Many of you probably know that, for some reason, iSight cameras can get into a weird state where they start causing serious errors with FireWire drives.
The symptoms usually include a bunch of I/O errors while copying to a FireWire drive: failed copies, flaky behavior, crashes. All of this goes away if you power off, disconnect the iSight, wait a while and power back up.
Sometimes, the iSight stops working with iChat (it says the camera's in use when it's not, or the light comes on, but you don't get any picture), and in it was in that second state today when I had a kernel panic.
No data was lost, I'm happy to say, but I decided that I've had enough of this. Since 10.4.9 supports USB cameras, I've switched to a Logitech QuickCam Ultra Vision
It's not as elegant as the original iSight (it's fixed focus, horizontal format, a bit gaudy), but it's got a nice wide angle lens, built in microphone, works with any monitor, and seems reliable. Plug the thing in, and it works.
Given that you can't buy "real" iSights any more, and based on direct experience, I give it a thumbs-up.
Sorry, iSight. I'll miss you!
17 Mar 2007 at 06:58 pm | #
Hey man,
I’m about to do the same… trying to get away from firewire and stick with all USB drives so that I don’t have to worry about 5 bajillion cables to disconnect/reconnect when taking my MBP on the go.
Either way, I got 2 Belkin 7 port usb 2 hubs daisey chained this weekend and upgraded my Lacie drives to the new d2 usb versions. All is set. I’m also thinking about getting rid of the outdated isight as well (I use a 20” studio display at home).
Do you know what the difference was between the one you bought and the silver (non-special) edition? http://www.logitech.com/index.cfm/products/details/US/EN,CRID=2204,CONTENTID=11804
Seems the only thing making it “special” is the black color… in that case, I’m going with silver so that it matches my desk better.
Since there’s no mac drivers and you mentioned it was very plug-and-play… do the advanced features work like the rightlight 2 technology and the built in mic?
Thanks!
Shahrum
17 Mar 2007 at 07:06 pm | #
Be a bit careful about migrating to USB drives: I still strongly suggest FireWire, myself: they’re faster (FireWire is a bidirectional protocol, and doesn’t slow down when a “low speed” device is on there, because there are no low-speed devices) and generally pretty trouble-free.
They can also act as startup drives for both Intel and Power PC Macs.
I think the two units are identically priced and the same except for color.
The mic and lighting work fine. Anything supplied by external software (putting mustaches on the user, etc) won’t work, of course, because that’s only available on the PC. But everything that your iSight does, this does too—the only thing it’s missing is the twist to turn it “physically” off.
17 Mar 2007 at 11:11 pm | #
Is that always the case? (USB 1.1 devices will slow down a USB 2.0 hard drive) if they’re on the same chain? I thought that the hub handles that so that they’ll operate at native speeds…
Thanks Dave.
17 Mar 2007 at 11:13 pm | #
Depends on the hub, actually. Some do, some don’t: if the hub has a translator per port, then it will give relatively full speed per device.
Even with that, though, the drives are slower than FireWire.
17 Mar 2007 at 11:31 pm | #
I agree. I will check on that for my hub. Regarding firewire speed—that’s true, I went with these for convenience. If I was accessing them for daily work, I would go firewire. But as a simple backup and do not touch drive, USB was fine.
Thanks,
Shahrum
19 Mar 2007 at 01:42 pm | #
I think your iSight problems may be related to faulty FireWire cables. WHen I had my PowerBook G4 and used to take my iSight between the PowerBook and my Desktop G4, I put much wear and tear on the cable to the point where it did pretty much what yours did. After my PowerBook was stolen and insurance replaced it with a MacBook Pro, I got Apple to replace my iSight FireWire cable with a new one - my iSight now sits permanently attached to my G4 - I have had no reoccurrence of the problems since the new cable was put in place.
19 Mar 2007 at 01:55 pm | #
Actually, I don’t think so! I’ve traded cables a number of times, and the unit is pretty ‘static’ on top of my monitor…