Kodak EASYSHARE SV-710 Digital Picture Frame - Digital photo frame - 7"

Author's product rating:   

Display quality
Range & Quality of Features
Durability
Ease of Use
Value for Money

Advantages:	Great picture quality  -  everone can see
Disadvantages:	None

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

I’m sure I am like most people, I take loads of photographs with my digital camera, I might have a look at the photos through the view finder at the back of the camera, I might even run a quick slide show on my PC. However when I comes to showing friends & family the photos, it never seems to happen, mainly because it is too mush hassle to boot up the PC, run the slide show, and pass the PC around for people to see.

Well I have just remedied that situation!

*** What is it? ***

I have just bought a Kodak Easyshare SV710 Digital Picture Frame

A digital picture frame is just what it says, you load up your favourite photos, and leave it running, all can see and admire your latest creations. It is however much more that that, you can play videos through it, also you can play MP3 music files, so you can add a sound track to your slideshow!!

*** Where did I get it? ***

I first saw these when I was working in Germany, and remember thinking what a good idea, I didn’t buy one, as the transformer was built into the plug, which meant I would to have done a bit of a Heath Robinson conversion.
Move forward 2 months, I decided to visit PC World, and to my surprise they had the Kodak Easyshare SV710 at a sale price. The normal price was £159.99, but the one I bought was £69.99

*** Opening the box ***

Once I got it home, into the box I went. The whole thing was really well packed, and apart from some small plastic bags the packing was all recyclable!
So it the box you get
The digital picture frame, a manual (the first 16 pages are English!), a CD, the mains lead, a USB lead, and a remote control unit, which is about the size of a credit card and a little holder you fit at the back of the frame to hold the remote control.

*** What is it like? ***

Looking at the frame, it is black with chamfered edges, the screen has a protective cover on, which can be removed. The whole thing is about 40mm deep.
Looking at the back, to either side you have the USB ports and the memory device ports. The on/off switch is located bottom right (as you look at it) this is very easy to get to when the picture frame is standing on a cupboard.
There is an integral frame stand, which allows you to stand the unit up, like a traditional picture frame. Located above this are the speakers. The volume control and headphone socket is to the left.

ON the top of the back (if that makes sense) are the controls, this is where you can start or stop things, get to the menu. To be honest, I really don’t think you would be using these controls – unless you misplace the remote control.

All in all the controls and slots for cards etc, are easily accessible.

*** Remote***

The remote control is the main controller for the picture frame, from here you turn the unit on, access the menus, navigate through your pictures or music, and control your video.
Once you access the menu system, everything is very easy, in fact the manual is so easy to follow, just follow it! You can switch between normal viewing, or viewing pictures as thumbnails, you can then use the arrow buttons on the remote to locate the picture you want. You can magnify the image up to 8X, then you can use the arrows to move around the picture.

*** How do you use it? ***

First some features – this is straight from the box! Photo formats supported JPEG, EXIF, Video formats supported MOV, AVI, MPEG1&4, Music formats supported MP3.
Screen size 7 inches Diagonal 16 :9
Resolution 480x234 pixels
It also supports a number of media cards SD, MMC, Memory stick, xD compact flash and microdrive, you can also connect your digital camera direct to the picture frame to run a slide show direct – I’ve not used this, but I can imagine camera batteries wouldn’t last too long!

Also if you want to hook it up to your PC, the PC must be Windows XP or later, with Internet Explorer 6.0 or later, you also need 200Mb of disk space available. Again I have not linked my PC to the frame.

You can have the frame free standing on a desk, or you can wall mount it, horizontally or vertically.

*** KISS - Keep it simple stupid !***

Lets go for the simple option first.
Unpack box, plug in, load SD card (or which ever one you use.) turn it on, use the remote control on/off button, select language (only on the initial startup), sit and watch slide show! And that is about it, the slideshow will start automatically, and plays in a continual loop, with the basic setup (default) the slide transition varies, sometimes they fade out, sometimes they slide out, great fun to watch!

*** Oh it’s getting harder ***

No not because of the videos on it!

Lets really make the thing fly, so I have a 256MB SD card, and a 512MB USB stick.
I downloaded a whole load of jpeg images to the SD card (about 2 or 300), and put that in the picture frame. On the USB stick, I loaded a number of MP3 files.

Turning the Picture frame on the images started to display, so I stopped them (you can of course select the images you want to have displayed, using simple presses of the buttons on the remote.)
On the remote there is a button to switch between Pictures and Music. So I toggled it to music, the menu then asked me for the source, I selected USB, the next choice was “all music” or you could select individual files. I went for “all music”. I then pressed the button to switch back to pictures, started the show, and that was it, a full multimedia experience!! You can of course if you have more time than me, get it all timed perfectly, so you can sync your slideshow with your music – now will impress your friends! The music sounds OK, it is not a top quality super Hi-fi system, but it is acceptable. Both the slideshow and the music loop, so when they finish, the show goes back to the 1st slide.

I added a short video clip to the USB stick, put the stick back into the picture frame, and it played straight away, overriding a slideshow that I had running. The image quality on the video was really good, better I would say than running from my PC, again the sound was OK, good enough to listen to.

Once you get into the settings (home) you can set the time of the picture frame, you can also program when you want it to turn on/off so you could use it as an alarm clock of sorts! You can select “display options” here you can set the slide transition times, the actual transition type, and if you want the frame to display landscape or portrait

Generally I would say that the quality of the slideshows, more importantly the quality of the images being shown was very good. So much so that I will always use this for display my pictures. I just need to buy a load of 2 GB SD cards now!

*** Software ***

First thing is you can choose to install from the CD, or get a newer version from the web I went for the web install. You then get the option to select the support option you require – I went for the full works, email support, product updates etc. The actual install downloaded about 50-60MB . Once the software has installed (took about 25 minutes for me) you have to restart your PC.
Once you open the software for the first time, it will scan the My Pictures directory, and load these images into the program. The software is basically a picture album, you can create your own albums, link to on-line galleries and so on. You can also burn CD’s from here, just select the images you require, hit BURN, and there you have it, and CD with Photos on!!
On the right hand side of the screen is a “picture tray” here you drag a picture you want to work with, double click on it, this opens a new window, where you can edit the picture, using tools such as red eye reduction, enhancing the picture, creating effects and so on.

I found the software one of those things you could play with for a while, and end up having a fun time!! That said I wouldn’t really use it too much.

You can (on some models) connect your picture frame to a wireless network, and then from your chosen PC and Windows Media Player 11, or even from an account you can set up on-line with Kodak play you slideshows. Personally I don’t use Wireless due to certain security implications, so I cannot vouch for how this would operate. Technically I understand it, but professionally I will not use wireless.

Just a quick note about the location of this on Ciao. I did try to get a separate category for Digital Picture Frames, but at this moment they have to be under portable MP3 players!! They will be moved at a later date – watch this space.

Thanks for reading this, and if you want to share your digital memories with family & friends, you really can’t go wrong with one of these.

Larry