"New" HP Pavilion Notebooks

Here's an interesting question that I can't seem to find addressed anywhere online.

The Pavilion dv6000z, dv6000t, dv2000z, and dv2000t models, all released about a year ago, all were customizable with a built-in 1.3 Megapixel webcam.

However...fast forward to the present, and the "new" Pavilion notebook line (which include the same components, for the most part), including dv6700z, dv6700t, and dv2700t, also have a built-in webcam option...however, according to the website, the webcam quality has been downgraded to a 0.3MP VGA "low light" webcam.

My question is, why the downgrade? When I first came across this, I thought it might be someone's error when the website was updated for the new line...but, looking at the pictures of the new series, next to the webcam, it says "Web Cam" whereas the former models have "Web Cam 1.3MP" printed on them.

Does anyone have any info on this?

 

most other brands have also "downgraded" to 0.3MP...the reason being that, if i am not mistaken, it usually lags if u are video conferencing as 1.3MP will use more bandwidth. 0.3MP will use much lesser bandwidth and thus doesn't lag, with not much visible quality loss.

 

Yea I can understand too why they did it. Besides not many people use the webcam, it's therefore cheaper for the company to downgrade it.

 

i have the old 1.3mp dv2000 and i have the new ones aswell, i dont notice the difference at all to be honest. I didnt even know about it till i read this thread.

The only difference i noticed was it says HP 1.3mp next to the lens on the old ones and it just says HP on the newer models.

Most chat programs reduce the quality anyway to save bandwidth.

 

if you compare the 1.3 and .3 you'll find that the .3 actually gets a better fps

 

I have seen both in action and the fps is about the same

 

If the image sensor chip is the same size the 0.3MP chip will get much more light per pixel and have much better low-light capability. Just a guess. Very practical move if that's what they did.