# Buying/choosing a webcam

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buying-choosing-a-webcam/647209>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [January 14, 2013, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buying-choosing-a-webcam/647209 "2013-01-14T19:28:48Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\
**Post date:** [January 14, 2013, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buying-choosing-a-webcam/647209/1 "2013-01-14T19:28:48Z")

</div>

The young lady who comes in and helps with our housekeeping is interested in Skyping with her son while he is on deployment to Afghanistan. She asked how much a webcam should cost, so I went online, and found that they are quite reasonably priced.

She also wants to know if there are technical matters that she needs to reconcile to make sure that whatever she picks up will function with her computer. As far as I know, she is using a Windows-based platform. Are webcams generally plug-and-play, or is she likely to need to install drivers, whatever she picks?

Thanks in advance for knowledgeable responses.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\
**Post date:** [January 14, 2013, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buying-choosing-a-webcam/647209/2 "2013-01-14T19:34:21Z")

</div>

She probably wants 720p resolution. (Lower is blurry on modern channels, 1080p is probably unnecessarily expensive.) Autofocus is nice. Other than that, it’s whichever Microsoft or Logitech product fits her budget. Both are good and have good drivers/software. They are almost 100% plug and play after you install the drivers and utility software.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\
**Post date:** [January 14, 2013, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buying-choosing-a-webcam/647209/3 "2013-01-14T19:58:37Z")

</div>

Thanks very much. She just left and will pick up a webcam this evening.