FutureFive New Zealand - Consumer technology news & reviews from the future
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Hands-on review: Jabra GN PanaCast 20 webcam
Mon, 11th Apr 2022
FYI, this story is more than a year old

Don't fall into the trap of thinking that all webcams are the same.

This Danish-designed webcam is in a different league. From the moment you open the box, you feel it is a sturdy metal design.

It comes in jet black and clips to the top of your laptop screen or display. You can purchase a table stand additionally if needed.

It's also tiny and comes with a travel bag for the road warriors amongst us.

The device has USB-C on it and includes a USB-C to USB-A cable. So you may need to purchase a USB-C to USB-C cable depending upon your setup.

It has a 13-megapixel camera, which allows you to capture 4K quality video. Built-in is a privacy screen that can be pulled across the camera when not in use.

You can set the camera to 4K Ultra-HD, 1080p or 720p resolutions, all at 30 frames per second (fps).

These days more and more artificial intelligence (AI) is used in live streams and video conferences. For example, automatically blurring your background when working from home. However, most of that AI processing is done on your computer or in the cloud.

The PanaCast 20 is different, it uses AI, but it's on a chip inside the Webcam itself. This means the raw footage isn't uploaded to the cloud and then processed before it even enters your computer or goes up to the cloud.

The AI can intelligently optimise the lighting levels or even continuously scan and adjust the zoom, so you're always in the centre of the frame.

At the 720p resolution, you can zoom 3x without loss.

The unit's picture-in-picture mode is something unique. It enables you to share a close-up as your main image while continuing to present it in a smaller window. This is possible thanks to the advanced chips and processors built-in. They combine two real-time video streams into one.

Three microphones are built-in (which isn't the case for all webcams).

Support is included for all leading unified communications platforms, and it's certified for Zoom - Microsoft teams environments. We used it without any issues with Google Meet. What's more, picture-in-picture mode works with any video platform, even if they don't support dual-stream devices.

You can feel confident with the Jabra PanaCast 20. It's a premium webcam made to the highest standards, with advanced AI and excellent quality video.