Focus on the D-Link DCS-1000W Wireless Internet Camera

摘要

One of the Side benefits associated with evaluating hardware is the opportunity to work with some truly outstanding products. The D-Link DCS-1000W wireless Internet camera, the focus of this column, is one such product. If you are familiar with conventional Web cameras your first glance at the DCS-1000W, which is shown in Figure 1, might give you the impression that it is simply a wireless camera similar to the camera shown on some irritating pop-up menu advertisements frequently encountered when surfing the Web. That impression would be far from correct. The DCS-1000W represents a sophisticated network-enabled camera that incorporates a built-in microprocessor and firmware that enables the device to support TCP/IP networking, email, and Web browsers under Windows, UNIX and Macintosh operating environments. As a network device the DCS-1000W can be accessed via either a wired Ethernet IEEE 802.11b or wireless network. Concerning the latter, the D-Link camera incorporates all of the built-in functionality of an IEEE 802.11b wireless LAN client card, supporting ad hoc and infrastructure modes of operation and Web encryption.