I like this frame a lot, image is large, sharp, clear and bright, very HD looking. Easy to operate. I have about 1900 photos at full resolution loaded onto a 32GB SD card so far. The 1900 photos use about 5GB of memory so it looks like I will be able to get around 14,000 photos on this card. Random playback and continuos looping is good as long as you don't put your photos in a folder in your storage media. Viewing angle is great. This frame is a home run.Very stylish looking too.
You won't be disappointed.
Another issue is the auto on/off functions. You can set it to turn on at a set time, and off again later. I try to conserve energy so this is important to me and I do not want it running when no one is around to see it. It can only run on the same schedule every day though, no weekdays vs. weekends etc, and only one on and off event per day. Other digital picture frames I have seen support more detailed scheduling with the ability to run mornings and evenings but turn off in the middle of the day or use a different schedule on weekends, and this thing has calendar and clock functions so it has the hardware capability they just chose not to make very good use of it.
Returned it. With a firmware update to address these problems, it could be a pretty good product, but I am not keeping it "at risk" as to whether Nix gets off its duff and issues one. Failing to display any recent pictures is kind of an important defect for a product whose entire raison d'etre is displaying pictures.
Wish I could point you to a better frame in this size range, but thus far I have not found one. Ironically, the smaller, less expensive frames (e.g. Pandigital) seem to be much more polished products than the larger ones.I'm actually unimpressed with this unit. And disappointed as well. The picture is quite grainy and I have the correct settings chosen and am using 5mp images that are the same size format as the screen. The remote control takes some effort to use. Have to push buttons multiple times to get the unit to respond. Pictures are ok but appear washed out, and there doesn't seem to be any contrast or brightness controls anywhere. I figured I'd go with the more expensive unit to get a better quality. Ehhhh. I'm unimpressed. I think it's going back. Can buy a whole small tv with a DVD player for what this costs, and just out the pictures on a DVD... Idk. Just unimpressed... Not the quality I expected.
Update 7/30.
Ok after figuring out the kind of cumbersome interface I do have to say the frame now working well. Seems easiest to just load the pictures on an sd card and just leave the card in the frame. And with the "optimum" setting chosen the pictures look really good. This frame definately has a better LCD panel than the cheaper models. It can be seen well from all angles and is nice and bright. And the 4x3 format is much better for photos than the widescreen sizes. I use a mac and found that if you click enhance in the iPhoto software the pictures look much better on the frame. The auto on/off was not working. But it started working once I discovered that in the menus you have to push enter after you make each selection, even though enter does not appear to do anything. And then you have to push exit on the remote for changes to set. So now the auto on/off seems to work. I do like the frame. Still think it was a little pricey. But the picture quality is really very good. If you are worried about your power bill. I measured the amp draw. Running the frame is the same as running a 25 watt light bulb... Would cost a couple dollars a month to run 24 x 7. I did finally find the picture controls. They are on the second screen of the setup screens. Hard to find as there is absolutely no indication in the software that hese is a page 2.Bought this photo frame as a compact way of displaying the 1,000s of images we've collected over the years. The screen display is bright with lovely colors as advertised, though back-lit faces are displayed much darker on the Nix than on my PC monitor. The unit has brightness and contrast controls but I've found it to be more effective to adjust the images on my PC to make sure faces are not in deep shadow.
The frame is constructed well and I very much appreciate that it does not have NIX in big letters on the front like one of the competing models. The instructions for the frame support say to keep pulling it out until it clicks. I never did obtain a click and it does not lock in place and I feel that if I pull on it any harder it will break. Seems cheap to me to have flimsy plastic support without a locking mechanism on one of the more expensive frames on the market. Whenever I move the frame to slide a memory card in or out, I must make sure that the support is extended. I would have gladly paid a couple of extra dollars for a sturdier support to avoid a catastrophic crash. Especially since I live in earthquake country.
