Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[travelerjack]

I'm new to the X10 family, and am entirely intrigued by the possibilities of ALL the hardware and software. I purchased the VK74A Pan 'n Tilt Camera system with color camera. It took me a few days of fidgeting with it to get the video to come in on my TV (50" HD Projection with normally great picture quality), and when I did get it to come in, the quality was horrible. I have the camera and video receiver about 6 feet from one another, and the picture is so grainy I wouldn't be able to recognize my wife at 8 feet from the camera if I didn't know t was her. Is this the best I am going to get?
I've also got a video sender kit in the same room (on a different channel) that sends from my cable box to my bedroom TV, and it works fabulously. I've yet to conquer the remote control ability to use in the bedroom to control the cable box, but I haven't spent a lot of time on it yet. I was wondering if the two pieces of hardware could be the cause of the camera quality, truthfully please.
There is also a wireless 2.4ghz phone in the room. I bring this all up because I spoke to telephone support (was chatting with them on-line, then they called me, and when I answered I was immediately on hold for 30 minutes before a human got on the phone with me, I explained my picture quality issue, she said it was because of the phone being in the same room, then she said "I have a lot of other calls on hold, so please try different channels and call us back." This after being on hold myself for 30 minutes and getting about 30 seconds of support myself. Needless to say, I figured the rest of that issue out myself and am very unhappy with the 'support', if you can call it that.
Also, I am seeing these 'USB video capture devices' advertised, but they look to be specifically for sending the camera video to the computer. Is one of these necessary to get a quality image on the computer? I have a computer monitor input on the TV and can view my computer screen using the TV as a monitor. Would the quality be better if i did it that way? I probably need to do that in order to use the iWatch Mobile software I purchased anyway, right?
Thanks in advance for your input. I will have multiple questions about other pieces as well, so you'll be hearing a lot from me!
Travelerjack

[J.B.]

Welcome to the forum.

To use the cameras with iWatchMobile and the PC, you must have x10s VA12A USB video converter and ActiveHome Pro with iWatchOut.
The lower end cameras I find do not have the best quality on LCD and plasma TVs.
I would guess this is due to the fact most of these TVs are such a higher resolution compared to older TVs.
The higher end Vanguard and Sentinel cameras provide much better quality, along with a much higher price.
With the cameras and video sender, any 2.4GHz device can interfere with them. Things such as routers, cordless phones, some microwaves, etc...
Normally, you can change channels on the cameras and receivers or on the other device causing the issue to help clear this up to a point.
You shouldn't have much issue with a 2.4GHz phone unless it is in use.
Any metal objects between the camera and receiver can also cause poor signal.

[nybuck]

At six feet, you should have about the best picture you are going to get.  Yes, the TV sender and the cordless phone will interfere if the channels are close in frequency to each other.  My microwave oven KILLS my X10 reception from a long distance away.  With the exception of the Vanguard and Sentinel, the X10 cameras are basically low-end and low resolution, and are priced accordingly.  They also need a lot of light to get a good picture.

All that said, a 50-inch HD TV will show lots of 'grain' even in cable TV shows, if they are not broadcasted in HD.  There is no wonder that your XCam picture is not so sharp.  I doubt that you'll get any better results sending it through the computer.  The resolution on the VA12A "high res" USB adapter is 720x480, way lower than the 1920x1080 of a PC monitor or an HD TV.