What is the best electronic photo frame for 2021?
Pix-Star 10 & 15-inch electronic photo frame is one of the most robust and versatile frames of 2021. With an extensive and comprehensive feature set and performance to match, Pix-Star’s frame’s set themselves apart from the pack. You get Wi-Fi connectivity, free-for-life cloud storage, an elderly-friendly interface, and a mobile app & web interface.
Pix-Star’s electronic photo frames can be controlled remotely from anywhere in the world via the web interface. It’s an excellent feature for controlling several frames in the family – and making sure your grandparents don’t get overwhelmed.
The Pix-Star Snap mobile app lets you send photos to any Pix-Star frame via their unique and dedicated email address. You can send up to 250 photos to multiple photos at the same time. Photos can be captured either inside the app, or selected from your phone’s gallery/explorer. Video can be selected from the gallery and sent directly to your frame.
Perhaps Pix-Star’s most versatile feature is the web album support. Web albums are photo albums on your Facebook, Instagram, Google Photos account, etc. Pix-Star’s electronic digital frames let you link and sync those photos directly to your frame for viewing. Web albums are saved to your frame’s internal storage and can be viewed offline.
The whole web album linking and syncing process is done through the web interface. It’s a quick and straightforward process and lets you link from Facebook, Instagram, Google Photo & Drive, Dropbox, Flickr, and more. Whenever you add new photos to a linked album, you can set the frame to automatically update and download the new photos – making sure that all connected frames get your latest photos.
Web albums are excellent because of how easy to process is and how automated updates are. You just need to link a web album once and it’ll be automatically updated thereafter. It’s fantastic for elderly users and big families as almost no input is required other than uploading the photos to the linked album.
On top of all this functionality, Pix-Star still offers multimedia support, weather updates, games, web radio & music, and more. The display is clear and sharp with a broad viewing angle for bigger rooms. Pix-Star’s frames also use a handy 4:3 aspect ratio that perfectly matches most of the photos taken on smartphones and point-and-shoot cameras. This means you don’t need to worry about black bars around photos – or any unnecessary cropping, distortion, or zooming.
How do electronic photo frames work?
Most electronic photo frames have either Wi-Fi capabilities or a USB/SD card slot to receive and play photos. In many cases (as with the Pix-Star), you get Wi-Fi, cloud, and USB/SD card support. Sending photos to the frame by USB/SD card doesn’t require any Wi-Fi connection – so it’s a great offline choice.
Sending photos over Wi-Fi or via the cloud is usually done through email, a mobile app, or the web interface. Note that the options available vary greatly between brands and models, with more premium brands offering multiple ways to send photos to your frame.
Internal storage is important for the operation of an electronic photo frame. Without internal storage, you have to either rely completely on cloud storage (which in turn relies on good Wi-Fi) – or on leaving the USB/SD card inserted all the time. Many premium digital photo frames use >4GB of internal storage to keep all of the frame’s photos, videos, and audio files.
All of these stored or received photos can then be displayed in slideshows via the frame’s digital display. You can often change slideshow settings like speed, transition style, play order, etc. Note that controlling the play order, selection, and frequency are usually limited to just a handful of the top electronic frames like the Pix-Star.
Is Wi-Fi an important electronic photo frame feature?
Wi-Fi is an essential feature if more than one person is going to be using the frame. It’s also essential if you want to send photos and other media to the frame without needing to be there in person. Without Wi-Fi, the only way to send photos to the frame would be by USB/SD card.
With frames like the Pix-Star, Wi-Fi enables the full use of cloud storage and lets you control your frame remotely from anywhere in the world. Here you can change settings, start slideshows, create folders & albums, and adjust slideshow and color settings. This isn’t a feature offered on most electronic frames – but can be crucial for bigger families and elderly users.
How to start slideshows on the Pix-Star electronic photo frame?
You can start a slideshow directly from the Pix-Star frame’s home page. Simply select the “Play all the frame’s pictures” panel and press “ok”. This starts with a slideshow containing all the photos saved to the frame’s internal storage (but still applies your slideshow settings).
Pix-Star lets you manage the play order, frequency, speed, and style of slideshows effortlessly without leaving the slideshow. You can even choose to play photos and videos from the past “x” number of days more frequently (or exclusively).
Alternatively, you can play slideshows from specific sources, folders, or albums by going into the “My pictures, videos, and messages” panel from the home screen. Here you can select multiple folders to include in the slideshow. You can even create new folders and move photos into them to create customized and tailored playlists for slideshows.
Can an electronic photo frame play videos and audio?
Video and audio playback support isn’t a universally offered feature. It’s usually limited to a couple of the best digital photo frames – and is often locked behind a subscription paywall. For example, Skylight frames require an active “Skylight Plus” subscription to send and play videos on the frame. Nixplay has a similar subscription that increases video playback maximum length from 15-seconds to 1-minute.
There are some rare options like the Pix-Star frame that let you play 2-minute video clips (more than almost all other premium digital photo frames) with or without their audio. You also don’t need to pay for sending videos to the Pix-Star frame using the mobile app – something that’s not too commonly offered either.
