Sony Europe Introduces Two Beautiful Digital Picture Frames

Sony has two new digital picture frames:  the 8-inch DPF-D80 and the 10.2-inch DPF-D100.

The two frames have identical features, among them a 800 x 600 resolution and a 4:3 format.

Both Sony frames can be displayed in either landscape or portrait style; the picture display is auto-correcting.  Both frames support almost any memory card or flash drive, too.

With 256 MP of internal memory, both frames can hold a couple of thousand pictures each, and with memory card or flash drive, even more!

Both Sony digital picture frames will be in stores - in Europe, that is - by October.  Perhaps the next Sony frame will be wireless; I hope so, anyway!

Sony Introduces Its Newest Wireless Digital Picture Frame: the VAIO CP1

Just yesterday, Sony introduced its newest wireless digital picture frame, the VAIO(R) CP1 Wi-Fi photo frame.

What will the wi-fi technology in this frame do for you?  Plenty!

A wireless digital frame can stream photographs, videos, music, and anything with an RSS feed directly from your computer to your picture frame.

Xavier Lauwaert, product manager for VAIO product marketing at Sony, says, “How many times have you uploaded images to your PC - vowing to share them - never to see them again?  this new frame provides an easy way to retrieve and share these precious memories that otherwise would have been forgotten.”

Sony’s newest wi-fi digital frame can connect to Google and Picasa, allowing you to view any or all of the pictures you’ve stored there.

Besides all the magical wireless capabilities, the Sony VAIO CP1 can also display images from most memory sticks or SD cards, and if you have a digital SLR camera, you can use your CompactFlash(R) media card.

Or, you can just upload up to 100 digital pictures directly to the frame; it’s got 128MB of internal storage.

This frame’s RSS reader will let you view headlines, entertainment, weather, sports scores, and countless other information - in real time - from the internet.

You can listen to your favorite podcasts on this frame, too.

The Sony VAIO CP1 digital photo frame keeps your pictures and slideshows organized, too.  According to the press release on the SunHerald.com website, “Content is grouped into sections called “frames,” making it easy to enjoy photos, information and music.  You can choose from Slideshow - for movie-like presentations, Flow - which creates a slideshow with fun, special-effects, and Dissolve - a more traditional view that fades images into one another.”

The new Sony VAIO CP1 wireless digital photo frame will retail for about $300.00, and will be available in mid-October.

The Wireless Digital Sony PGF-CP1 Frame uses Opera 9.5SDK

The marriage of Sony and Opera promises to be a long-lasting and happy relationship!

“We are delighted to be working with Sony again on this dynamic device,” said Jon von Tetzchner, CEO, Opera Software.  “We admire Sony’s drive to always offer the latest in innovation.  Opera complements Sony’s vision by offering customers with the latest in Web browsing technologies, ensuring the best Internet experience on their devices.”

More, from Sony senior manager Tatsuo Eguchi:  “Opoera is able to meet Sony’s demands for a rich and user-friendly experience.  To ensure more user-friendliness, we needed a superior and full-featured Web browser.  It’s the obvious choice that we select Opera who has proven track record of high performance, compatibility with Websites and intuitive UL.”

What does all of this mean to YOU?  It means that when you buy a Sony VGF-CP1 wireless digital picture frame, you’ve also got a wireless frame with a web browser!

The Sony VGF-CP1 wireless digital picture frame has a seven-inch display (800 x 480), a multicard reader, USB port, 100 MB of internal storage, and an RSS feed reader.  this wireless frame also supports all kinds of picture files, mp3 and wav music files, and will give you the time and the weather.

The Opera-powered Sony wireless frame will allowyou to access Yahoo!, Google, and most other sites.  But there’s more!  Opera’s full browser and RSS reader will enable you an interactive experience like no other.

You’ll be able to “surf” for pictures from most of the leading picture sharing sites on the internet, such as Google and Photozou, Yahoo, Flickr, Picasa, etc.  If this wireless frame proves to be FrameChannel-compatible - as the best wireless frames are - you’ll be able to coordinate all of your pictures from any picture sharing site with your FrameChannel account.  (I LOVE my FrameChannel!)

Bad news, though: right now, this amazing wireless frame is only available in Japan, but stay tuned; it should be available in the States soon.  Cost?  Around $258.00.  Not bad.

This wireless digital photo frame comes in black or white.

China Is Unable To Compete With Taiwan in OEM Digital Photo Frame Orders

From the April 30 DIGITIMES comes this news about OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) digital photo frame orders:

“In view of the estimated global demand for 20 million digital photo frames in 2008, many makers in southern China have offered lower prices to compete with Taiwan-based makers for OEM orders, but their disadvantages in inferior quality and inability to secure supplies of small-sized TFT-LCD panels renders them unattractive to international brand vendors including Phillips, Sony, Toshiba, and ViewSonic, according to industry sources in Taiwan.

Most makers in southern China used to assemble digital music and/or DVD players and thereby are familiar with image processing and modulating technologies, the sources pointed out. AS the technological barriers for stepping into making digital photo frames are not high, makers have quoted prices 5-8% lower than Taiwan-based makers to compete for OEM orders.

However, compared with leading Taiwan-based competitors such as Lead Data, Foxconn (Hon Hai Precision Industry) and Qisda, China-based makers are significantly less competitive in terms of quality, production capacity and ability to procure enough TFT-LCD panels (mainly 7- and 8.9-inch) partly due to competition from low-costs notebook PC’s and handheld devices, the sources analyzed.

Consequently, it will be hard for china-based makers to land OEM orders from leading international vendors for the time being, the sources asserted, and so the makers are currently focusing on winning orders from second-tier and small vendors, white-box brands, as well as retail channels, the sources noted.

Currently, leading Taiwan-based makers each ship 200,000 - 300,000 digital photo frames a month while the average monthly shipment volume for China-based competitors is below 100,000 units, the sources indicated. Of the estimated global demand for 20 million digital photo frames in 2008, Taiwan-based makers may collectively account for as much as 90% of shipments with China-based makers making up the remaining 10%, the sources forecast.”