Pix-Star 10.4 Inch Wi-Fi Cloud Digital Photo Frame FotoConnect XD with Email, Online Providers, iPhone & Android app, DLNA and Motion Sensor Black

Update #3: It's still a favorite! (2018) Three years after purchasing the Pix-Star, it's still working great, and two sets of grandparents comment regularly that they are still enjoying seeing pictures of long-distance grandkids.Update #2 (2015): I bought one of these for one set of grandparents a few years back, and they have LOVED it. So I recently bought another frame for the other set of grandparents. They love theirs as well. This is one of the best gifts I've ever given...both sets of grandparents regularly comment on what a nice gift they have.The frame has very clear resolution. It's nice to be able to e-mail pictures to grandparents directly from my smart phone, or from a Facebook page. There's an option to have the frame on all the time, or to set it up to turn on/off at specific times. (I have both grandparents' frames set to turn on automatically at 7 am and off at 9 pm.) You can determine how long each picture shows, if you want most recent pictures to show up more often, and a lot of other nice features, including the daily weather report. (If they don't have your city, they can add it.)I stated in my original review that the frame was hard to set up. I shared my frustrations with Pix-Star. An hour later I had a thank you and they'd fixed the faulty information on their website. Clearly this is a company that's conscientious about customer service. Pix-Star has obviously worked really hard on setup, because when I set up the 2nd frame in 2015, it was a piece of cake! We were up and running in minutes.Verdict: A perfect gift for long-distance relatives!

Apologies in advance for the lengthy review. I try to be very thorough, especially considering this frame was not inexpensive at $189.99, but entirely worth every cent.Compared to other digital photo frames that have Wi-fi connectivity, the Pix-Star PXT510WR02 10.4 Inch FotoConnect XD Digital Picture Frame is by far the best choice. Kodak had similar offerings, but their frames were either smaller in size or were more expensive. Kodak has since filed for bankruptcy, resulting in their Wi-fi enabled picture frame content management to be transferred to a third party. Since there is no guarantee that the proverbial "plug" might be pulled on the Kodak picture frames at any time, choosing a Wi-fi enable picture frame leaves you with few choices. Enter Pix-Star, with their well-designed 10.4" offering.Right out of the box, it is clear this frame will lead to years of enjoyment. The materials are of good quality. The frame is non-touchscreen, which helps eliminate fingerprints, but in order to keep the face of the frame clean, the navigation buttons were placed on the back of the frame, which takes some serious getting used to. If you decide to mount the frame on the wall, the buttons are inaccessible. For this reason, the supplied remote control that works from across the room is a definite "must". There is a SD card slot on the back of the frame, along with a USB port. (Hint: If you have a spare USB Bluetooth dongle, you can plug it in to the USB port and you've also just made this frame Bluetooth compatible, allowing you to send photos directly and instantly to the frame with a Bluetooth-enabled device.Setup is simple enough. Following the supplied directions was a breeze. The manufacturer's website supplies some Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) and also serves as the content management for your frame. Pictures saved to the frame can be deleted from the frame or from the website. Delete only from the frame and you still have a backup online. Delete only online and still have the picture saved locally on the frame. Check the box to delete from both sources to wipe a picture completely. Upon registering your photo frame with Pix-Star, you create a dedicated e-mail address ([email protected]), which allows you to use your computer (PC or Mac) or your data- or Wi-fi enabled smartphone or tablet to log in to your e-mail provider (Gmail, Yahoo!, Outlook, etc.), attach a picture to it, hit send and in about one minute, the picture arrives at your photo frame, provided it is connected to Wi-fi. In the frame's settings, you can enable the option to show the subject line of the e-mail overlaid on the picture in an unobtrusive fashion, which can help serve as a description of the picture (where/when it was taken or what you were doing). There are three methods to e-mail delivery. Since I am gifting someone who is tech-savvy, I elected to choose the "notify me, then let me decide to save or delete the new picture mail" option. The frame has sound, so it lets you know when there is new mail, along with displaying a "new mail" icon in the top right corner. The other two options are to "automatically save, and inform me of the new picture mail" or "automatically save and don't notify me". I prefer the first option, since it notifies you of the incoming mail, but also allows you to delete the picture immediately. With "SPAM" e-mail as prevalent as it is, you never know who may end up sending random pictures to your or your loved ones' photo frame. Once pictures are received, the frame even has the option to send it to other recipients, without the need for logging in to your account on the website.As an added bonus, this frame also allows Wi-fi streaming of radio stations from numerous countries, all over the world. You can have the radio play in the background while still using the frame to cycle through pictures. Weather information is also an option, although I have not explored it yet. According to the website, it can take several hours for the weather information to update and make its way to your frame, so don't be alarmed if you don't see it right away. I didn't in the about hour I tested the frame before packing it back up to send to the parents.One final note regarding the Wi-fi connectivity. There are some reviews that state the frame has a sub-par radio. I did not have any issues connecting the frame, although it did take uncannily long to connect - literally about 5-6 minutes passed before the icons on the frame's Wi-fi menu changed to active and the frame began receiving e-mails. Attempting to retry entering in the access point (router) password resulted in the same 5-6 minute wait. Since I have a UPS (uninterrupted power supply) backup battery, I was able to test the range of the frame up to approximately 75 feet (outside to the sidewalk) before the frame lost connection. Your results may vary depending on your router's strength. My results were obtained with a WRT610N Linksys router. Once connected, there were zero issues with the photo frame. It took about 30 minutes for all of the radio stations to show up on the frame. Picture mail was immediately received and were consistently received within about a minute each and every time I sent a test picture.Bottom line: A solid choice! There aren't any other true Wi-fi photo frames out there that have as many options as this one, with such a large screen, with a dedicated e-mail address and with great support. There is one other Wi-fi photo frame out there I considered (Ceiva.com), but it required a monthly/yearly membership fee to use the picture mail, etc. option - I prefer paying a bit more on the front end, which pays itself off in just a few months of use. Buy the Pix-Star now and you won't be disappointed.

