Mouth of the Amazon

12/15/05



I don’t visit Amazon.com all that often, but occasionally I pass by in the search for something I absolutely can’t do without such as a battery operated cock-warmer or seasonal whisky cozy. The reviews are decidedly the best part of this site and not because most of them are useful, by and large they are, but because of the slightly rarer instance in which you will be subjected to the frighteningly obvious fact that what you’re reading is propagandized horse apples written by someone with a vested interest in the product. I stumbled across this gem today concerning a digital picture frame, (it’s like a framed display screen for uploading and showing digital photos.) If you can’t imagine what kind of product I could be talking about you probably rate the accessing the internet as something akin to filleting the skin off small orphans, so I’m safe in assuming you aren’t reading this.

At any rate, upon first sight this particular brand appears to have the customer approval rating of raw sewage; one and a half stars. The first review here is pretty indicative of the theme of all of them, so you can skip the other three if you like; I merely included them for some verisimilitude. Everyone heretofore in the reviews seems to agree that they’d rather have someone toss live anthrax into their face than give or receive this item, that is, until you get to the last review. Up until that point everyone had given the product one out of five stars and this one crops up with a whopping five for five!

My personal comments are in italics on the last review which hilariously reads almost like a catalogue and was clearly submitted by some douche-bag working for the company which produces this steaming pile of techno-shit.



Customer Reviews

Very poor quality pictures, December 10, 2003
Reviewer:
Geoff Ables (Charlotte, NC) - See all my reviews


Your photos will look awful in this frame. Nothing even close to what you would see on your computer monitor (LCD panel or tube). Nothing even close to what they show on their advertising of this frame either.

The resolution is 800x600, but the pictures all looks "blocky." Even when using photo software to sample the photo down to 800x600 and previewing it on my PC, it still looks blocky.

Also, the edges of the picture tend to "wash out" and be brighter than the rest of the photo. You can adjust the brightness, but then the center of the picture is too dark and the edges still look whitewashed.

Their tag line is "easier than putting a picture into a frame." Maybe. But nothing close to the quality of printing a picture or looking at it on your computer.

We got this for my parents for Christmas. We'll be returning it and getting them something else.




32 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

Very Poor Quality, August 21, 2003
Reviewer:
H. Isenberg (Los Angeles, California United States) - See all my reviews

Picture quality is extremely disappointing. It must be using 8-bit color. In 16-bit color (found on most computers) pictures look very good. I wouldn't waste my money on this product for pictures. If you want to use it as a sign with directions or just messages, it would be fine. But anything else....well, just forget it.




12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

Poor Viewing Quality, March 1, 2004
Reviewer: A customer

This digital frame has perpendicular horizontal and vertical viewing angle. If you are not looking straight on at the frame you cannot see the picture. The contrast is also very harsh. Its shades of black are minimal so if any of your pictures have varying shades of black they will all blend together. So no night shots or shadows. Remember when laptops first hit the market you had to be right in front of the LCD panel to see the screen. This is what it is like using the Digital Picture Frame




13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

Digital frame, January 2, 2004
Reviewer: A customer

I have previously owned a Dig[[iframe]] frame that was pretty high end and very small so I tried this Digital Frame. The controls are not well explained and the photo quality is poor. There is a MAJOR blue hue to all photos. The photo quality is much better with Dig[[iframe]] but the cost is almost twice as much. I would not recommend this frame, and when searching for digital frames, make sure that there are controls to "tweek" the color and brightness. good luck!




Here’s the good one!

Best Value Digital Frame available today, December 11, 2003
Reviewer: A customer –This is the first in a riotous string of lies.

This Digital Frame (DFP-104) is the best value digital picture frame available in the market at this time.

It is also the simplest to use to display and manage digital images since it works directly from SmartMedia and
CompactFlash media cards. No USB download from a PC or camera, which can be an excruciatingly tedious procedure
for other digital frames. --If you’re a quadriplegic without the service of one of those creepy “helper” monkeys.

Menu button functions are simple, quick acting and easy to figure out.

While is it extremely simple to transfer images into this frame, it is important to remember that owning a digital camera
does not make every picture a perfect shot. All images need to be retouched, cropped, brighten, saturation boosted, or
have other retouches done in a PC before being loaded into a digital frame, if anyone is to expect good display images.

Clearly this satisfied customer is illustrating the fact that every digital photo inherently look like snapshots taking from inside a coffee can.

Picture quality is on par with other frames (24-bit color) even though viewing angle is not as wide as with TFT screens, but
in practical use this proves not to matter as almost everyone views any display from in front anyway. --In a museum.

Resolution is
800x600 so imagery is not the same as on a big PC screen, but then a 17" 1024x768 digital picture frame costs $2,500.
This frame will not fix bad photography, but it won't hurt it either. Bad images are usually the result of "pilot error", not hardware.

It’s not the designer or engineer’s fault, you just take shitty pictures. Maybe you’d prefer a ball-and-cup game instead of a digital camera since you’re such an insufferable moron. Also, a bit grandiose to call it “pilot error,” isn’t it? Sort of implies hundreds of people will be smashing into the ground at hundreds of miles per hour because you can’t use the point-and-click function on your camera.

We have checked out all digital picture frames available at this time, and find this unit to be the easiest to use and most
certainly the best value in any size now available for sale.


Translation: Please stop saying bad things about our product. It’s not nice to be so truthful.