AOL Photocam Plus Digital Camera DC-620?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Frederick
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Frederick

I hope this is not OT, but I could find no better news group to post
this.

I have inherited an older digital camera that seems to work fine -
that is after I replaced the batteries. It is an AOL Photocam Plus
DC-620. It takes pics nicely. If I could find a way to connect it to
my XP SP3 computer in order to upload the pics, I would give it to one
of my kids. But alas, I cannot seem to be able to do that. I do have
the USB connected, and I have installed a software driver that
eliminates error- flags in XP Device Manager. That software is called
Digital Camera 640X480 USB Controller. But the XP machine still does
not recognize the camera.

Anyone have any experience with this camera? If not, I guess I will
pitch it. Maybe I am not doing something right? Being quite
fallible, I probably am. In my case, it would be called a permanent
senior moment.

Paul?

Thanks

Frederick
 
Frederick said:
I hope this is not OT, but I could find no better news group to post
this.

I have inherited an older digital camera that seems to work fine -
that is after I replaced the batteries. It is an AOL Photocam Plus
DC-620. It takes pics nicely. If I could find a way to connect it to
my XP SP3 computer in order to upload the pics, I would give it to one
of my kids. But alas, I cannot seem to be able to do that. I do have
the USB connected, and I have installed a software driver that
eliminates error- flags in XP Device Manager. That software is called
Digital Camera 640X480 USB Controller. But the XP machine still does
not recognize the camera.

Anyone have any experience with this camera? If not, I guess I will
pitch it. Maybe I am not doing something right? Being quite
fallible, I probably am. In my case, it would be called a permanent
senior moment.

Paul?

Thanks

Frederick
Click to expand...

Here is a manual.

User Manual

http://web.archive.org/web/20040727200340/http://www.pretec.com/Camera_Manuals/Photocam_Plus.pdf

Your best bet, is to transfer photos via using a CF card. Doing
so, saves on battery life, and also cluttering the PC with more
bad software.

1) Insert CF into camera. Shoot photos.

2) Turn off camera. Pull CF, and plug CF into USB-based card reader
(some card readers accept as many as 57 different kinds of
storage media). Or use a dedicated USB to CF dongle (some photographers
do it that way).

3) Using the card reader, the CF will appear as a mass storage device,
and you can transfer off the images that way. Be careful where you
"format" the CF, as some cameras only accept their own formatting.
Hopefully, the camera has a menu item to format the CF media.
(Check that manual.)

The camera is 640x480, so don't expect miracles.

You can stop reading right here :-)

*******

The Win2K driver for the camera, mentions "TWAIN", but I don't understand
the reference. Methods of transferring off photos include USB Mass Storage,
PTP, MTP. Whereas things like TWAIN (old) and WIA (new) are methods for
transferring a live image from the thing as far as I know. (On checking
Wikipedia, TWAIN may do more than that. If so, the issue would be,
no WinXP version of driver. Presumably it hides the details of the device.)

There are driver sites offering a driver, but they also install...
you guessed it... Ask Toolbar.

For some reason, the camera has the same digital identification over
USB, as Polaroid pdc 700. But Polaroid went out of business long ago.
Links like this will no longer work. (The form factor of the DC-620
is different than the PDC700, but the electronics inside could
be virtually identical - same chip and sensor.)

http://www.polaroid.com/en/service/software/photomax/pdc700_twain_driver.exe

I ended up here.

http://web.archive.org/web/20020701...ice/software/photomax/pdc700_twain_driver.exe

The file sizes and contents are very similar to the DC-620 driver.
The AOL driver installs DCCamera.sys and the Polaroid installs PDC700.sys
and while the file sizes aren't exactly the same (173,920 versus 173,576 bytes),
I expect they're the same type of driver. They even use the same
ClassGUID 6bdd1fc6-810f-11d0-bec7-08002be2092f

So if you want to pour junk into your OS, you could try the
pdc700_twain_driver.exe . (But you say you've already installed
the one for the DC_620, so I suppose there is no point now. You're
as ready as you can be right now, at the TWAIN level.)

I tested the driver installer in WINE under Ubuntu, just to be able
to look at the files is spews out. I don't like to install the
drivers in my regular OS.

With the TWAIN driver loaded, you still need application
level software. There is a description here, of some of the
things TWAIN can do.

http://www.eztwain.com/twain1.htm

"If appropriate, the application may transfer multiple images until it chooses
to stop, or until the DS signals that no more images are available."

