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My husband and I bought two of these as valentine gifts for each other. We are very satisfied with the resolution, clarity, color, and the size of the internal memory (256 mb). We used the USB cord to connect directly to our computer in order to transfer files.
We edited the size of our pictures so that they matched the 800×600 pixel resolution (versus the 7 megapixel original images). The remote works well, but only a few of the features are available on this model.
As for the battery life – between 1 and 2 hours is the best we have seen. Not enough to make this feature very useful. Someday you should be able to hang a big 15? digital frame on the wall and only have to change batteries once a year or so. Sadly, given the power gulping state of these frames now, that does not seem to be a near-term possiblity.
The size (8-inch diagonal) and angle of the frame are perfect for sitting on a desk where your eye is above the frame. If you place it on a shelf above eye level, it could be difficult to see (basically due to the viewing angle limitation of most LCD screens).
Once quirk of the frame is that the power button needs only a very quick tap to turn the unit on. If you press it longer than about a second, it will not turn on.
Compared to the rest of the field the $79.00 price was very competive. We both would recommend it.
Rating: 4 / 5
The Toshiba Journe Air 801 digital photo frame from Toshiba is an ambitious product that strives to show what’s possible within this nascent gadget genre. So does it deliver? Or leave us with the frustrations of the early adopter? Read our Toshiba Journe Air 801 review now and we’ll tell all.
Its 8.4-inch, 800×600 screen is bright, and the viewing angle of 65 degrees from above and either side (45 degrees from below) is well suited for viewing on a shelf or with friends on the couch – the rechargeable battery can power the frame for just under an hour. But picture detail seems even worse than the 400:1 contrast ratio would suggest and colour reproduction is atrocious – dithering was evident in all content we viewed. Despite the surprisingly clear internal speaker, the unacceptable picture quality precludes even attempting to play videos on this device.
The clumsy interface on the Toshiba Journe Air 801 doesn’t help matters, resembling a 1990s era BIOS in appearance and an unintuitive arrangement of touch-sensitive buttons making navigation and text input a chore – it took us three minutes to enter an email address to sign in to Picasa.
Read our LightSleeper review now
Read our SmartControl universal remote control review now
Frustratingly, we had to input our details quite often as integration with Picasa and Flickr is buggy and half-baked. We had to create a brand new Flickr account just to get the device to recognise the Photostream, and photos must be publicly available to be imported, which not all users will be comfortable with. Pulling photos from online services is a manual (and with the slow interface, laborious) process requiring you to individually select the new photos you’d like transferred to internal memory, SD card or attached USB storage.
This could have been done so much better: with support for up to 32 Flickr or Picasa accounts, automatic synchronisation on the Toshiba Journe Air 801 would have enabled this device to surprise you with new photos as friends and family uploaded them. Sigh.
In theory, the Subview feature allows you to connect the Journe Air 801 to a Windows PC for use as a second monitor, but why you’d want to use an 800×600, low colour device to display content – when a far superior screen is likely right in front of you – is beyond us. If this feature functioned over WiFi, we’d see the point. Sigh again.
However, we were impressed with the bundled 3D Albums software, which pre-renders your photos as a stylish MPEG video that can then be transferred to the digital frame. The included themes – which show photos on pages turning in a book or as pictures hanging in a gallery – are an easy way to really show off your shots. At least, they would be if the rest of the Toshiba Journe Air 801 wasn’t such a shambles.
Have you noticed that almost no one is using a 35mm camera to take pictures anymore? Even trying to find film for it is becoming harder and harder. With more people switching to digital cameras for the ease of “point and shoot” picture taking, the next step for users will be to purchase digital photo frames to go with the digital pictures.
The beautiful parts about these products are the following facts:
1. Be green by lessening the amount of paper waste you produce every year by not printing the photos you don’t need.
2. You can do as much or as little editing with your photos as you like before displaying them in your digital frames. Most frames now accept popular camera media so you can simply remove the card from your camera, put it right into your frame, and start enjoying the memories right away.
3. Wouldn’t it be great not be limited to displaying only one photo at a time, but rather have access to hundreds of photos in a single frame? Digital frames effortlessly display all of your photos as a slide show with several transitional effects to choose from.
4. Load up your favorite songs and have them play as a musical tribute to your memories.
Now what are you going to do with all of those home movies you have shot over the years? Would you be excited to know that you can also take those home movies, put them onto a memory card and enjoy them on your digital photo frame as well? It’s true most frames not only display photos but also play music and movies. So now you can enjoy those memories anywhere you wish and no longer have to fumble for the connector cables, or trying to figure out how to setup your computer /television to enjoy those memories again and again.
Go ahead and take a look at these products and you’ll agree that these frames are going to become the mainstream solution for displaying all your photos as we further progress toward a truly digital age – not just for data, but for our memories as well.