iSight Terrible Video Quality

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iSight Terrible Video Quality

I recently picked up an iSight camera for my 2012 model Mac Mini, which is running Mountain Lion. The quality of the video is terrible, and I'm wondering if this is just a case of this being an old product that's not up to today's standards, or if there's something I can do to improve it.

The video image refreshes at a rate of about once every 3 seconds, and the picture quality looks like something from video chat circa 1998. The only thing I found in the iSight manual about choppy video was to lower the MBPS if your internet connection is slow. I tested my internet speed this morning and it's at a perfectly acceptable 10.5 mbps. But nonetheless I tried every speed setting available on the Message video preferences and there was no change.

The iSight is connected to my firewire port via a 400/800 adapter, IEEE1394A 1394B.

Thank you.

OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.5)

Posted on Mar 4, 2014 10:28 AM

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Answer 1

EZ Jim

Level 7

22,590 points

Mar 5, 2014 5:57 AM in response to ecm1171

Your old iSight may have problems. Here are the things I know you can try:

(0) Use good (bright) lighting and take your time while starting iSight tests.

(1) How to test external iSight to ensure it is functional.

Be sure to test on a different network and another Mac.

(2) Apple's How to Troubleshoot iSight. Be sure to test more than oneApple camera app

in more than oneuser account if your trouble continues.

(3) Apple's iSight Service FAQs includes info about where to get external iSight serviced.

(4) Try a different Firewire cable and / or adapter unless you know yours are good.

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