Customer Reviews

Smartparts SP104C 10.4-Inch Digital Picture Frame (Cherry Wood)

5 star:		(24)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(10)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(10)

 

 

Overall: very good picture quality with poor documentation and interface.

Having 1500+ photos to get in the frame, I opted to use the supplied Optipix optimization s/w. This wound up making it difficult to arrange my photos and led to several discoveries about the product.

Experimental Observations:
a. Photos are displayed on the frame from earliest to latest modification date.
b. Photos can be placed in folders on an SD card, folders will be displayed earliest to latest creation date.
c. Optipix S/W handles horiz. pictures well, gets grainy on vert. pix.
d. Internal memory only held about 1000 optimized pix in my case
e. Internal memory access is slow via USB
f. Need to have PC on and USB connected prior to booting frame to be able to delete files on internal memory via USB

In the end, given that I saw 4GB SD cards free after rebate, the internal memory seemed like a waste of time.

I finally settled on the following process for getting photos to display in order using an SD card:

1) Use Optipix for horiz. pix as needed for compression, store on PC.
2) Arrange pix in folders on SD card, being careful create folders in the order I want them displayed (makes it easier to manage groups of photos).
3) Change modification date of photos within folders (e.g. add an "_" to end of file name) to order pix if needed
4) Insert SD card into frame and sit back.

I am pleased enough with the quality of the product to buy a couple more as gifts for the relatives, but I plan to set up the SD cards beforehand so it is plug-n-play for them.

The picture quality and video quality on this frame is excellent, sharp and clear and very impressive. I must say that I could not get the Optipix Pro software to work, maybe its me but I tried everything I could think of with no dice. I ended up dragging and dropping pictures to the internal memory of the frame and that was fast and easy. I will be using some 1 GB SD cards to load photos onto and then using those for slide shows, as that way you can keep the slide shows fresh. The learning curve on this photo frame isn't too bad even though the instruction manual is poor, but contains enough information to let you know how to navigate the menus. The sound quality from the tiny speakers is what you would expect, not great but OK for hearing voices and sounds from a video but not very good for music for slide shows, I didn't even try to add music to the frame. The video's must be in .MOV or .AVI format to work on this frame. My digital camera (Canon SD1000) takes .AVI video files and they work slick on this frame, very clear and smooth at 30 FPS. Just pop in the SD card, navigate with the remote to "Show Video" and then select "SD Card" from the menu and then select which video clip you want to see, very easy once you are familiar with the menu's. All in all I recommend this frame as the picture and video quality is excellent and isn't that the most important thing?

I bought this as a gift. I transferred a friend's lifetime of photos onto an SD card on my PC along with a couple classical tunes from a CD. It was so easy and then all you do is plug in the card, turn on the power, and the photos are displayed in screenshow format with the music in the background. My friend was thrilled that his life in photos (73 years) had been digitized so he could enjoy it with his family. The quality of the frame is excellent and the screen is large enough for everyone in the room to see it. I'm no computer whiz and this was EASY!
I will purchase this product again.

I bought this frame for a gift, but I uploaded 100+ pictures onto it before giving it to my grandparents for Christmas. The upload was easy. The menu is easy. The pictures look great in the slide show. This frame was easier for me to use than the Polaroid frame that I have personally -- I was tempted to give the Polaroid away and keep this one for myself. hee!hee! (except that the cherry colored frame and the matting were not my style...) It looks great for my parents or grandparents house which is a little more traditionally styled.
A couple of negatives - deleting pictures is a bit tedious. It gets done, but I could not find a way to delete more than 1 pic at a time unless I selected the option to delete everything I had uploaded. Also, the pictures won't scroll through randomly -- the order in which you upload is the order of the slide show.

Overall, great frame. Glad I bought it. Would buy it again.

I purchased this frame for my mother who is almost 80 and does not have great eyesight. The photo quality is amazing and I am very pleased with the frame (10.4" size). The set-up took longer than I would have liked and I am pretty tech saavy. I think the best bet in set-up is to upload the software from the frame and add photos to that folder. If you decide that you don't want a particular photo in the group or you want to add a photo you need to add or delete from the folder on your computer and then upload the entire folder again to the frame, this replaces all the photos on the frame with the ones in the folder. It was the only way I could find to add or delete a singe photo, which isn't really a big deal since all the others are still in the folder from the previous update. The brochure could be better detailed in how to set the auto on-off timer, etc. I found using the remote was the best way to set all of the fine details of the frame. Overall I am very pleased and happy with the product and the price.

As a professional Photographer, I am always looking for ways to showcase our work to clients and potentials clients. We use the smartparts frames when we are on location to display our event photography. Clients love to see their photos so quickly and potential clients see photos and then order them quicker. This product works great in situations where we can't use projector screens to display our work. We also give these frames to our high end clients with their favorite photographs. The frames are displayed in lobbies and welcome areas in offices. Portrait clients love the ability to freeze a photo or have the images rotate. Great product.

A beautiful classically designed cherry wood 10.4" (diagonal) picture frame with ivory matte and incredibly easy to use which makes it especially convenient as a gift for seniors. Once the frame is programmed, they simply turn on the switch and pictures appear. Picture quality is clear and sharp and transitions between pics are smooth. OptiPix Pro software is not available for Mac but it does not matter as many other photo programs can reduce the size of your originals and you can click and drag pics onto the digital frame icon and create separate folders so your pics will show in batch sequences. Also, frame accepts SD camera cards so you can send additional photos for your recipient to insert into a slot on the back of the unit and automatically a new set of photos will be displayed. Pull out the card and the original photos are displayed once again. Great for sending photos to a loved one long distance or a senior confined to an assisted living facility or a hospitalized patient. Wonderful gift and was greatly appreciated by my "technologically-challenged" mother. Not only has she been showing it off to all her friends, but she has asked me to create additional cards with scanned pics of her old photos so she can enjoy those too, rather than hauling out her old photo albums all the time. Great gift... all around for any age... and great price!

Bought a cheap 7" digital picture frame last year. Only $45, but no remote, not configurable, not very bright, choked on the 4G SD card... my wife hated it so she gave it away.

Bought her this one for Christmas. She loves it. 10" may have been overkill, but it's gorgeous. You can see the picture details from across the room. Nice and bright. Remote work from 30' away.

We haven't even tried or figured out all the features yet, but based solely on it's display, it was worth the $100.

I ordered 2 of these to give to our parents whe I just got married 5/2/09. They loved them not only can you hook up to any pc there is a slot for every kind of common memory card out there. The picture is Fantastic, bright, and clear ... I don't remember the pixel count or aspect ratio but if you are like me I wanted to know hows the picture when I was reading reviews on these. 5 stars for picture quality. I do not do reviews ever but this is a great deal for a great product so I had to share my 2 cents!

I got this as a replacement for another brand which malfunctioned and was more expensive than the Smartparts. It not only works better, it is less complicated and more intuitive in its operation.