Creative Live! Cam Optia

I just bought the very same camera today. It is very strange.
It works on my G4 PowerBook without any driver installs.
But it refuses to do work with an G4 iMac and an Intel core Duo iMac all with 10.4.10.

Did anybody observe some progress in this matter?

Matthias

Here a theory

I seems that on any machine (at least G4 or G4) which was upgraded regulary via Software Update the Optia works. If a Combo Update was used it does not work.
Is there something missing in the Combo Update?

MacFormat (UK) for OCT 2007 issue 187 reports this cam does not work on Intels



7:50 PM Monday; October 15, 2007

The point is that most posters in this thread have already made a purchase based on the fact that USB Video Class devices are supposed to work in 10.4.9 and above.



8:40 PM Monday; October 15, 2007

Could this issue be solved with Leopard? We can find out in a week hopefully.

has anyone been successful in installing live cam optia on their macs?

i have the same problem... i have an ibook g4 running 10.4.x. whenever i use skype, the app recognizes the webcam but there's no image coming out.

hope there's already a breakthrough... 🙂

leopard is finally out... has anyone tested the optia in leopard?

any feedback is greatly appreciated. 🙂

I have the Creative Live Cam Optia AF. I'm using it on an Intel Mac (OS 10.4.10). I've tested it with iChat, Skype & Quicktime. It works great, except for one thing which is hugely annoying ...

After the computer wakes from sleep:

iChat reports "Your camera is in use by another application"

Skype reports "No video camera connected"

QuickTime reports "No recording device found"

Of course, no other applications are using the webcam (at least not that I'm aware of). Now, as mentioned here in this discussion thread, the Creative Live! Cam Optia AF is a UVC webcam. So the macam plugin is not required. For the most part, the camera works fine (completely plug-n-play) ... that is until my computer goes to sleep.

Restarting the computer solves the problem.

HOWEVER, I don't want to restart my Mac each time I use iChat. I think us Mac users expect more than this.

I've tried some other things like resetting the PRAM, trashing the iChat plist, etc. At the end of the day - as soon as the computer wakes from sleep - the webcam is NOT recognized.

Has anyone else encountered this problem, or better yet, can anyone offer me a solution?

Thanks much!

The optia live seems to respond, still the screen is black. If I would have known the "higher" model did work,.. I would have bought that one.
It's just a bit crappy to unpack a nice gadget to conclude it doesn't work "as advertised".

Resellers should be more accurate with their product specifications. in retrospect Creative does not advertise the product as suited for osx. "big bummer"

Does anyone know a good camera for osx with cool software included/boxed (e.g. periscope) ???

so if it was advertise as a mac os x compatible hardware, what went wrong?

any, i just hope someone from creative would give us a hand in resolving the issue. 😟

What went wrong I am convinced will be right soon, it has worked before.

An idea for my neighbors in the Rembrandt tower,

What I don't understand is why camera companies don't put an effort in writing their own drivers for the steep increasing market share and the already huge installed base of Mac computers. Drivers can be part of the OS if they are compatible. Write a driver that runs in the front application only, deliver outstanding image and audio quality, and add iChat functionality (or all A/V messengers). Put this feature on your box, visual merchandise it nicely with something like: "Camera works with all applications that stream video". Amsterdam has a company that could use an image boost and show off their 50 years of experience in camera technology. Their webcams are the not as pretty, but just as good as the iSight. Now gentlemen, here is a market. Never seen such a good opportunity to sell the hi-quality camera's we produce and rub backs with the best OS in the world. Competition? NONE. Let's be serious, when you teach business administration and you need to explain what Triple P means, this case would be an example to remember. You don't need to do market research, just Google it: "iChat webcam" or anything like it. Anyone?

JP Melchior.

Message was edited by: Jan Pieter Melchior

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today i m bough this camera live cam optia in system profile say:

Live! Cam Optia:

Versione: 1.00
Potenza bus (mA): 500
Velocità: Fino a 12 Mb/sec
Produttore: Creative Labs
ID prodotto: 0x4057
ID fornitore: 0x041e

with osx 10,4,10 all ok , nothing under Leopard (black screen in all applications)