I have been using Webcam Max for quite a bit now to do videos, live streams and the like. I will say it has the best options of any client out there for Windows. With later versions, you can of course quick switch between sources, have as many Picture-in-Picture sources (PIP SOURCES) as you want, or can run. And it has some good, and some silly, effects. With Webcam Max, you can closely emulate the look at a feel of Chris Pirillo’s stream at live.pirillo.com Take a screen grab of a chat widow, and a black bar at the to, and manually input a topic header inside the program.. It is impossible right now to automatically get the topic, as there is no way to get an RSS feed. That is, until the developers incorporate it into the code.

Now, while it is great, it’s also nice that the support people at least look and respond to emails. I posted an idea of using RSS feeds for it, and the support contact was receptive to the idea. It showed that someone was actually looking at the emails and sending out a written statement, not a canned  reply from an automated bot. Another good point is that from inside the main source options, for the Webcam, you can chose any video source that is on your machine. It’s awesome for TV Capture cards, and is what I use when streaming my games from my xbox 360.

Now, with the PIP sources, you can grab part of the screen, useful if you want to incorporate chat into videos or live streams. Besides screen, you can have pictures or a movie playing. It also gives you the option to clear the PIP selection. A drawback to the way it Webcam Max has it now, the PIP settings are not saved, nor can you define one that I have found that will keep the position, size, and location of the source. This is the worst for screen. You must re size the box in the window to get it where you want, and you must move where the screen capture is. Still though, minor annoyance, but nothing that is a major problem to overcome.

Webcam Max does have a a big drawback, and that only being if you are on a weak, single core system. The more PIP soruces and effect you have, the more CPU it takes up. Howver, with most dual core systems, that is not a factor anymore. However, if you are on a decent system that isn’t a few years old, you can download this great peice of software here.