This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of faceVsion Technology USA. All opinions are 100% mine.
I’ve been on a few business trips. I like them, overall– it’s a nice opportunity to get out of the house. But it must be extremely laborious to go on business trips regularly (and expensive, too!). Sure, there’s always video conference calls… but I have tried Skype and Windows Live, and… let’s just say that the quality leaves something to be desired. Very “skippy” and blotchy. And, really, for a video conference call to look and feel professional, you really need a nice web cam. Those cheesy little $30 ones just won’t do when you’re discussing you next big idea to the boss.
Thankfully, technology is swelling with options to make conference calls easier and affordable for the small business person. The best I’ve seen on the market so far is faceVsion. FaceVision does what other HD cams, such as Microsoft Cinema and Logitech Pro 9000, cannot do– stream high resolution live video over the Internet with clarity. The FV Express Combo from FaceVision Technology USA has a special chipset and encoder/decoder to provide really clear video. The nice thing is that it’s affordable, too. You can make video calls through Gmail, too– the FV Express Combo allows you to sync your Gmail contact list to your HD contact list.
There’s much more to the faceVision technology– see the faceVision on line store for more details and a good intro video. There’s a great promotion going on– save $10 off any purchase with the promo code FVTBTS2 . This ends on September 30, 2010, so don’t delay.
I’ve been researching various voip options, both for my home phone service and my iPod. Phone service is SOOO expensive. It’s crazy, how expensive it is! And cell phone service is even more expensive. I just don’t understand why, after all these years, service is still so pricey. Voip, or Voice Over Internet Protocol, is a digital voice service through a computer. And now, it’s also through the iPod, iPhone, and iPad. I have an iPod Touch– a very basic one– that I love. I’d like to look into getting an iPad or iPhone sometime in the near future… but I dislike paying the sky-high prices for cellular service.
There’s a terrific new app I have heard about called Line2. It’s gotten a good review from PCMag, and is available on the AppSafari’s site. It’s touted as a “very flexible” iPod Touch voip, although it can be used for voip iPhone and iPad. There’s a good video at the site. Looks very easy to use.
It is expensive, $15 a month. But that’s still a lot less than cell phone service ($70/month for the most basic plan), and there’s no long-term contract. Of course, voip is more of a supplement than a full-fledged phone plan… but still, it’s a great option. And Line2 apparently is able to make calls when the cell service signal is weak or non-existent. That’s pretty cool.
I was given a link to a good website today. I’d been having web hosting server problems, and it seemed that somewhere down the pike between my computer and my server at Hostgator, I was encountering connection problems. The tech support dude gave me a link to a website where I can check all the connections “down the pike.” Checking the IP connection is called “pinging.” The site is PingPlotter.
Let’s run through a basic scenario where we discover the route between your computer and an interesting destination (maybe one you’re having a problem with).
Normally, when troubleshooting a problem, you want to run PingPlotter against the server where you’re experiencing problems. Maybe that’s a web server (in which case, you’ll want to enter that web server’s address); maybe it’s a game server (in which case you’ll want to enter that game server’s address). If you aren’t experiencing problems with your network connection or something you access with it currently, no worries – just think of something you access regularly with your Internet connection to use in the exercise below. If you really can’t think of anything right now, feel free to use something interesting like quikorder.pizzahut.com or bigmac1.mcd.com. It doesn’t have to be food related either… If you don’t like Pizza Hut or McDonalds, and can’t come up with a server off the top of your head, use www.pingplotter.com.
It’s a free program that you download and use. I’m definitely going to check it out.
This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of faceVsion Technology USA. All opinions are 100% mine.
This is pretty cool. It’s the FV touchcam N1. I’ve never been very fond of webcams, generally speaking, until I traveled without the kids and husband recently. The webcam became a very important tool– everyone missed the mom while I was away! The webcam helped ease the homesickness. And it also gave the kids the opportunity to look into my “travel” world and see everything around me. I’ve also utilized Skype for a few business and educational exploits, too. So I guess I am slowly making more use of the webcam and “video conferencing” more frequently as my career develops.
Unfortunately, the webcam and the software with it has been horribly slow. Most webcams that are labeled as “high definition” (HD) are pitifully inadequate. The images are blurry, the sounds jerky. The cam I used while traveling stuttered a lot, and the connection was very slow. So when I heard about faceVsion, I was interested.
Basically,the faceVsion TouchCam N1 is a superior, high-quality webcam with touch capabilities and extremely high-definition quality, allowing your webcam video to stream up to 720p. There’s a very good video on the website that showcases the webcam– nice!
The faceVsion webcam has an H.264 hardware encoder built in Touchcam N1, which enables true HD quality. So it’s great for travel and business use. There’s also something called the FV ExpressCombo that offers an express card so you can use the HD webcam even if you have a slower, less-powered CPU computer. Looks nice!
Webcams are not that expensive. If you use them a lot, or need one for business, spend a couple of extra bucks and get something NICE. There’s a faceVision on line store that has more information and products. The faceVsion TouchCam N1 is certified for Skype. It’s an easy, plug-and-play cam small enough for any laptop or desktop or monitor, and big enough in quality to really make you go wow. Cool!
I tried GoToMyPC this week, while I was away on a trip. I liked it! I took part in the free trial for 30 days… after that, it’s $15 a month. Gulp. I rarely travel for long periods of time, so I don’t think I’ll be needing it anymore. But if I do start to travel extensively, I’ll probably use it.
I first heard about it from Kim Komando (GoToMyPC sponsors her). It was better than I thought it was– very easy to download, to run. The connection between the two computers seemed a little sluggish, but not too bad. GoToMyPC is not paying me at all, I’m merely mentioning then in case you need something like it.
Basically, GoToMyPC is a remote-controller. You install the program on your host PC. You must create an account and also a username and password to access the host computer. You can log in to your host computer while away, to access your email, bookmarks, passwords, etc. I found it very useful, and much more secure than entering in my personal data on a public machine or on a public WiFi connection that can be read by scammers.
You must leave your host computer ON while you are away, however. If you have power settings that shut off your hard drive while idle, you must turn this off.
So I give it a thumbs up. It was very easy and straighforward to use. However, $15 a month is really steep, especially when there’s LogMeIn which is absolutely free.
![[del.icio.us]](http://images.del.icio.us/static/img/delicious.small.gif){kind=small}
