The Pandigital PAN7000DW 7" digital photo frame is the best digital photo frame I've found yet. I've purchased 4 other models in different sizes from Axion, Phillps, Smartparts, and Opteka. All of these others had various issues (16x9 when I wanted 4x3, didn't always start picture show automatically, buggy software).
The PAN7000DW is reasonably priced (about $65 from Amazon as of 11/9/2009) as compared to the Sony models which are all much more expensive.
The PAN7000DW display is excellent -- showing 800x600 pictures crisply and vividly. The software is very good with a reasonable user interface and useful options. I like displaying my photos using their original dimensions (the optimized view attempts to maximize the amount of display used but will chop off edges to accomplish this) - you can pick the view mode you want.
The frame accurately shows the EXIF photo date/time if you want to display it. It will also optionally show the current time. It has a nice calendar w/ picture view as well as the normal full frame photo view. And it seems to show ALL your photos eventually (I had a strange problem with an Opteka frame not showing all the photos, only a subset). The remote is small and is held on the back of the frame by a magnet. The remote works well (some remotes I've used have buttons that are hard to press or control). The menu structure (frame software) is logical and well arranged.
The clock functionality and auto turn on/off functionality is useful if you have power available to your frame at all times. However, I've hooked my frame up to a motion sensing power strip in my office and the time/date gets whacked when the sensor shuts off for the weekend (the time/date seem to survive for a few minutes or hours without power but not over a weekend). So if you use your frame with a motion sensing powerstrip, forget using the clock/calendar feature.
As I've discovered with many photo frames, if you want to display pictures in a particular order, they must exist in flash memory written down in that order - this is not a visible ordering - it does not depend on file name or file creation time. If you start with a totally empty flash card (or internal frame memory) then it will be the order in which the files are copied to the memory device. Macintosh and Windows file copy routines are the fastest way to copy files but the order in which copying takes place is not under your control if you move a large number of files all at the same time - the operating system parallelizes the copying for speed but this places the pictures in different physical memory order. It is too bad that most photo frames do not allow you to display in creation date order or EXIF date order or even file name order.
The best way to lay down the photos in sequence is to start with an empty flash device. Then copy the files either one by one by hand or using an automated method that copies files only one at a time. A cmd file on Windows that can do this is like:
-------
dir /b /od>c:\junk.txt
for /f "delims=*" %%i in (c:\junk.txt) do copy "%%i" f:\
-------
[...] (you need to change this script to fit your exact situation)
Alternatively you can use Photoshop Elements or some other photo management tool to export photos in sequence directly to a memory card or your picture frame.
Hopefully future photo frames will become a bit more intelligent and allow you to pick your display order.
Overall I've found the PAN7000DW to be a good value and to work as you would expect. Pandigital PAN7000DW 7-Inch Digital Picture Frame (Black)
I bought the Pandigital PAN7000DW so that I could load it up with pictures and videos of my new son and send it to my grandmother. After a few hours dealing with it (I'm very experienced with computers and electronic gadgets), here's my take:
- I like the look of the frame (classic looking) and the screen is bright and crisp.
- I could not get any video files to work. The documentation says it plays motion jpeg AVIs, and I tried many conversion options on my Mac using MPEG Streamclip and could not get it to work.
- Navigating the menus is a pain using the built-in buttons, so at first glance you're glad they included a remote...except the remote only registers about every 3rd button click, so you're constantly over clicking.
- The UI is pretty slow and lags your button presses.
All that said, it'll do what I want it to do. I've loaded it with 223 pictures at 1280x720 resolution, and it only takes up 34MB of the 1GB internal memory.
Right after I purchased a digital picture frame (about to become my Mom's 90th birthday present), the Pandigital PAN7000DW 7-Inch Digital Picture Frame (Black), I found an offer from Amazon Vine for a similar item, Smartparts SP72 7-Inch Digital Picture Wood Frame with Beige Matting (Espresso). Oh well -- it gave me the opportunity to compare-and-contrast the two frames (which are similarly priced). *I* didn't know which of these gizmos was best for the purpose, and I dare say you're just as unsure, so maybe my experience can help you.
The short summary: both these frames do what they claim to: They display your photos. But neither of them will give you a heartwarming feeling. The ideas are sound; the implementation kind of stinks. Perhaps more-expensive units have a better user interface, but these two frames are somewhat disappointing.
