[IOXperts Video-Announce] IOXperts Video Drivers 1.1b30 Available

[Steve Sisak]

Sorry for the delay in getting this updated beta out -- as many of 
you discovered, there were some issues with 1.1b27 which took awhile 
to resolve on the video-beta-discuss list.

This will probably be the LAST BETA before final candidate, so PLEASE TEST.

Please send any bugs/comments to <support at ioxperts.com> -- also, if 
the driver is working well for you, please drop us an note as well 
with your machine configuration, OS and applications you are using so 
we have an idea what's being covered and what's not.

At this point I believe we have all application compatibility bugs 
addressed except for the IOXperts Video Control application not being 
able to communicate with the driver when it's running in the Apple 
iApps (iChat AV and iMovie).

We hope to resolve this soon, but it may wait until 1.1.1 if the 
change is too severe.

The only other known bug is incorrect range values in the manual 
color balance sliders for some webcams -- this will be fixed before 
final release, we are consulting with the camera manufacturer for the 
correct values.

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READ THIS: We are seeing an installer problem on Mac OS X when 
installing the webcam driver over an older beta -- our current guess 
is we changed the 'c' in Webcam to lower case and the Apple installer 
gets confused.

If this happens and you open the installer log, you will see something like:

Jan 30 13:43:09 : Name: NSInvalidPackageException
Jan 30 13:43:09 : Reason: Can't open package 
/Library/Receipts/Webcam.pkg (there was an error reading the file 
Webcam.bom).

To fix the problem delete /Library/Receipts/Webcam.pkg and install again.

---

Both the MacOS 9 and X installers are posted.

As of this release, we've cleaned up the ftp server so that of the 
installers for a video release are in the same folder. 1.1b30 is 
located here:

   <ftp://ftp2.ioxperts.com/IOXperts/Video/Beta/1.1b30>
   <ftp://ftp.ioxperts.com/IOXperts/Video/Beta/1.1b30>

Note that ftp2 is the fastest server -- also we have just replaced 
the PowerMac 8100/80 that was ftp with a Dual G4/450 -- the DNS for 
ftp.ioxperts.com hasn't fully propagated across the net, so you can 
use the new server's canonical name for the next few days:

   <ftp://splinter.ioxperts.com/IOXperts/Video/Beta/1.1b30>

As of 1.1b30 there are also logging versions of all of the drivers 
which can be used to help us isolate bugs and by developers to debug 
video applications. See the archive of the video-beta-discuss list 
for instructions.

For Mac OS X, there are 2 installers:

   IOXWebcamX    -- for all USB and FireWire webcams
   IOXIIDCX      -- high-end industrial IIDC cameras ($99)

For Mac OS 9, there are 4:

   IOXUSBWebcam9  -- all USB cameras
   IOXiSight9     -- Apple iSight
   IOXFwWebcam9   -- all other FIreWire Webcams
   IOXIIDC9       -- IIDC cameras ($99)

* The definition of 'webcam' for the FireWire drivers is the Apple 
iSight or any camera based on the Texas Instruments TSB15LV01 chip 
set (pretty much any camera under $200).


The reason for splitting up the 9 driver is that it allows us to ship 
a single driver file for each camera rather than forcing you to 
install a bunch of extensions unless you have more than one type of 
camera.

Please note that the list of supported USB cameras is slightly 
different for 9 and X -- we've been having some problems with one of 
the chip sets on Mac OS 9 and didn't want to hold up the entire 
release to get working.

Our goal is to support all cameras on both operating systems, but 
there may be periods where one is in better shape than than the other 
and we'd rather not hold back the ones that are working.

I believe we are very close to shipping so please test thoroughly -- 
If you have any comments or questions, please let us know.

Thanks,

-Steve

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Changes in 1.1b30
* Fixed black video problem in some applications

Changes in 1.1b27:
* Fixed a problem with QT Broadcaster and SecuritySpy.
* Fixed a crash seen with SecuritySpy.
* Fixed a problem switching between cameras.
* Fixed a problem with some camera state not being properly initialized.

Changes in 1.1b26:
* Fixed problems with QuickTime 6.4 on Jaguar and Panther
* Fixed potential crash with Purchase Application
* Mac OS 9 drivers are now separate for USB, FireWire and iSight.
* Mac OS 9 users should remove old versions of the following files
   from their extensions folder:
     IOXperts FireWire Webcam
     IOXperts FireWire Cameras
     IOXperts Type 1 Camera
     IOXperts Type 2 Camera

Changes in 1.1b25
* Introduction of Mac OS 9 USB support for many cameras see below for 
currently list.  Remaining cameras supported by Mac OS X, will come 
to Mac OS 9 soon.
* Fixed sliders to work on QT6.4
* Fixed some problems which could cause partially green video on some cameras
* Fixed problem installing which would cause cameras to show as 
Philips Vesta Scan
* Improved startup of some cameras by caching values
* Fixed problem which might cause incorrect color on some cameras
* Crash quitting application after unplugging some cameras
* Fixed cropping on RGB video

Changes for 1.1b24;

* Major rework to correct interaction between flip/crop/zoom

Changes for 1.1b22;

* Eliminated startup delay for some cameras

Summary of 1.1 features:

* Separate retail and OEM versions:

We now have two versions of the IOXperts Webcam Driver, IOXperts 
Webcam Driver LE, and the Retail IOXperts Webcam.

* People who have purchased the retail driver, will continue to get 
all of the retail driver features.

* IOXperts Camera Control (ICC) for OS X for retail driver.  Look in
/Applications/Utilities.  ICC let's you control the camera even when 
the host application doesn't have a video settings dialog.  (iChat, 
and Yahoo Messenger for example.)

* Face Tracking for OS X retail driver.  This will automatically zoom,
pan and tilt to follow a face.

* Fixed problem installing over earlier versions of IOXperts FireWire driver

* New cameras supported:

   Aiptek HyperVcam Fun USB (some)
   AME CU-68R
   Ariston iSeeII
   Askey VC050
   Creative Video Blaster Webcam 2
   Creative Webcam Pro eX
   D-Link DSB-C100 (some)
   Digicom Galileo USB
   Dynalink Digital Camera
   Ezonics EZ Cam
   I-View NetView NV200M
   IO Data USB-CCDChat
   Microtek EyeStar
   Mustek VCAM-300
   Pace Contour Video Camera
   SuperCam WonderEye
   TCE Netcam 310 USB
   Tekcom TekCam 10/ECP
   Tekcom TekCam 10/USB
   Terratec Terracam USB (some)
   Timlex WonderEye
   Trust Sp at ceC@m 100
   Trust Sp at ceC@m Lite
   Utobia USB Camera
   Zoom CU-68R
   Zoom ZoomCam 1595
   Zoom ZoomCam 1596

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_________________________________________________________________________
Steve Sisak, CTO                                 steve.sisak at ioxperts.com
IOXperts, Inc.                                            +1 617 876-2572