Anyone have a digital picture frame? Comments?

[Spec A!]

Hi, I'm looking to get one as a gift and am wondering if anyone here has any experience with them. There are a jillion and one brands out there and reviews are as always, soooo trustworthy on the interweb. Any feedback you all have on brands, sizes, features, etc would be great. So far here's the one I'm looking at getting:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...specifications

[kenw]

they're like flies on cow poop this year. We got ours awhile back at Kohl's. B&H looks to be a bit pricey, it will be hard to compete with the mass merchandisers (Target, WalMart, Kohl's, etc) now.

Brand names don't mean much, except I've never heard of anyone who liked one made by Westinghouse (seriously: Westinghouse). Ours is a "PanDigital" brand, and no, I had never heard of it before.

resolution would be the single biggest differentiator, as opposed to sheer screen size. A 15" running 800x600 won't look as good as a 13" running 1600x1200. Other decent specs are hard to find, a side-by-side visual is often the only way to compare.

[Spec A!]

Yeah most I've seen have been in the 640x480 range, I figured the higher the better of course.

What size, rez, and price was the one from Kohls if you don't mind my asking?

[Abel]

i bought a 8" frame from best buy made by Insignia which is their house brand. i like it more than all of the other brands they had there at best buy. it was like $120.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....=1207957325100

i like it a lot... best image display i saw there..

[ggeen]

I bought Westinghouse 8" frames for the family this year. They are 800x600 resolution and were about $120 per on Amazon.com.

BTW, Consumer Reports ranked three frame this year as best buys

HP 8"
Westinghouse 8"
Sony DPF-700

[Duffy Pratt]

Some of the frames have internal software that will stretch your image to fit the frame. I had one like that a few years ago, and you had to size the pictures exactly for the frame or they would become distorted. I returned it, and haven't gotten another frame since. So, other than resolution, I would pay some attention to file sizing before making another purchase.

[kenw]

Duffy brings up a good point. Due to memory limits, I found that resizing (including cropping to the exact pixel size of the frame, and to 72dpi) not only avoided the potential for stretching to fit, but also saves memory space.

I also like to not depend on the frame's (probably low end) method of resizing, so I resize in my editor where I can control it a bit more.

Also realize that the frame doesn't autorotate. You'll need to do that before you save and then upload it. It's a minor issue for most of us here but you might be flabergasted at how many "normal" folks that trips up....

unless you take all your pics either landscape or portrait, you CANNOT simply plug in the card and go. Not many of us here would do that, but if you plan to get one for a non-photographer friend/family member, keep that in mind! Be ready to give a few editing lessons on MS Paint or Picasa (rotate, save at the bare minimum) or expect to provide the service ad nauseum....trust me...i know. ;)

[deep_creek]

I was actually looking for one as well. I've found some good deals here, but have not made a choice yet: newegg.com

[Charles Putnam]

Just picked up a Kodak 7" frame for my wife for her BD. Decent image quality. Comes with it's own software and stuff. Supports several media card formats plus USB to download images to the photo frame.

[newtune3]

I have a 7" Phillips but I have real issues with the color rendition. Hue is way off. It has no problem with the sizing, but I only load landscape images. Good luck. Mine was a Xmas present and rated well on epinion. Side by side sounds like the best method though.

[ggeen]

Also realize that the frame doesn't autorotate.

The Westinghouse frame will auto-rotate if the camera's rotation detection was turned on. This is one of the reasons I purchased this particular frame. The other was that the HP was reportedly not compatible with Mac and that is all I have at the house.

[deep_creek]

One other idea i'm toying around with is taking an old laptop and making my own.

You basically disconnect the screen from the body and attach it to the backside with say velcro. You can then build a simple frame, etc... and you have a great digital picture frame with lots of storage and any custom effects you add. You can grab an old laptop for about the same price as a good ready-made digital picture frame.

[kenw]

Originally Posted by deep_creek

One other idea i'm toying around with is taking an old laptop and making my own.

You basically disconnect the screen from the body and attach it to the backside with say velcro. You can then build a simple frame, etc... and you have a great digital picture frame with lots of storage and any custom effects you add. You can grab an old laptop for about the same price as a good ready-made digital picture frame.

other than the dissecting part, I did that for years. (old laptops I gots). Alas, the wife deemed it too clunky looking for public display and it was limited in what applications it could run under w95. Without USB support I had to load everything by PC Card. and the constant spinning hard drive made it noisy and the huge power supply didn't help its looks.

[nancyc]

My husband said not digital frame for me. We can use our TV that is connected to a desktop and display the pictures. So I have a very big (huge) digital frame :)

[Murph]

Thanks, I was looking for something like that as well.

Originally Posted by Abel

i bought a 8" frame from best buy made by Insignia which is their house brand. i like it more than all of the other brands they had there at best buy. it was like $120.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....=1207957325100

i like it a lot... best image display i saw there..