEG4 ASP compression, it does so simultaneously with streaming Motion JPEG. So you can easily choose which one you want to see.
There are even higher levels of MPEG4 compression (past ASP) but I don't think any inexpensive network cameras offer it yet.
Other nice things:
a) The camera comes with two types of swivel mounts: one which is like a short pedestal, weighted; and one which is essentially a plastic C-clamp which allows you to mount the camera to the edge of a table or top of a chair, for example. The C-clamp does seem a bit fragile; I would not crank down too much on it.
b) The camera comes with an extra length of power cord (an extender) so if the "wall wart" power supply's cord is not long enough for your application, just add this extension between the camera and the wall wart cord (this is not a 120VAC extension cord.)
c) Ultra-configurable. Just about everything about the camera seems to be configurable from the settings.
d) Wireless works well. I've only tried WEP, but it was a breeze to set up. In fact, the whole setup was easy. You do need a little bit of networking knowledge to set up port forwarding in your router, but most of the camera defaults are right on target. The camera also offers two types of WPA.
e) Axis offers a free Domain Name Service (DNS) which allows you to pick an easy-to-remember web address. For example, you could pick "SantaClaus" and the address of your camera would be SantaClaus---axiscam---net, where the --- is actually a dot (.) [My first review got squashed by Amazon because I forgot and put in a URL.]
Here are the disadvantages I see:
1) Focusing is tedious. It's a 2-person job: one to hold the camera steady and turn the focus ring and another person to view the image on the screen and give instructions to the first person.
2) Audio is not very good. It's set at a very low level and even after turning up the slider control to the maximum, I still had to have my computer volume turned up quite high to hear any camera audio. Of course then other sounds from the computer (warning beeps etc) are very loud. This is one thing which is not configurable. Audio can be set to ON or OFF, but there is no setting for the level. Axis should fix this in their software.
3) It's a bit expensive. For the same price you can get a pan-tilt model from Panasonic or Linksys, but the image quality on those cameras is not as good, and they do not offer MPEG4 ASP compression. You have to give up something to get something, it seems.
4) There's no "privacy screen." This would be easy for Axis to add--just a simple flip-down shield to cover the lens when you don't want the video to be seen. We use a simple box I made out of a sheet of paper. Of course you could also unplug the camera, but that takes a bit longer.
I see these disadvantages to be very minor when weighed against the excellent performance of this camera as a whole.
One last point: I showed the video to a person I work with who owns the Linksys WVC200 camera, and he said he thought the Axis 207W's video was cleaner.
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Axis 207W Wrls Network Camera Wireless 802.11G 30FPS In VGA ResCompact wireless network camera with MPEG-4 image compression and motion detection for bandwidth efficiency.
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