Surface Pro 3 camera quality

Anonymous
2014-06-23T00:43:23+00:00

i posted this as a question so that the Microsoft techs can have some visibility of this issue

Frankly, I am lividand disappointed at the quality in this product. at first I assumed it was a firmware issue and/or a hardware issue but after performing all of the steps the tech support people have instructedand having been instructed to go the store and exchange for new hardware, I get the same issue.

so this leads me to believe it may just be the quality of the cameras microsoftshipped out on all of the devices

now these were releasednot too long ago and maybe there is a firmware fix out there but until then I am going to share the photos I am able to capture with everyone here 

now I am a student and I bought the pro 3 to be able to take a picture of a document or whiteboard and be able to write on it in onenote. the picture above is of a small target, a barcode, but even taking pictures of a full sized paper with standard size text, it is still almost illegible!

to compare the photos with another device I brought out another moble device: my ipod. the quality of the camera on the device I use to listen to music should surely be about the same quality of camera in the $1600 ten times the size of an ipod device I just bought right? NOT EVEN CLOSE

the first super clear picture is not from the pro 3 but from my ipod WHICH ALSO has a 5 MP camera. as you can see you can easily define everything in t he picture not only to include the sticker underneath the barcode , but the number in that 2D barcode as well. very good job!

the next horrible picture is the BEST PICTURE I could get from the rear camera on the Surface Pro 3. as you can see this is horrible, you can see it’s a bar code, you cannot tell those are numbers underneath. you could guess but you wouldn’t be able to identify any single number

the last picture is the BEST PICTURE I could get from the front camera, which is strangely odd since it is markedly better than the rear camera, although still severely sub-par. you can at least identify some numbers and see that there is a sticker underneath the barcode.

So there you have it. this is the horrible picture quality we can expect from the surface pro 3's cameras and how it compares to equivalent-megapixel MP3 players

Microsoft, If you can address this with a firmware update to make the cameras auto-focus, I will be a happy customer;even half the quality of my ipod I can work with. but this? this is unacceptable.

Surface | Surface Pro | Sound and camera

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Anonymous
2014-12-08T09:51:06+00:00

On Sun, 7 Dec 2014 21:06:04 +0000, OAKNOVA wrote:

>>I am quite disappointed with the camera on the Surface Pro 3 and its inability to focus and take sharp pictures of documents. These days even the most rudimentary and basic phone or camera can take sharp images that can be save, printed. I have to now take a photo with my Samsung phone and then email it to my account and download it as a saved image. Microsoft learn from Apple and create flawless products the first time around. I think I have wasted my money on the Surface Pro 3. Any fixes out there or should I just sell this product?

there is no software fix for this. the camera is fixed focus. here's what I did

as a kludge

http://digitalmediaphile.com/index.php/2014/09/23/get-glasses-for-surface-pro-3-for-clear-documents-take-2/

__________________________________________________________________________________________________

Barb

Windows Entertainment and Connected Home MVP

My Blog - http://digitalmediaphile.com/

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Anonymous
2014-11-02T17:11:37+00:00

There is no zoom. It is a fixed focus camera.

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  1. Anonymous
    2014-06-28T11:37:04+00:00

    While I don't enjoy paying a lot of money for a device like the Surface Pro 3 for a camera that cannot focus and take photos of documents. I have found a work around that actually might be better for my purposes as a teacher. Simply use the OneNote Android App and then use the far superior camera on my Samsung Note 3 to insert photos of student work and/or other documents. To be honest it's easier to take photos with a smaller device like the Note 3 rather than the Surface.  HOWEVER, that doesn't leave Microsoft off the hook. Consumers should not be paying over $1,000 for a premium device like the Surface Pro 3 to get an inferior camera. I am hoping that after 1 week in the marketplace Microsoft has realized that it will need to quickly make some upgrades to the Surface Pro 3 software so that the camera can work on par, or even better, than most smart phone cameras.

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  2. Anonymous
    2014-06-30T06:18:42+00:00

    If indeed the rear camera in the SP3 is fixed-focus, and not auto-focus, then that is a bad design decision by Microsoft. It rules out the use of the SP3 in a whole class of Line of Business applications for field service personnel.

    For example, when the contractors arrived at our house to install and commission the solar panels and electric inverter, the team leader had an iPad with a LoB application. It contained the work order details. Once the installation was commissioned, he used the iPad camera to photograph the serial number barcode of the inverter, and the serial number was used to activate the monitoring system in the cloud. He also photographed my paper copy of the work order, now complete with my signature, and the electronic copy was added into the business process application.

    The iPad has an auto-focus camera, and can be used in these sorts of applications. The SP3's fixed focus camera can't. Once again, Microsoft snatches defeat from the jaws of victory.

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  3. Anonymous
    2014-06-30T12:20:48+00:00

    Thank you Geoffc1!  Yes!  It is these types of situations where folks that are using this for work will want to use the camera and with the integration with OneNote COULD become a very powerful and necessary part of their jobs. But MS has missed the mark and it falls short of being able to use the Surface Pro 3 in that way. I hope MS is monitoring this and will make the necessary changes sooner than later.  I'm assuming these could be software-related fixes and not hardware?

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