Skype: Free High Quality Videoconferencing for the Small Firm
While there are several instant messaging programs that are now incorporating two-way audio and video communications, Skype is by far the industry’s most popular free platform. 50 million different Skype names have been registered.
Up until now, free video conference software was limited to resolutions hovering around 320×240. This is little lower than the resolution of a standard definition television. To give you an idea, almost all computer monitors are now have at least 1024×768 pixels. The highest resolution HD TVs are 1920×1080. Most modern laptops and larger flat panel LCD computer screens fall somewhere between 1024×768 and 1920×1080. The following graphic demonstrates the difference between some of the resolutions. Compare the pink box (representing a standard definition TV) to the green and blue boxes (representing the 720 and 1080 HDTV standards).
Video conference software usually allows you to blow up the video image to full screen. The problem with blowing up a video that is only about 320×240 to full screen is that something called pixelation occurs. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pixelation. The same problem occurs when you watch a standard definition television program on an HDTV. With increasingly high resolution displays almost everywhere now video conferencing at 320×240 is very awkward and unimpressive. In order to video conference at higher resolutions than 320×240, it has been necessary to invest in expensive software, complicated network setups, and expensive high resolution webcams. High quality video conferencing is now available for free.
Skype now offers a High Quality configuration with DVD resolution of 640×480 at up to 30 frames per second. (Note: most DVDs are actually 720×480 in widescreen). The increased image quality facilitates very lifelike communication.
What do I need to get High Quality Video?
If you want to make High Quality Video calls - our clearest, crispest, sharpest ever video quality, you’ll need the latest version of Skype for windows, an optimised Logitech High Quality Video webcam with the latest webcam software. Plus a dual core processor PC and a fast broadband connection.
Basically, in order to get the high quality function to work, you will have to have a webcam capable producing video in 640×480. Just look at the specs to see if it is 320×240 or 640×480. A word of caution though: webcams can “image capture” at higher resolutions than they can “video capture.” Video capture resolution is the only one you care about. The only webcams that will “automatically” work for the new high quality feature are the following.
Logitech Quickcam Pro 9000
- Autofocus and Carl Zeiss optics make video stay razor sharp, even in close-ups.
- High-Def 2.0MP Video and 8MP* photos mean images never looked more real.
- RightLightTM 2 Technology corrects for poor lighting so you always look your best.
Regular Price: $99.99
Sale Price: $94.99
Logitech Quickcam Pro for Notebooks
- Autofocus and Carl Zeiss optics make video stay razor sharp, even in close-ups.
- High-Def 2.0MP Video and 8MP* photos mean images never looked more real.
- RightLightTM 2 Technology corrects for poor lighting so you always look your best.
$99.99
NEW! Logitech QuickCam Orbit AF
- Mechanical pan and tilt follows you around the room.
- Autofocus and Carl Zeiss optics make video stay razor sharp, even in close-ups.
- High-Def 2.0MP Video and 8MP* photos mean images never looked more real!
Regular Price: $129.99
Sale Price: $119.99
If you do not have one of these cameras or if you want to get even higher quality video, there is a very simple hack to the skype config.xml file that will enable 640×480 with other cameras and hardware.
High Quality Video has been introduced in Skype 3.6 and is enabled for everyone who has proper hardware for getting out the maximum quality.
You may use this hack to get higher resolution and framerate video on hardware which is not designed for High Quality Video Calls, .
We don’t provide support for these instructions. You need to be confident enough to mess around with your computer and edit configuration files.
You need to do the following to use near-DVD-quality video calls.
Video hardware
You will need special hardware to support high resolutions. Most webcams don’t go beyond 320×240 resolution and basic framerates, so you need to use something that can do that. We have been testing it with Sony EVID100P, there may be other devices that can do this.
Instead of USB, Sony EVID100P uses S-Video input, so you will need to get the S-Video signal to your computer. There are two ways to do that.
One way is to use a video card that has S-Video input. We are using ATI Radeon X1900 GT. Another way is to use S-Video to USB bridge, like Belkin Hi-Speed USB 2.0 DVD Creator.
A third way is to use a USB webcam that can deliver high resolution/framerate directly over USB.
Please tell us if you have tried out some other hardware - see below for feedback options.
General hardware and Internet connection
You will need a good computer on both sides. The minimum requirement is having a DualCore processor. As with every high-end application, “the faster the better”.
As for Internet, the absolute minimum upload speed you can get away with is 128 kbit/s. With minimal packetloss, this should be sufficient. With a worse connection that drops packets, you may need as much as 512 kbit/s uplink.
Here is the DXDiag output from our test computer. dxdiag.txt
Software configuration
Install the latest public version of Skype 3.0 or newer for Windows.
Open config.xml in Skype settings directory. Find the <Video> section under <config>/<Lib>. Add the following additional parameters in it. (It probably already has some other settings in <Video>, just leave those there.)
<Video> <CaptureHeight>480</CaptureHeight> <CaptureWidth>640</CaptureWidth> <Device>ATI T200 AVStream Analog Capture</Device> <Fps>25</Fps> </Video>You of course need to replace the device name in the <Device> setting with your own device name. You can see the device information if you run “dxdiag” and then save its output as text file (see above for example).
You have to explicitly pick the ATI device as device you want to use in the settings. I.e. not “default device”, even if that is your only device or it is first in the list.
Now check in Skype configuration that you have the video format set to PAL_D.
Install ffdshow-tryout. The version we were using for testing was FFdshow-20060828-rev2546.exe. Make sure it’s configured as shown on the picture below. In particular, see that “Raw video” is set to “all supported”, and that the “Deinterlacing” checkbox is checked. If you don’t do this, you may get interlaced video that has much worse quality.
