Look good anywhere! - Dell UltraSharp 4K Webcam
ShortCircuit
·ShortCircuit
·2022-05-05
·
1,703 words · ~8 min read
0:00
- Oh, today we're going to look at something with a massive Sony sensor.
0:05
Well, not that massive, but it still is pretty big for a webcam.
0:09
This here is a Dell Ultrasharp Webcam, yeah, that's it, and it looks awesome.
0:14
It features a Sony DSLR sensor,
0:17
which, even though you know, it's not gonna be like this,
0:22
compared to any other webcam I'm pretty sure
0:25
it's gonna blow it out of the water, so. Looking at the back here it says we have
0:29
one over 2.8 inch large sensor,
0:32
which is a difficult way to say that. Also .35 of an inch and 9 millimeters.
0:38
Much prefer either of those ways to say it.
0:41
Magnets in the box, that's fancy. I guess it is a $200 webcam,
0:45
so you can expect things to be fancy. It's just like a little tube.
0:48
We have a USB-C to type A cable.
0:52
We also have, looks like a little stand with a 1/4-20 thread on the bottom.
0:57
This one here, that you attach to like the top of your monitor,
1:01
that's kind of your standard webcam mount. A little quick start guide.
1:05
Yup, plug it in, attach it to your monitor, you're good to go.
1:09
Wow, that is pretty big for a webcam. That's a pretty fine looking piece of glass there.
1:14
They do have a multi element design. So on a multi element design, let's kind of look at this.
1:19
You can have a problem that when the light hits the sensor, if it doesn't hit it perpendicular,
1:24
it looks bad because the colors can change.
1:27
So multi element is trying to get all of the light
1:30
that's going in to hit the sensor as perpendicular as possible.
1:35
Here we have a couple of cool other things. So they have a little proximity sensor.
1:39
I don't know if you can quite see that in there, it's dark.
1:42
And I don't know which one's which, but there's a proximity sensor
1:46
and Window's Hello facial recognition. So, in some laptops, like the XPS15,
1:52
you have a combination IR and normal camera sensor in there.
1:57
And that can cause problems where the IR sensor
2:01
makes things look purpley and weird colored. So that's why they have basically two webcams in one,
2:07
but one of them only does the IR detection. The big selling point on this thing though
2:11
is the large sensor. So Dell says that it's from a Sony DSLR camera.
2:16
So right here we have, you know, a full frame sensor.
2:19
This right here, this is a beautiful thing. Yeah, 35mm across.
2:24
The one in here would be about 9mm.
2:27
And basically, the more bigger, the better. The larger the pixel, the more light that can hit it,
2:32
the better your image, the better your low light performance. One thing that is similar between these two
2:37
is it has back illuminated technology. So basically, in a normal sensor you have, you know,
2:43
the light that comes in and there's a metal wiring in front of it that delivers electricity
2:48
and stuff to your pixels, and a lot of it to read data and so on.
2:51
And then your photo diodes are below that. Whereas in this, and this guy here,
2:57
you have the photo diodes on top, and the metal wiring below it.
3:00
So you don't potentially have your little light rays coming in, bouncing off of that metal wiring,
3:04
and not giving good picture. Because of that, you also receive more light,
3:09
which can increase your low light performance.
3:12
Oh, the magnet's directional. So it only goes in one way.
3:16
And it's pretty strong, too. I like that it is a directional magnet,
3:19
because it would be pretty easy to accidentally put this on backwards, set it up,
3:24
and then you go to turn it on, you're like. I do really like this lens cap though.
3:28
It's just magnetic. Actually, before we plug this in, let's just get a baseline of what the famously bad webcam
3:35
on this XPS15 looks like. A web cam that looks like this on a $2,000 laptop.
3:41
In fairness, I do understand why they did this. It has to go into a super small space.
3:45
You can't put a big sensor in a small bezel, but yeah, it still is a bit annoying.
3:50
This thing does feel, it does feel really good. I believe all of the outside is aluminum.
3:55
It looks premium. Oh, that's cool. Thing just boots right up.
3:59
Select a preset that suits your style and how you want to appear on camera.
4:03
Default, smooth, yeah beauty filter, vibrant, we'll just go with default and continue.
4:10
High dynamic range, why wouldn't I want that? Proximity sensor, walk away lock, wake on approach.
4:15
Sure. That's quite the set up. This is definitely designed to be used on desktops.
