D-Link DSC-350F Dual-Mode PC Camera

by D-Link

Product Details

Product Manual [905kb PDF]

• Item Weight: 3.5 ounces
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S.
• ASIN: B000063XJE
• Item model number: DSC-350F
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes
• Date first available at Amazon.com: April 16, 2002

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

39 of 39 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good camera for the money -- poor usability, July 11, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: D-Link DSC-350F Dual-Mode PC Camera (Personal Computers)

This is one of the best digital cameras you can get new for the money.

Its VGA (640 x 480 pels) format is good for taking pictures that you will view on your computer and share over the internet. But photos printed at sizes larger than wallet size (1.5 x 2.5) will be grainy. This is a good camera for the kids. I've had the camera for a week and the kids have already taken several hundred pictures (including pictures of fireworks on the 4th of July). Considering film processing costs, the camera has already paid for itself.

The camera features a fairly bright f2.8 fixed focus lens (to 35"), a macro switch that allows focusing as close as 9" (but no flash in macro mode), four auto exposure modes (outdoors/cloudy, outdoors/sunny, indoors/bright, indoors/dark), one auto flash mode (on/off -- no red eye reduction), auto white balance, a 10 second self-timer, two resolutions (VGA & CIF), 8M internal memory (which can't be increased) that can hold about 70 VGA pictures and 160 CIF pictures, a movie-mode that takes one CIF picture every .75 seconds as long as you hold down the shutter button, a fast USB interface (cable included), and it can be used as a Web Cam if you have the right software (not included).

With only four buttons, the camera is simple to use. Press the Power button to turn it on (with a loud beep). Pressing the button again will NOT turn the cameral off. The camera will turn itself off (with two load beeps) after 60 seconds of inactivity.

It has a small black and white LCD that shows mode settings. To change a setting, press the Mode button repeatedly (with a loud beep for each press) until the desired setting flashes in the LDC. Then press and hold the Select button until it beeps twice to activate the setting. There are twelve settings: VGA, CIF, outdoor/cloudy, outdoor/sunny, indoor/bright, indoor/dark, flash on, flash off, movie mode on, delete all pictures, delete last picture, and self-timer on. To change another setting, you must cycle through all the settings again, starting from the beginng.

WHICH BRINGS US TO THE CAMERA'S BIGGEST DRAWBACK. The engineer who programmed the camera had a fanatical obsession with resetting your settings. When the camera powers itself off (after only 60 seconds of inactivity), all the settings are reset to their defaults (VGA, outdoor/cloudy, flash off), so you have to go through the whole setup routine when you turn it on again. I would have rated this camera a 5 if it were not for this ANNOYING behavior. FORTUNATELY, YOU CAN PREVENT THE CAMERA FROM POWERING OFF BY PRESSING EITHER THE "MODE" BUTTON OR THE "SELECT" BUTTON BEFORE THE 60 SECONDS EXPIRES. In addition, Self-timer mode is turned off after the shutter fires, and Movie mode is turned off after you release the shutter button.

The camera takes decent pictures. The auto exposure modes and auto white balance work well in normal "snapshot" situations. The flash is only good for 4 or 5 feet, but actually, this can be used to highlight the subjects of the picture while deemphasizing backgrounds. I don't have the necessary equipment to evaluate color accuracy, but the color looks fine to me in most situations, although I have noticed a pinkish cast in low light situations.

The camera comes with ArcSoft's Photo Impression software and a no-name program that will download a sequence of images from the camera and create an avi movie file. The AVI maker is extremely limited, but ArcSoft's Photo Impression is powerful and easy to learn and use (which is good since there isn't much help or documentation.) It is faster and more powerfull than Microsofts' Image Express and easier to use than the other Image sofware packages that came with my printer and scanner. It has about a dozen image enhancing tools (red eye reduction, brightness, contrast, tint correction, etc.) including an almost magical one-button photo enhancement feature that corrects almost everything. It supports multi-layer image processing, adding text to pictures, and twenty or so image manipulation tools (morphs, solorizations, melts, etc.) My favorite is a tool that turns your photograph into a pen & ink drawing. My kids love coloring drawings of themselves and their friends. It comes with built in projects that allow you to instantly turn any photograph into a greeting card or a calendar, and much more. It also has a very powerful, flexible and easy-to-use printing "wizzard" that allows you to get the most from your expensive photo paper.

We've gotten 69 VGA exposures in normal conditions (and 156 VGA exposures of fireworks where the background was all black). After hundreds of pictures, the two AA batteries are still going strong. It fits in a shirt pocket, and when I put it in my pants pocket, I forget that it is there.

Except for the stupid settings program, I am very pleased with this camera.

27 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good, very nice., May 24, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: D-Link DSC-350F Dual-Mode PC Camera (Personal Computers)

This camera is a pretty decent camera for any beginner.

It has a USB connection which makes fast downloading, it has a flash unlike most cams that have poor lighting, and the VGA quality is nice and smooth.

If you want a camera and you are new at it, get this item.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good Digital Camera, Better WebCam, August 2, 2002

By 

Christian Gunn (Detroit, MI United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: D-Link DSC-350F Dual-Mode PC Camera (Personal Computers)

I looked at the reviews for this and was scared. Was pratically ready to ship it back when I first saw it. Then i took some pics they were great. Hooked it up to the computer. EASY!! Been having fun ever since. :)

The only thing that I don't like is that the default settings are the settings that are put in place everytime the camera is turn on. You cannot save your settings. :(