I wanted a digital picture frame to display my photos. I did a little research, and the frame that I found to be rated the best was the Aluratek ADMPF108F 8-inch Hi-Res Digital Photo Frame. So I purchased it. I was terribly disappointed. The frame did not automatically adjust the picture to fit the frame. Specifically, if the photo was taken in landscape mode, it showed the image in landscape mode, regardless of whether or not the image was vertically correct or not. So, there were quite a few "sideways images" being displayed, and it was just unacceptable.I heard a commercial on radio about a frame that used WiFi to allow for images to be sent directly to the frame, and it piqued my interest. That frame wasn't available on Amazon, so I researched a WiFi enabled frame that was available on Amazon, and found the Pix-Star 10.4 Inch Wi-Fi Cloud Digital Photo Frame FotoConnect XD. I read some reviews that said it was "difficult to set up", but generally speaking, the ratings for the frame were good, so I decided to give it a try. I'm so glad I did!I found the frame setup to be very easy. Albeit it took maybe about a half hour to get all the pictures I wanted onto the frame, but that time was more about going through a lot of images, and selecting which ones I wanted to be shown on the frame. The actual frame setup took no more than five minutes. I was able to log into my iCloud on my pc, and effortlessly transfer all the images I wanted from the cloud directly onto the frame. It could not have been easier. When you set up the account, you are given an email account that you can send pictures directly to.The frame displays every photo correctly, automatically arranging it so it fits the screen. I run the slide show, and the frame has several effects when changing pictures, such as a zoom out old picture, zoom in new, and a fade out old picture, slide in new picture. The day, date, and current time show nicely on the top of the frame, and the frame turns off at the designated time, and back on at the designated time. I am completely satisfied and actually pleased with the functionality of this frame.If you, like me, have a ton of pictures that you would like to transfer from your iPhone, iPad, Facebook, and the cloud to a digital frame that will display them properly, then this frame is for you! While it may cost $100 more than the other "High Rated" frame, it works so much better that I think it's worth every cent!***** Having read my review and viewed the images, I laughed out loud! The images shown below are PRECISELY what the frame DOES NOT DO! The frame would rotate the pictures to show them correctly. The other frame displayed pictures just like the ones below: sideways! ;)