4:21
Private Internet Access is a VPN that allows you to access services and websites
4:25
as if you were in a different country. It encrypts all of your internet traffic, and uses a safe, protected IP.
4:30
Connect up to 10 devices at once, with clients for Windows, macOS, Android, iOS and Linux.
4:35
Buy a one year plan for $39.95 at the link in the video description.
4:38
So let's see, we have AI auto framing. So I guess if I move around, does it?
4:45
Oh it does. That's kinda cool.
4:49
Oh I have like weird distortion over here now.
4:52
So I guess that it's a wide lens. It's currently on 90 degrees,
4:56
and the other ones are digital zooms. So you do definitely want to stay kind of
5:01
in the center but it does a pretty good job of following me around.
5:05
Hello, camera, can you get me?
5:09
So you can change your field of view. It's a fixed lens, so you're just digitally zooming.
5:14
But it does do a pretty good job. I am really impressed with how
5:17
it's able to manage this scene. So you've kind of got like, that's a light,
5:21
that's really bright. You've also got a lot of dark.
5:25
This wall back here, all of this is really challenging,
5:28
but it's doing a really great job of just exposing for my face
5:32
instead of exposing for just random things that it picks up in the background.
5:36
That can be a real problem on, well, any camera,
5:39
but laptop webcams in particular. The zoom.
5:44
It's just a digital zoom. It doesn't look fantastic.
5:48
This feels kind of weird now. The priority, it says exposure or frame rate.
5:55
Why would you have to choose between those? I'm guessing that they're changing the shutter speed
5:59
in order to give you more exposure in low light situations.
6:03
Can we turn the lights down here? So it just got a lot darker.
6:06
Exposure's coming up. This is a really challenging situation for a webcam,
6:10
but also one that you'll end up in a lot. So this is kind of the classic,
6:13
you're sitting in front of a window, you're really dark and everything else behind you is really light.
6:19
It's doing an okay job at this. But in fairness this is a really tough situation,
6:24
I don't even know how it looks on that, probably fine. Let's see what happens
6:28
if I change it to frame rate priority. So I'm doing this on frame rate priority.
6:34
And then we go to exposure priority, and huh.
6:40
It's kind of hard to tell, but I do think that is making a difference.
6:44
It seems way more jello-y. The exposure on this is really good.
6:47
Like the way that it automatically just changes. Take a look at this.
6:52
So I'm moving the white balance. That's too blue.
6:56
This is really hard to do. All right, well auto white balance, leave that on.
7:00
That's my conclusion from that. That's at Dell, it would be really nice
7:03
if you had numbers in there, pretty please. That would be a great update.
7:07
So, sharpness. So I guess on a normal day
7:11
you might wanna turn that up a bit so that you look nice and crisp.
7:14
But then, if you're having kind of a bad day, you take it over to the left.
7:18
So if you have like a pimple, you can't quite see it. (laughs)
7:21
This is all pretty standard camera stuff, but it's fun to play with it.
7:24
So let's compare these. This is a very practical camera to have as your webcam.
7:31
Going to talk into it here. It's a bit heavy.
7:35
So bit out of most peoples budgets when it comes to webcams, for sure.
7:39
But it can deliver just, I imagine,
7:43
stunning video quality if I'm able to hold it (laughs) - The resolution was in full HD,
7:48
you didn't even use like 4K. - What?
7:52
Dang it. I can't believe that. See, this is why you have camera operators.
7:57
Frame rate seems way lower now. I am like a jello-y mess.
8:00
That must be why they were doing that. They were both set to 30, I believe.
8:05
So this right here is 4K,
8:08
the best that this camera can give you. Now, looking at it, especially like the sharpness and such,
8:15
this seems really good. I am impressed.
8:18
We just recorded the whole video in 1080p, damn it.
8:21
So yeah, thanks for watching guys (laughs) - [Andy] Hey, you know, the 1080p is good.
8:26
You know that the 4K one is even better - Yeah, if the 1080p is good, the 4K's even better.
8:31
This is an exceptional webcam. I do have to say. 200 bucks? This seems pretty compelling if you need it.
8:38
So anyway, yeah. This is the Dell Ultrasharp webcam, WB7022.
8:44
I think it's a wicked little piece of tech. Hope you guys have a great day.
8:47
Hit like, get subscribed. So long.