Perhaps that's how the camera software would have worked. You
need an application that understands TWAIN, and will transfer
out the images over USB. The application was probably separate
from the driver, and written by a different company, and "AOL"
bundled the two items on their enclosed CD.

Paul
 
Hi Paul
How do you know all this stuff? You are a bundle of knowledge for
sure. For which I thank you.

Here is a manual.

User Manual

http://web.archive.org/web/20040727200340/http://www.pretec.com/Camera_Manuals/Photocam_Plus.pdf
Click to expand...

I downloaded it and have scanned it.
Your best bet, is to transfer photos via using a CF card. Doing
so, saves on battery life, and also cluttering the PC with more
bad software.
Click to expand...

I found no mention of a CF card in the pdf file. The camera 'menu'
does mention such a card, but as yet I see no 'format'. The camera
has a female slot some 1.5" to 2" wide on its bottom. Do you know if
this is where a CF card would insert? I would buy a cheapee just to
try one, if I were sure it would fit. Tell me what I should buy? I
have never used a CF card.

Frederick
 
Frederick said:
Hi Paul
How do you know all this stuff? You are a bundle of knowledge for
sure. For which I thank you.



I downloaded it and have scanned it.


I found no mention of a CF card in the pdf file. The camera 'menu'
does mention such a card, but as yet I see no 'format'. The camera
has a female slot some 1.5" to 2" wide on its bottom. Do you know if
this is where a CF card would insert? I would buy a cheapee just to
try one, if I were sure it would fit. Tell me what I should buy? I
have never used a CF card.

Frederick
Click to expand...

Perhaps you could take the camera to a camera store, and see if they
can identify the socket ?

I could find a few references, to people plugging something in to it,
but you're right, after browsing the manual, I can't find a reference
to it.

The available pictures of the camera, don't show that kind of detail,
so I can't verify any of this.

On this page, the CF socket appears to be male, meaning the CF
device itself must be female. It looks like two rows of pins,
and a fair number of pins. Try comparing to the photo here.

http://www.dansdata.com/io079.htm

I don't have any CF, memory cards, or the like here. I don't
even have a digital camera. Just a webcam and that's it.

I wasted $1000 on film based camera equipment years ago and
never really used it much (just a few photos off the tops of
mountains), and I guess as a result, never got interested
in wasting more money on a digital version.

Paul
 
Perhaps you could take the camera to a camera store, and see if they
can identify the socket ?
Click to expand...

Goood idea. I do see in the camera's menu a selection for format,
but when I select that it seems to want to erase and format the
internal memory wherein some old pics reside from prior user.
Of course with no CF card plugged in, what else is there to format.
I could find a few references, to people plugging something in to it,
but you're right, after browsing the manual, I can't find a reference
to it.
Click to expand...

There is a symbol on the camera 'door' covering the slot which I swear
looks like PCMCIA, but I really would be surprised at that. A camera
store is the best bet.
The available pictures of the camera, don't show that kind of detail,
so I can't verify any of this.

On this page, the CF socket appears to be male, meaning the CF
device itself must be female. It looks like two rows of pins,
and a fair number of pins. Try comparing to the photo here.

http://www.dansdata.com/io079.htm
Click to expand...

CF cards now for sale appear to be male to me, much resembling the
present-day SD cards. Certainly the camera slot is a receptacle
about 1 1/2 - 2 inches wide.
I don't have any CF, memory cards, or the like here. I don't
even have a digital camera. Just a webcam and that's it.

I wasted $1000 on film based camera equipment years ago and
never really used it much (just a few photos off the tops of
mountains), and I guess as a result, never got interested
in wasting more money on a digital version.

Paul
Click to expand...

Maybe I should just forget it.

Thanks

Frederick
 
Frederick said:
Maybe I should just forget it.

Thanks

Frederick
Click to expand...

It all depends on the picture quality.

Maybe it's the perfect camera for hiking or
situations where it could fall in mud, take a shock,
where you might regret damage to a better camera :-)

Paul
 
It all depends on the picture quality.

Maybe it's the perfect camera for hiking or
situations where it could fall in mud, take a shock,
where you might regret damage to a better camera :-)

Paul
Click to expand...


Good point. Let me see what I can determine about the CF card thing.
Let ya know.
Thanks.
Frederick
 
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