Looking for a decent webcam to purchase for my Mom to chat with her sisters. Nothing fancy but not trash either. She has graduated from emails, to MSN to Skype and is now wanting to do video. Her HSI runs light at about 5.5MBs down and 1.5 up. Her PC is old (forget specs) but I have a decent video card that will fit it, should that prove a limiting factor.

Since I'll end up having to buy two (no good getting her one and not at least one of her sisters to get them going) price is a consideration.

Thanks ahead. You guys are always a wealth of information on almost any topic so I'm sure this will be worth asking here while I browse some review sights as well.

I'd have a look at Microsoft cameras, and possibly Logitech. Stay away from Creative.

One of my friends got a Microsoft camera. It has the worst low-light picture I've seen in 10 years. Get a Logitech.

I'm just concerned about drivers, hence the total shunning of Creative.

I'm generally a willing participant in any given effort to "shun".

Seems like this question got asked here before and the answer was Logitech.

Have you guys ever put a mint in your nose? It's cold.

I don't know if this works on PCs, but on a Mac with a Firewire port I found out that you can connect any camera with Firewire and use it as a webcam. I found that this includes an old JVC digital video camera (Hi8) that I had lying around. Very useful.

Does your mom's PC have Firewire? I know a lot of older Sony computers did. If so, any old Firewire camcorder might work.

I've been happy with my Logitech QuickCam Pro 9000, but it's probably not as cheap as you'd like. I actually gave it to my mom a while ago. She got quite a bit of use out of it on Skype, and people would comment on how good the picture was, but then she got an iMac, so she didn't need it anymore. I have it again. Though I've only used it once since getting it back, I did get a comment on how good the picture was.

Thanks, now I have to clean coffee off my keyboard!! BCNLOL!

On the plus side, I invented a new webonym, "Blowing Coffee out NOSE_LOL"

And I blew mint all over mine.....

Sneezing white powder again Mark?

Sounds like Logitech it is, a few web pages last night seem to agree. Some praise for Microsoft Lifecams as well but Logitech gets more concensus from real people on forums which I tend to trust more than magazine reviewers.

Thanks all!

Heh heh. Ha. Bwa ha ha ha ha! MWUAH HA HA HA HA HAHA!