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Nifty Uses for Today's Digital Picture Frames?
The ever-prolific AtariDatacenter asks: "The prices of digital picture frames have dropped dramatically over the past year. And some of the upcoming models are promising things such as MPEG playback, and Ethernet access. Are there any killer uses for the current generation of digital picture frames? How about the next generation?" Of course, before you race out to buy one of these picture frames, be sure to look at the terms of use. Last I checked, some of these things were downright useless without the service and fair-use unfriendly. Have any of you found Digital Picture Frames that were worth the price and that actually let you play with the internals a bit?
I watched a recent show on the Digital Duo where there was a segment about digital picture frames. I did not realize some of them were offering some sort of internet appliance like things. One I recall would try to get headlines, however DD reported that some of the headlines included what was on the Today show (not exactly a headline in the normal sense...)
Another thing to think about, beyond obvious visiable range is input type. If you can have a frame but you have to continue to pay someone to host your pictures, content, whatever you are not only paying for this, but you are possibly relying on them to stay up or you may lose content. I have heard about eth ones where you can serve your own content, however I am the only geek on my block with cat5 running around more than cat hair.
What I want to know, what is the real difference between a $300 digital picture frame, and a low low end $300 color laptop. This search (prices between 0 and 300) I just ran on eBay shows to me several laptops I can stick linux, (or in risk of flamebait) windows and put ontop of the TV where I have family photos now, and just run a slide show of pics on local HD, NFS, MS File Share, samba, ftp, whatever my heart dreams up. What does a magic picture frame get me that one of these laptops doesn't??
Wheeeee