Introduction
Webcams are an interesting segment of the market. For most home users, these are very much optional peripherals, and I still feel that their potential uses are pretty unexplored. Most people use their webcam for chatting or perhaps a video blog, but that's really the majority of applications.

The cam is from a company called Genius, and it goes by the model name of Look 313 Media. It can be yours for about $50 online. This is near the upper mid range for webcams these days, so it will have to deliver in order to make the cut. The company is based in Taiwan, and they make a range of peripherals including keyboards, scanners, digital cameras, and MP3 players just to name a few. Despite this, I'd say that they are a relatively unknown company in the computer enthusiast community. It's interesting to me that they decided to attempt to compete in the busy webcam market, which is already fairly well dominated by Logitech. They must think that they've got a good piece of hardware on their hands.

Unboxing
The Look 313 Media comes in a very shiny silver box (it was actually a bit hard to photograph). The front is clear plastic, and you can see the camera on the inside.

Once we get the package open, we can finally get the camera out. It's a silver cylinder that's about 5.5 inches long and 1.75 inches in diameter, a bit large for a webcam. On each end is something different: speakers. In a rare move for a webcam, the Look 313 comes with its own set of stereo speakers. These are initially pointed straight out, but a beveled rotation point allows them to swivel 90 degrees and face forward. The camera itself can be adjusted up and down, but not left to right. You can adjust the focus by turning the silver ring around the lens.

The rear of the camera also has a bit of a surprise: some ports. Most entry-level webcams don't have anything on the back except for the permanently attached USB cable. The Look 313 media, on the other hand, has two USB 2.0 ports and standard 3.5mm audo jacks for speakers and a microphone in addition to the mini-USB port for connecting the cam to the system. To help with power needs of the two USB ports on the rear of the camera, the USB cable for system connection splits into two standard USB plugs, one of which is a "pass-through" type (you can plug something else into the back of it). This ensures that anything you jack into the ports on the Look 313 Media will get plenty of power.

Interestingly, the Look 313 does not have a microphone. I really find this odd. It's not uncommon to have an internal microphone in a notebook, and many people (especially gamers) have headsets, but I just expect a webcam to have a mic of its own.

The Look 313 Media comes with just a few accessories. There is the USB power/data cable, a manual, the software/driver CD, and a carrying bag.

Windows Installation
Installation under windows was a breeze. I used the included disc to install the driver and plugged the USB cable in. Doesn't get a whole lot easier than that. Annoyingly, my system immediately switched to the camera's speakers as the default audio output whenever I plugged them in. I had to go into the windows sound settings to reset it back to my desktop speakers. This is especially annoying because the speaker quality is B-A-D. To me they sound like someone is playing a wax cylinder at the bottom of a steel drum. Just terrible, and a waste of space considering the fact that just about everyone probably already has some other sort of speakers. Anything else at all would be better than these things.

I also installed the included "DDPlayCam" software, which, I'm sorry, sounds like a dirty video site to me. It's actually a little app that puts some animations up over the webcam image. It uses rudimentary facial recognition to place everything over top of the cam feed. This is lots of fun, for about 5 seconds. The software ran very slowly on my PC, and I was worried a few times that my system was going to crash. Plus, there really is no point besides making a few goofy images.

The Genius Look 313 Media works fine as a Skype camera. I used it for several extended sessions and the images were pretty standard webcam fare. The camera did not adjust as well to low light as some others I have used. After a bit of use, some lag tended to creep in. It's unclear if this is a fault of the camera or some other part of the system.

Linux Installation
Let's see how this camera does under Linux. My system is an Asus z63a notebook running Ubuntu Feisty Fawn. Webcams are notoriously hard to get working under linux, but I like a bit of a challenge. First I tried to find the Genius USA website, which was surprisingly difficult using Google (try http://www.geniusnet.com/). There wasn't a linux driver, but they do provide links for all flavors of Windows as well as MacOSX. I then spent some time working with some nonspecific linux drivers, but could not get this camera to be recognized by the system. I'm willing to wager that it is simply unsupported at this time. In all fairness, a Logitech camera did not work either. Thumbs down to Linux on this one.

Summary and Conclusions
When I think of webcams, I actually first think of the Apple iSight. They include a webcam in many of their computers as standard equipment, and this has led to a growth in personal videoconferencing among their user base. In typical Apple fashion, the cameras are almost unnoticeable and well integrated into the design. So what does this have to do with the Look 313? If you look at the hardware footprint for the integrated Apple iSight, it's clear that a standalone camera could be very very small. I actually think this is a problem for makers of webcams on a couple of levels. The first is that such a tiny camera would actually be almost too light to hold itself down to your desk. The second issue is that people don't want to shell out money to open up a box with a tiny square that's a half inch on a side. They want some bulk, something that looks nice, and maybe has some nice features added.

In this case, Genius added bulk to their product with a couple of really awful speakers. They neglected to include a microphone, which I can only assume was because feedback would be a major problem with the two speakers so close by. So you lose something useful and gain something useless.

Some people may like the look of the camera, but I'm not one of them. It's too flashy for me, and sticks out like a sore thumb sitting on the desk. The plastic construction feels a bit cheap, although the presence of some pads on the bottom is a nice touch.

In conclusion, I'll just say that there are much better web cameras you can buy for the same amount of money. I just can't think of anyone I would recommend this product for, unless you own a notebook with an integrated microphone and no speakers at all?

The Good

• Easy to install
• USB and Audio ports on the back

The Bad

• Winner of the HWHell prize for worst and most pointless speakers on an electronic gadget
• No microphone
• Design is gaudy

In conclusion, I give the Genius Look 313 Media a HWHell rating of 3/10 and a brand-new HWHell "Rejected from Hell" designation. It's simply not a product worth buying.