The 4GB USB memory card that came with the frame is not recognized by my Dell PC although every other USB flash drive card I've ever inserted into it before and after has been accessible. So the drive that it comes with the frame has been useless for me. Luckily I have a spare SD card that I've loaded up with images for a trial run. I was able to insert the SD card in the Nix unit upside-down which I've never been able to do in any other device. It did not harm the unit but it makes me wonder about build quality.
For my purposes, the primary opportunity for improvement is in the random image selection algorithm. Every time I turn the unit on and put it into the slideshow mode the algorithm seems to start all over again and re-selects the same set of images it started with every other time I've entered the slideshow mode. I would much prefer that it start up where it was when turned off last and display images that have been selected fewer times than other images. I have now seen about 50 of the 900 images on the SD card dozens of times and the rest of them not at all. We do not want to waste energy by leaving the unit running when no one is watching it. This is quite frustrating and something for potential buyers to consider seriously as this is one of those things you just can't know about until you've tried it.
For the transitions between the images in slideshow mode, you can choose None, Random, or any one of a set of transitions to be used constantly. The one we would like to use constantly is the Fade transition. Unfortunately, it is not an elegant fade like every other slideshow software product has. It is better described as pulsating where parts of the new image overlay the existing one in steps. It gives my spouse the heebie-jeebies to look at it. The None option does exactly that and it works fine though it is abrupt. All of the other transitions are gimmicky in an elegant setting.
Sorry I cannot comment on the musicor video-playing functions since I did not purchase the unit for those features.I bought this Nix 15" digital frame as a gift for my mother's 90'th birthday. I've been loading pictures directly into the frame's memory all week. The pics are a variety of landscapes and portraits, some from my own camera card, along with a couple of dozen that were emailed to me from different relatives. Before loading them onto the frame, some had been cropped, but none had been photo shopped. All were JPEG. Also, all of them were taken in a horizontal/landscape camera position except one. I was relieved to find that I didn't have to resize any of them, but the frame did crop off the bottom of the legs of the people in the only verticle picture that I installed. The slide show is the only feature that I've used, but that is why I bought the frame. The sharpness of each picture is great, however, in a few, the colors are brighter than the natural colors. I did try to tone down the brightness (red faces and brighter clothing) using the brightness and contrast features, but it tended to make some of the other pictures look faded. I might be able to refine it more, but I haven't had the time. I'm thrilled with the overall crispness and detail of the pictures and that there are so many choices for timing the slide show (secs, minutes, or hrs between photos).
There are 5 things that I would highly recommend though:
First of all, take all of your pictures using a horizontal (landscape) perspective or try to crop them to that shape. It's possible that you might have better luck getting your vertical pictures to not get cropped by the frame if you use a USB flash drive. Secondly, if you are going to load them directly into the frame's memory, select the order that you want them to be viewed in before loading them onto the frame. If not, you cannot change the order once it's on the frame. You can delete pics or add new ones (which will show up on the end of the slide show), but can't just switch them around for better sequencing. Although, if it's important, you could delete out all of the pictures and reinstall them in the desired order or create a new file with those same pictures in a better sequence. Thirdly, the stand seems a little flimsy considering the wt of the frame. It extends out easily from the back, but when I pick up the frame, even just to move it over a bit on the table, the stand drops back down inside of the frame, leaving the frame unsupported. At first, I barely caught the frame in time because the stand closed up every time I picked it up to move it. This happened several times. I'm planning on stuffing a piece of foam rubber in back to keep the stand fully extended so that my mother won't have this problem. Fourthly, place the frame in a spot that is below eye level from where you'll view it, such as a desk, coffee table, or end table. This is because the frame tilts back, making the photos look dark if you have the it at eye level or higher. Lastly, some of the features on the frame, require you to use the remote control, which at first seemed like it didn't work. It does work however if I try pointing it at different angles to the frame.
This might seem like a lot of issues, but after all of the complaints that I've read about on all sorts of digital frames, I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised at the quality of the pictures and how easy it was to download them onto this frame without any difficulty. Also, for my purposes, it was user friendly. And, it's the ideal gift for my mom --and what's more important than that!!!
Save 35% Off
No comments:
Post a Comment