Let's start with the positives. The picture frames both have a 7" display, which is big enough for sitting on a desk or coffee table, and the displays are bright and clear. You do need a power cable, which might limit where you set up the frame; I can't see hanging them on a wall. The wood frame on the Smartparts is slightly nicer than the Pandigital, but both are reasonably attractive. The basic setup is extremely simple: stuff an SD memory card into the frame and turn it on.
A 2GB card holds 1000+ photos, depending on image resolution. That's a LOT of pictures, even when putting together a huge "this is your life" collection as we did for Mom. I bought a 4GB card along with the Pandigital, which would hold about 5,000 photos, and I could have saved a few bucks.
One thing that isn't clear from the documentation is that you don't HAVE to use an SD card. Both units have their own on-board memory that lets you add a decent number of pictures. You'll need to use the USB connection to get to that memory (and I never DID figure out how to delete their sample photos, grrr); more on that USB connection in a moment.
The Pandigital frame will also play MP3s, if you like. I didn't explore that feature because (a) my Mom's almost deaf and would never use it and (b) there are probably better options for playing music. The Pandigital can also be used as a clock and calendar, though I'm "eh" on that option myself; perhaps you care.
Other options are more important, I think. The Smartparts frame has an option for showing multiple pictures at a time (photo of mom on the left, then Pop's picture on the right, then fade to a third picture to replace Mom's photo). It really does look good, except that a 7" frame is too small to show most photos in enough detail to bother with this. Depending on how you use the frame, though, this feature could be useful. (Maybe for advertising purposes, such as in a realtor's front window, where the detail is a bit less important?)
Both frames have a USB connection, so you can plug them into your computer (mine's a Mac) and easily transfer JPG files to the frame or to the SD card you already stuffed into it. (That's a good thing, in the case of the Smartparts frame, since the card is a real pain to remove.) On the plus side, it means that I could choose a photo in iPhoto and export directly to the unit. On the downside, the Smartparts USB connection was very flaky; it would disconnect itself randomly -- usually in the middle of a file transfer. I used colorful curse words. You're probably best off to use whichever SD-card reader you already use to connect with your PC.
But truly the worst thing about these frames is a terrible, awful user interface for adjusting settings and for interacting with the unit. Both let you control the slideshow from buttons on the top or back of the unit. The Pandigital's are on top, which is slightly more convenient, but both are hard to read without a bright light nearby. The Pandigital also has a remote which (nicely) has a magnetic spot to hold it to the back of the unit. However, I give Mom about 20 minutes before she manages to lose it; it has the right dimensions to be a dandy cat toy, so I'm not upset that the Smartparts unit (which I'm keeping for myself, in case that's not obvious) doesn't have one. Plus, the remote's controls are sticky enough that it takes a few button-whacks to get the frame's attention.
Anyway, they both work with "OK" and "MENU" sort of buttons, and then up/down/right/left arrows to make selections. But the menu design is so poor that it's never clear when you want a right-arrow or a down one. (I never did get the clock set correctly on the Pandigital. Perhaps more detail was in its documentation, but I can't tell you. Other than a "getting started" flyer, the doc is on one of those tiny mini-discs which I feared would disappear into the maw of my iMac's drive. The Smartparts printed documentation is a little more extensive, but not much; a missing CD promised a Windows app, but I wasn't going to use it anyhow.)
Please note that you WILL need to mess with the settings. For one thing, the Smartparts frame seems to need to be told EVERY TIME to show pictures from the SD Card rather than from its own memory. The default time selection to show each photo (5 seconds) is probably too fast for what you prefer, one both units. (The Smartparts has slow/regular/fast; the Pandigital unit has specific time measurements, ranging from 5 seconds to one day.) Most irritatingly, both frames assume you want to choose the "optimal" display setting (well it does SOUND like what you want, right?). However, that actually means, "Make sure the photo touches the right-and-left edges of the frame, even if it means I chop off the heads of the people in the picture." The Pandigital unit automatically shifts the photo display based on whether you arrange it narrow side up or wide side up, but I can't see moving it around that much.
Despite our trained expectation of 5x7 photos, I came to the conclusion that these gizmos ought to be square to accommodate both horizontal and vertical photos. In reality, if I were to get serious about displaying the photos, I'd crop the images to make them get along with the gizmos' formatting; I wasn't about to do that with the 850 images I set up for Mom.
Bottom line: Both of these digital picture frames will get the job done. One isn't significantly better than the other, so I can't tell you to choose the Pandigital over the Smartparts or vice versa. No matter which you choose, though, expect to spend some time cussing before you finish with the setup. - Pandigital - Pandigital Photo Frame - Digital Picture Frame - Digital Frame'
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