Digital Photo Frame Recommendations?

[MarisaSF]

I believe I saw a thread on this recently and if anyone can point me to it, I'd be so grateful! Not sure if it's transferred over from the old BBB yet.

We'd like to load up two digital frames for the two sets of grandparents. Looking to spend about $200 each? We're Costco members and see a bunch there, but not sure what features are good, etc.

TIA!

[MarisaSF]

I've done some research online, but there aren't many reviews and the CR on these frames was from a year ago.

Adding that we have a Mac and I'd like the USB function.

If anyone has a recommendation, I'd love to hear!

[joyful mommy]

Me too! Any reviews and/or suggestions on options, etc. would be helpful.

ETA: We have a PC rather than a Mac and the grandparents are completely baffled by computers. ;)

[MarisaSF]

I read reviews at Consumer Reports, Amazon, Cnet, and Best Buy. I called my friend who had good personal experience with the 8" Westinghouse and 8" Pandigital frames. I just got back from Best Buy with two 8" Westinghouses that I will try to load up tonight. If they are duds, Best Buy has a pretty good "Christmas Return Policy" where I can return to the store before 1/30.

[octmom]

I read reviews at Consumer Reports, Amazon, Cnet, and Best Buy. I called my friend who had good personal experience with the 8" Westinghouse and 8" Pandigital frames. I just got back from Best Buy with two 8" Westinghouses that I will try to load up tonight. If they are duds, Best Buy has a pretty good "Christmas Return Policy" where I can return to the store before 1/30.

Keep us posted! I bought two SmartParts 8-inch frames from Costco.com on Cyber Monday. DH will get one for his office and my parents will get one. I now wish I had bought another for my brother and his wife at the sale price. They took hundreds of photos on their honeymoon in May, so it would be a nice way to enjoy them.

I haven't loaded the SmartParts frames yet, but I played with one and the image quality looked good. It was pretty high resultion-- 800 by ??, IIRC.

[MarisaSF]

Oh lucky you! I would have gotten that one. They were sold out at my local costco, which only had the 15"(?), which looked huge!
If you load it up with photos, let us know what you thought. I'm loading my Westinghouses tonight... if the kiddos cooperate with their bedtimes.

[MamaKath]

DH and I were glancing at these also. We were trying to figure out if you need a memory stick to hold the photos or if the frame actually has a memory. We could not seem to get a clear answer from the boxes, the sales people, or the various websites selling them. What am I missing? I feel so dense at times, lol.

[Aunt to sweet baby boy]

We just got my grandparents the 8" Westinghouse model for Channukah. It was $120 at Best Buy, and is the same price on Amazon. You need a SD card for the photos which is not included. We put about 140 on the card that we happened to have in the house already. They loved it! We loaded the pictures onto the card because my grandparents are not very good with computers but if someone is more technologically savvy I would have given it to them with the card separate.

HTH

[MarisaSF]

I don't know how the threading works on this new board, but responding to MamaKath -- some have "internal memory" and some do not. My Westinghouse has 128MB of internal, so I did not need to buy a card or leave the camera card in there. I am currently loading pics directly from my computer. The frame did not come with a usb cable to upload, but I had one in the house.

It's working well! Photo quality is good, it's fairly easy to use, amd I think it will be a great gift!

[octmom]

The SmartParts frames I bought have some internal memory (I forget how much) and also accept a variety of memory cards. We've got SD and CF cards at home, so I'll probably use those. It also came with a USB cable so that you can hook up the frame to a computer and move things over that way.

[sue_g]

Does anyone know the difference in quality of the 8" PanDigiital vs. the 8" Smartparts spx8? CR rated the Smartparts better, but there was not details in the review and I could not find many reviews online.

[hipmaman]

Can I also tack on my question about digital frames?

What is the hole usually seen at the bottom of some frames? Usually on the matte area like this one http://www.costco.com/Browse/Product.aspx?Prodid=11255650&whse=BC&topnav=&browse=&lang=en-US

Btw, I also heard good things about the Philips frames. Anyone knows?

[octmom]

I suspect it is a sensor for the remote control. Many of the frames seem to come with a remote.